Seems to me, that if you’re a pure-as-the-driven snow virgin until you get married to someone equally as sexually inexperienced and chaste in the eyes of a fundamentalist god, that you have every right, from the vantage point of blissfully bouncing on your sanctimoniously holy and blessed marriage bed, to withhold a lifesaving cancer vaccine from your daughters — and everyone else’s daughters, too.

Let me back up for a second: I just read (in the Kansas City Star) that Bay Area assemblywoman Sally Lieber “has introduced legislation that would require girls to be immunized against HPV before they enter the sixth grade.” It looks like here in California we’re joining the ranks of nine other states (the most recent being D.C., Virginia and Maryland). I had this as one of my top sex stories of 2006 but it looks like it might be a hot one for 2007 as well, especially in light of this snip from last week’s Time article, An STD Vaccine For All Girls?:

“HPV is an increasingly common sexually transmitted disease and one that scientists say is linked to 70% of all cases of cervical cancer. Gardasil, the first vaccine to fight cancer, was approved by the Food and Drug Administration last June. The CDC says the vaccine has been tested, is safe and goes a long way toward preventing the deadly cancer which is estimated to have affected 9,710 women in 2006, killing 3,700.

But not everyone is happy with the move by state legislators to make the vaccines mandatory.

‘I had no idea that this would engender the kind of uproar that it has,’ says Kentucky state Rep. Kathy Stein, a Democrat who this month became the Bluegrass State’s first woman to chair the powerful House Judiciary Committee. ‘Some parents might be cautious before giving a vaccine that is fairly new to a child and I can understand that. But many, many conservative groups — and I won’t say Christian groups, but many of them are — say it is the parents who have a right to decide what happens to [their] children. They argue that if you are good folks who raise your daughter to be chaste and pure until she reaches her marriage bed, she won’t need this.” Link. (See also: More states introduce HPV mandate bills)

And if she’s not, who cares what happens to her. Right?

It’s been a while since I blogged any free galleries from Hegre or New Nude City because I’ve gotten a number of displeased reader responses about how the girls look too thin, like you want to feed them lasagna more than fuck them — and I agree. They’re too thin, they could be waaay sexier if they didn’t have ribs sticking out everywhere. So I’ve held off on the galleries. But… but… this one has a brunette in cute panties, and I have a special lust for see-through panties (I don’t own nearly enough) and I’ve returned to this shoot a few times for my own enjoyment. So here ya go.

This won’t do anything to stop me from getting those emails telling me I have a small penis (oh wait, those are from Jonno), but it’s interesting nonetheless. Snip from the San Jose Mercury News:

“A man faces a sentence of up to 101 years in federal prison after being the first person in the U.S. convicted under a federal anti-spam law, authorities said.

Jeffrey Brett Goodin, 45, of Azusa, was found guilty Friday of running a ‘phishing’ scheme that tricked people into believing they were giving personal information to a legitimate business. Prosecutors said Goodin then used the information to go on a spending spree.” Link (via Digg)

Whoah — I’m Into Clippy is phone sex based on that annoying of all annoying evils, the Microsoft Clippy. It’s over at Phone Sex Pranks, which seems authentic, and slightly offensive to all of us who’d be more likely to jack off to fantasies about killing the ‘office assistant’. And yes — the phone sex worker’s corrections are painful to listen to… but worth it to hear “*sigh* Are you writing a letter, baby?” (Thanks Scott! Also seen @ Gizmodo)

My pal at Masturbate for Peace spotted this contest over on the Viagra website where we’re asked to count the Viagra-branded items in each picture. Big pharma is relentless and with Viagra it’s impossible to come up with entendre-free verbiage to describe this particular type of market penetration. It’s like whoah, suddenly staplers make me think I need a really hard cock. And I just came in for some allergy meds. Weird.

Naturally, the office is sporting a hot, throbbing Mac.

For those who follow the vlogs, and even if you’re as sick of hearing about Amanda Condom as I am, there’s a very informative piece about the Rockteboom ugliness over at the LA Times, They rose like a rocket and crashed with a boom by Richard Rushfield. Only thing I’m wondering is, what’s a “vblog”?

It seems that the labia minora, the delicate hairless inner lips that smile coyly from the edges of the vaginal opening, were once referred to as the nymphae. Mythos, Eros; the nymphs were beautiful and randy nature spirits, and when they weren’t gleefully decorating Pan’s maypole or giggling and jiggling him into satyriasis, they were bound to smile coyly from trees and bodies of water — likely lying around all juicy and sighing and daydreaming about the day someone would eventually invent the Hitachi Magic Wand. One might say that it’s only natural this is where the word nymphomania comes from, though that’s hardly a stretch when you’re alluding to horny maidens who dig trees and fountains, if you get my drift. Reasons to smile, indeed.

At any rate, I’m writing about the smarmy little prostate gland today, and tonight. Smug in his seat within the male urogenital system, he has little to do with nymphs and lots to do with satyrs, and I’m excited to finally get to write about this pleasure zone bad-boy and do him some sexual justice. He’ll have more to do with nymphs when I’m through with him, that’s for sure. (”For this book,” she blogged, with a very coy smile.)

Tired of all the retro-looking boobies on the blog today? Too bad! I’m stuck waiting for the DSL dude to show up and lay some pipe or something, and I just love the sexy squishy natural bodies I keep finding today…

And Retrofap seems to be a fabulous source for videos, galleries, vintage Marilyn nudes, cool spooky vampire women, retro babes of the week…

They are clearly Russ Meyer fans here, at least if you are measuring the boobies in metric tons. So, speaking of Valley of the Dolls tribute porn, pictured is Cynthia Meyers, who was in the epic film, and Retrofap has a nice post on her here. It’s a salve for soothing my porn-weary eyes… Plus, we totally need something to cheer us up after the Voice replaced Rachel Kramer Bussel with sexless, pseudonymous yuppies. The comments here say it all about their *hot* new sex column (via Viviane).

(Retrofap found via Sexornot?)

So neither should you:

* Ze Frank gets all up in that Anshe Chung biz-ness and we see the video Chung’s (nee Graef’s) hubby is calling ‘cyber rape’, to the anger and insult of actual rape survivors worldwide and the discredit of animated penises everywhere. (via Tailrank)

* Do not miss the beauty that is Anna Biller’s Viva. Skip the YouTube trailer and go straight to the source, where you’ll find the trailer plus several laugh-out-loud clips — it’s like Valley of the Dolls on GHB! (image via)

* Also spotted while I was trolling for mainstream porn the other day — Italian dirt bike/motocross porn with Rocco Siffredi! The plot of subtly named Furious Fuckers looks complex and ultra-believable– Rocco helicopters in a delivery of horny babes to a dirt track and everyone has unsafe sex for like four hours straight — but the riding, stunts and (most of) the boobs are real! Seriously, you can’t make this stuff up. I kind of want to see the whole video…

* In case you missed it in the last post — *do not miss* the charming, sweet and seriously sexy erotic short film, Honey and Bunny.

This week’s Chron column, The Rise of Indie Porn? begins,

“It was all undoubtedly an initiation into sex, but I felt like it was addressed to Hannibal Lecter. There were hacked-off feet, seared together from what must have been scorching heat and violent fire, leaving only tiny gaps between them. Horrifying limbless torsos, and genitalia everywhere — lone detached penises, solo vulvas in various states, some with hair and some without, all the ghastly color of dead flesh, all cool to the touch. Surely I had wandered onto the set of ‘Silence of the Porn Stars.’

Or maybe I was standing in the middle of an Adult Video News expo, surrounded by the latest crop of porn star anatomy sex toys. OK, I was, and this was in 2005, but you get the idea: With all the human parts on jiggly, fleshy display in the other parts of the expo that were just as artificial as their molded counterparts, it was easy to feel the disconnect.

Adult Video News is a porn trade magazine whose expo and awards event attracts thousands of people to Las Vegas every year. A variety of media outlets cover the event from every angle imaginable — the Fleshbot.com blog offers the best and most unbiased coverage — and every year the AVN awards show hands out the “porn Oscars” to movies, performers, directors, editors and porn industry personalities deemed worthy of a statuette. For those in the mainstream porn business, it’s a big backslapping event where the same companies and same names win year after year. It is a celebration of itself.” Link.

In response to this column, I have already received two happy emails from both an indy porn filmmaker and Buck Angel; and another email from an irate AVN reviewer/judge. I guess I’m doing my job. While we’re on the topic, also skim the excellent article where New York Times’ David Cay Johnston ponders live action VoD and PPV.

Image: a still from the short indy porn film Honey and Bunny, showing friday night at this weekend’s indy porn film fest CineKink: San Francisco. This is one of the hottest short films I’ve seen in ages — it’s from Coco de Mer and you can watch it in its entirety here.

Hacker Boy continues to surprise me. In many ways, he is the consummate San Francisco gothy hacker boy (thus the accuracy of the name). He is tall and lanky, skinny and pale; always in long sleeves and all-black, with black boots. The only color you’ll see is in his accessories — one of two laptops, each with web 2.0 buzzword-compliant stickers (the only source of color in his ensemble). He detests the sun and dwells in dark wifi zones; anything he drives, he drives too fast. Like any boy in his twenties, he readily eats chocolate for breakfast and one can typically find beer in his refrigerator before edible food, as everything else will be a take-away box with questionable contents.

But he is full of surprises. One that that has really blown me away (after his seemingly unlimited capacity in equal measure for both erotic sadism and deep nurturing), is his astounding knowledge and love of tea, and all the accoutrements of a proper tea experience. It is beyond refined, it is obsessive, and his ability to tell stories and quote prices per pound of the rarest blends on earth stuns me.

It is with serendipitous timing that Thrusti Kicki Grabbi has emailed me, asking me with the most formal and cordial of emails to peep their website. Delightfully, it’s full of sweetly humorous, incredibly naughty tea-time Victoriana. All with an accent of playful male submission, especially evidenced in the Naught-Tea Tea Set (”What a naughty boy is he. He shall have no jam for tea.”) and the Well-Kept Hair Brush (”Over Madame’s knee and bare, spankings for his un-kept hair.”).

So, surveying the still-perfect, five-day-old handprint of bruises on my right forearm from my last session with Hacker Boy, I think it’s about to be tea-time here at the Blogger Bungalow.

No, I’m not in jail for blogging at unsafe speeds; I’m under a pile of work — I’ve been answering questions for two major magazine interviews, have been approached to write for two others (one is shockingly mainstream), am still on the gnarly deadline and have started work on another book… and am trying to rev the cashflow for the long wait until my next royalty check. I’ll be back to normal blogflow tomorrow, and will get back to my podcast by the weekend (I took a little time off).

In the meantime, look at this baby picture I found of myself over the weekend, watch this hilarious project-gone-wrong video by Galacticast (inspired by me — oh Rudy, yum!), and this interesting Fleshbot post, Protect Yourself (And Your Porn) On The Interwebs.

Oh, and does anyone know what kind of phone set this guy’s pants on fire?

* Great sex links over on Boing Boing — as usual, the blog moves so fast, blink and you miss them. I *love* the story Playboy centerfold pranks from the late 1960s — the astronauts had no idea they were carrying cheesecake until they were *on the moon* — so very cool.

* Also, read this chilling post, Teacher faces 40 years for porn in classroom, blames adware. I think we all know what it’s like to work at a company and have a tech problem (often that we know how to fix ourselves) but get no solution until something bad happens. The school’s internet filter license had expired and no one did anything about it — and now she’s going to be sentenced for “four counts of risk of injury to a minor in connection to pornography the students saw on her computer screen”. This proves that we don’t need to fear the government as Orwells’ Big Brother — we *are* Big Brother now.

* Another Boing Boing porny bonus: NPR “Xeni Tech”: Tech and Porn collide in Vegas. Xeni went to AVN and CES (I’m sure she had to autoclave her entire body afterward), and brings back a sweet 3-minute report from the front lines. Her post links to the hands-down best coverage of the expo, proudly done by my cohorts at Fleshbot. I can’t even begin to relate how sad I am that I couldn’t go this year. The book distributor’s bankruptcy has me frozen without income for 6 months, and I’m unable to afford to do work like this. I missed seeing friends and doing weird multimedia coverage (and believe me, I was exclusively invited to cover amazing things in wacked multimedia ways at both conventions, I just don’t have the scratch to do it). I actually hate AVN and the suffocatingly heterosexual, hyped up, crass, stereotype-riddled atmosphere — but I also love being such an outsider there, with a handful of other outsiders. It reminds me of why what I do is important and different, and makes me glad I’ll never fit in. (Additional re: Xeni’s post: I already commented on “Janna Tales” here.)

* One of my other internet homes, SFGate, has a terrific article about Kink.com buying the old government armory here in town. Still, they don’t link… but worth a read.

* A great site to add to your bookmarks if you’re a nerdy sex and tech geek like me: X-Rated Patents. Check out the Lap Dance Liner for men, the Male Genetalia Tanning Bed Shield, and a sure way to avoid those pesky boob wrinkles, the Cleavage Anti-Wrinkle Device.

(Photo by Nikola Tamindzic. Check out the creepy/sexy/great Fleshbot AVN photosets on Flickr: day 1, day 2, and day 3)

It only took them a few months and an “ahem!” email from me tonight to get the Photoboof photos from the Laughing Squid 06 anniversary party online! Such a fun party — much like last night’s EFF Sweet 16 party (here’s my set). At the Laughing Squid party, I got cute in the ‘boof with two boys who hack — yummy boy number one, yummy boy two.

And OMG — hot GETV girl-on-girl ‘boof action!!!!

Update: A concerned Tiny Nibbles reader emails to warn about nudity and lewd behavior in the Photoboof images, specifically:

* These three pages of cock shots.
* This set of testicles.
* An alarming four pages of asses and titties.

You have been warned.

So, as outlined in my last post about AMS bankruptcy, indy pub authors like me won’t be seeing a royalty check until June/July — pretty intense if this is what you live on, like I *did*. I’m not sure how I feel about the latest news delivered via the RE/Search newsletter, snip:

“The Latest at PGW (Fri Jan 12, 2007)

In a conference call yesterday, PGW clients were explained the details of the offer being formulated by Perseus Books Group [to buy PGW]. According to people familiar with the call, the rough outline of the Perseus plan includes an offer to pay 70 cents on the dollar of what clients are owed up to the date of the bankruptcy filing. PGW would continue operating as is for the next six months before clients accepting the Perseus offer would move over to their distribution facility.

One person familiar with industry bankruptcy proceedings explains that this scenario would both take the PGW debts out of the larger AMS creditor pool and potentially contribute some post-petition profits back to that pool as well. From everyone we’ve spoken to thus far, 70 cents on the dollar–particularly if it’s paid out anytime soon–is more than most clients could have hoped for given the circumstances. But other [worse??] offers could still be made.

There was no discussion of what would become of the PGW staff if this scenario is tendered formally and approved by the court and creditors. Perseus declined to comment on both thedetails of the offer and the staff issue. Today the bankruptcy court will hear arguments on whether publishers can reclaim inventory they shipped to AMS anywhere from 45 days prior to the bankruptcy.

PGW has told RE/Search that all accounts are frozen, presumably meaning: 1) no payments for that fall quarter (yet), 2) our books cannot be returned to us from PGW warehouse, 3) we can’t get out of our contract and seek distribution elsewhere (yet). Hmmm…”

/end RE/Search snip

Obviously, us authors, as usual in the MSM publishing world, have no power here. 70 cents on the dollar — then on this, think of the teensy percentage we authors get from publishers — your contract says 7% of sales, then you only get 70% of that, aaaargh… And it looks like publishers are starting to scramble for survival, from merging (like Perseus and Avalon), to copping a feel on the future of digital distribution (it’s cool; they still don’t get it).

For people like me and Rachel, it’s a tough time to be an author.

This week’s Chronicle/Gate column is How To: Seduce A Mac Geek — A Macworld Sex Guide. The mail is coming in hot and heavy, here’s a snip:

Avoid Opening Lines About Intel

Also, don’t jump the gun and start talking about the OS X Tiger Family Pack. This is probably the one time you’ll be able to deliver the nerdiest opening pickup line about your second-generation Shuffle you ever imagined and have it work out for the best. You need to make what they call in science-fiction movies ‘first contact.’ Mars, meet Venus; Harry, meet Sally; Sigourney, meet aliens; Nano, meet dock. Here are a few suggestions:

* Talk about the Moscone Convention Center. Examples: ‘What’s that smell? Isn’t that old Greyhound bus station carpet smell romantic?’ ‘Isn’t the security here great/awful/in violation of my civil rights/apocalyptic?’ ‘Are the bathrooms on 5th or 6th Street? Isn’t there a shuttle?’ ‘I’ve been here for 10 days. Do you know the way out?’
* Talk about the reason you’re there. ‘How long have you been a fan of DRM?’ ‘This is one of my favorite places to get free pens with URLs printed on them. Do you like branded Post-its, too?’ ‘The after-parties here are legendary. Did you hear what happened last year at the O’Reilly booth with the Crisco and a stack of Make magazines?’”

Link.

Bonus @ Laughing Squid: today yesterday someone pranked first goatse on the *entire* Apple store. It’s a fun week here!

Update, reader comment: Adam writes, “*Loved* today’s column, the last line in particular. It kinda reminded me of this.”

I have a friend who just had a baby — I think this might be what she feels like right now. Jokes about backing up the milk truck aside, you have to see the rest of the hooteriffic photo set (via), showing the making of these exquisite topheavy sculptures, in a variety of sizes. Can anyone tell me who the mammary-obsessed artist is?

Update 1.12.07: Great news! Tricia Wang emails me saying, “Hey Violet,
I saw your post on the booby artist and asked my friend to translate the Japanese text.
I reblogged it [above] at Eyebeam. Thanks for posting the boobies!”

This is a truly excellent piece about the Google sex blog breakdown — it certainly has more information about what happened than any other post or article so far, and it puts forth some constructive critical thought about Google’s emerging power issues. Full, excited disclosure: I’m featured throughout the piece, with quotes I’m proud of — and the cute pic of me was taken by Hacker Boy! Don’t miss Mark Glaser’s in-depth post, Digging Deeper - Google Search Snafu Can Have Huge Impact on Niche Blogs.

As reported on Gawker and in my inbox, the spraycan huffing editors at the Village Voice have suddenly axed one of my favorite (and in my opinion, one of the best American) sex columns: Rachel Kramer Bussel’s Lusty Lady. I’ve always been able to count on her column for the latest sex trends, excellent writing, fierce sex-positive and grrrl-positive opinion and — might I say — some damn good sex column competition from the east coast. But no longer, and we should all be very, very sad. The Voice clearly has its head past its prostate. I mean, just read Rachel’s Fucking and Feminism: Blowjobs, Casual Sex and Rape Fantasies are Under Attack to see what a good thing they’re losing.

Here’s the thing: there are not all that many sex columns around the nation, and certainly few with, ahem, balls. To have a writer like Rachel on staff writing about sex is to have something enviable: who she is and what she brings as a writer and culture critic makes her a *valuable property* — especially on the internet, a tool she seriously know how to mix, bake and frost into delicious viral marketing cupcakes that everyone always seems to want. And unlike many other sex column writers (print or web) she knows a fuck of a lot about sex and sex culture (up to the minute), and importantly, she knows how to *talk about it*.

Evidently the Voice doesn’t get a lot of what’s going on here, which is so sadly typical of le MSM. On monday I did a three-hour taped interview with a big technology research and development company: they wanted to see what technology I used, how I used it, and to show them how I move information and ideas on the Internet. The interviewer had a great quote afterward, saying about MSM trying to understand blogs: “It’s like they’re renaissance critics trying to review street art. They’re jealous, and they don’t get it.”

The Voice doesn’t get it. So who will? Who should snap up Rachel for a sex column? Not Playboy or Hustler — tired, yawn. Spin tried to have Joanna Angel do a column, but that lasted a month: maybe Spin could get it right with an *actual sex writer*. Seems to me that one of these men’s or women’s magazines ought to have a real, hip sex writer working for them instead of the usual debutante biddies they have cranking out the same old, same old articles about how the ladies can “get a fella” or the dudes can “get her to [watch porn, blowjob, anal sex, threesome] with you”.

This is a sad day for the rest of us, who loved the Lusty Lady column and looked forward to it. Rachel — let them eat cupcakes.

This is huge news! Last year my article and podcast about unsafe sex toys got a lot of positive attention, and since then there have been more articles and studies about unsafe chemicals in sex toys — particularly phthalates, and those “jelly rubber” toys. I also listed the issue as one of the top ten sex stories of 2006 in my Chronicle column. Now it looks like one of the biggest mainstream sex toy retailers in the business Adam & Eve have decided that indeed customer health is important, and have officially decided to gradually stop carrying sex toys that have phthalates in them. Libby Lynn from Adam and Eve writes me this morning saying,

“PHE/A&E is currently cutting out all sex toys that contain phthalates. This process takes time because a large majority of the products we sell come from China. However, the merchandisers are requiring that all toys be phthalate-free. By mid 2007, PHE companies (Adam & Eve, Better Sex, AdamMale, VideoMail, Video Gold, Temptations Parties, etc) should also be phthalate-free. I am keeping my eye on this as much as I can.”

Kudos to Adam and Eve (and owner Phil Harvey) for taking this bold step in the mainstream toy industry, where typically distributors could give a rat’s ass about the safety and sexual health of their customers. Now we just need to give them a bigger push to stop carrying numbing creams (like Anal Eze) and shrink creams (containing alum). I want to actively pursue this: if you have any information, horror stories, suggestions or relevant links about the evils of Anal Eze and China Shrink Cream, email me — violet at tinynibbles dot com

Update, blog comment: Cory Silverberg at About.com- Sexuality links to this and writes, “This is huge news, as Adam & Eve (and their parent company PHE) carry considerably more weight in the industry than the smaller sex shops that have long complained about phthalates in sex toys, and could be a catalyst for the major manufacturers to turn away from phthalates as well. In addition to their vast mail order empire Adam & Eve has been aggressively trying to expand their franchise operations.

Of course the best laid plans don’t always end well, and we’ll have to wait and see if these good wishes come to fruition. The number of times I’ve read ‘latex free’ and ‘ethically manufactured’ on packaging and marketing material from companies where neither claim were even remotely true, is staggering.”

Update, reader comment:

“I had a horrible experience with those god awful numbing creams once. My girlfriend at the time bought a thing of Anal Eaze and I told her OK, we can try it.

After about a minute I got pins and needles throughout my entire penis, which then extended into my entire groin area. Eventually it went completely numb. Lasted for about 3 hours. I was actually five minutes away from going to the ER because I swear I thought my penis was going to fall off. She felt similar sensations but not as bad or distressing.

Afterwards I went online and looked around for info on what the hell could have caused that, and while I never got an answer and have since heard a similar horror story from a friends who tried the Extended Pleasure condoms and had a similar experience with thinking their penises were a few seconds away from dropping off…”

You know, Gore Vidal has a special place in my heart, not just for his writing but for his outspokenness on many topics. Also — and I know this is shocking — a dear (male) friend of mine had sex with him once, just because he was Gore Vidal. Whoah.

Anyway, the wine is talking for me (Shiraz, Spain, 2003). The reason I’m waxing about Vidal is because thanks to Sean Bonner, I just watched the fake trailer for Gore Vidal’s Caligula and it’s really entertaining. I wish this film had been made.

When the first Caligula movie was made in 1979 starring Malcolm McDowell, Teresa Ann Savoy, Helen Mirren, and Peter O’Toole, the primary scenes were shot and then hardcore sex scenes were shot and added unbeknownst to the big-name actors. It was originally written by Vidal, but Tinto Brass (who made many amazing hardcore sex films) and O’Toole rewrote it, and producer Bob Guccione (Penthouse) wanted more sex. Many of the hardcore sex scenes star Penthouse Pets (and are quite hot, one being a lesbian scene between two female Pets who were real-life lovers). Needless to say, there were lots of lawsuits.

Apparently there was an elaborate fake trailer made for a “remake”, making me wish that these sensibilities would be turned into a real fim. Even watching the outrageous sex and all-orientation debauchery in the non-trailer makes looking at the cast list an endeavor in disbelief: Helen Mirren (so hot), Karen Black, Mila Jovovitch, Benicio Del Toro, Barbara Bouchet, Adrianna Asti… and costumes are by Donatella Versace. (Mila has the fashion dish on it here.)

Watch the video embed after the jump. I still hate YouTube. And warning: only watch up until the end credits — the “bonus” monologue is Courtney Love trying to “act” her way out of a dime bag.

Reader comment: Thomas Roche says, “I would totally have sex with Gore Vidal just because he is Gore Vidal. Who wouldn’t?”

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Bathed in the divine light of the Beautiful One, the iPhone… No video today, but I will shoot some when I go back on Thursday to cause trouble. Fittingly, the supermodel iPhone had Zoolander playing on it (Butterscotch Stallion rides the iPhone!), and the Microsoft Blogger Lounge, despite the free drinks, couldn’t entice bloggers to be seen in Windoze-funded captivity. Check out Apple tattoos, the cutest girl at Macworld, and this cute shot of my new podcasting pal Tajee. Here’s my Macworld 2007 set.

I don’t know how I’m going to make it to June waiting for the iPhone, but that’s about when I should be able to afford it!

Update: Scott has the Macworld 2007 photos to die for…

I’m all set to head down to Macworld (!!!)) and I am totally freaking out over the iPhone — which looks to be my dream device. True mobile blogging, and a Mac compatible handheld — finally!

The keynote is still in progress, and I’m going to go hop a Muni downtown. I’ll update with photos and video in a few hours — in the meantime, sweet reader DZ points us to the Macworld 2007 keynote drinking game… :)

I recently blogged on Fleshbot about The Wiibrator sex hack — but now, this video on YouTube takes the Wii to the forbidden zone (actually, more than one). And hey, those things aren’t *small*… Video embed (and Wii embed, come to think of it) after the jump. (thanks, Scott!)

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* Photo by deconstructed BEAUTY, via sexblo.gs.

* Put your fetish model in a box: galleries at Shark, via the interesting new artphoto/porn gallery site It’s Not About Love, by way of Viviane.

* Jenna Jameon’s erotica and sex tip books? I bet I know how all the scenes end… And I can’t wait to learn how to spit on another girl’s pussy (”like a porn star”!) before I go down on her, because everyone knows how much women love that… But who will *write* them? Snip from Xbiz:

“‘For us, Jenna means sex, and for the mainstream, Jenna means sex, so we wanted to bring Jenna and erotic together, and Jenna and sex education together,’ Sounds Publishing CEO Brian OliverSmith told XBIZ.”

I really want them to bring Jenna together with those concepts as well.

* Ms. Naughty has an *excellent* Porn for Women Retrospective 2006 post up, including new porn magazines for women (please, oh please, more please), and a healthy helping of women + porn stats for the year.

* This is awesome: local, sex-positive online BDSM porn makers Kink.com purchased one of my favorite creepy old buildings in San Francisco, the armory building (built in 1912)! Here’s the article, where it explains that Peter bought it for $14.5 million. Peter explains, “Opposed to previous owners who wanted to change the building’s use, we will be able to use it straight-away for filming.” Indeed. (thanks Chriso!)

We blogged the most recent the Japanese one last year at Fleshbot without really even lifting an eyebrow, but now there is a sex doll brothel in China. Which is pretty eyebrow lifting when you consider how, um, open-minded they are there. Snip from Sex doll brothel = prostitution? (via digg):

“Local media report that the faces of these dolls replicate those of popular actresses / singers. These dolls are said to be of very high quality and can make specific sound in response to various actions and touches. Johns come in to the brothels, pick their “prostitutes” and go into one of the rooms.

There are no laws banning prostituting sex dolls in China (and I bet no where else!) and police have no way to tackle them.” Link.

Update, reader comment: David Thurlow emails me with some very thoughtful comments saying,

“I read your words, listen to your pod casts and appreciate your making the world a generally better place to be. So with coffee in hand and hair still unbrushed I checked my inbox and then hopped over to your sight to see what’s been happening in the tinnynibbles realm.

I was…well…puzzled by the story of the sex doll brothel in China. Puzzlement aside there was an important thought it brought into my head beyond ‘why would someone pay to have sex with a doll?’ You mentioned some surprise over it existing in China at all because of the Chinese government. Well I didn’t know until I was there last summer visiting my wife’s parents but the Chinese government is pretty ok with sex. The attitude is different from the west and I think a bit healthier.

If you go to a Chinese sex shop in Shanghai it will be located on a main street between maybe a shoe store and a candy store. They’ll have big glass windows like any other store. The shop keeperes are well groomed middle aged women with a bit of a maternal vibe. Shops seemed mostly to be broken into 3 sections…one for sexual health, birth control etc, one for sex toys and fun stuff, and one for maternity clothes. ‘Mommy to be’ is buying her maternity clothes the same place she bought her strap on, her nipple clamps and her favorite double headed dildo, and the same place she buys Monostat. Imagine that in our culture.

Also just outside Shanghai there is a sex museum (I’ve read false reports that the government closed it down) and in fact at one public transportation terminal there were 3 temporary museums that contained what were considered to be more or less family oriented exhibits. One was a small sex museum that studied the history of sex in China and ends with some good positive safer sex information.

Not only that, go to any vending machine on any subway and you will find at least two flavors of condoms.

So, those are my words about sex and China. There are some less positive aspects to things sexual as well. Plenty of brothels filled with girls who come from rural areas to find better work. But really I do recommend a visit.”

The Condensed History of Humankind is a nice set of galleries that are providing me with an evening’s distraction. Enjoy.

In my last post I mentioned the Publisher’s Group West bankruptcy issue and linked to the New York Times article about it, the Mediabistro post that provided a little explanation, and the snarky parody site, Radio Free PGW. Then I had a long talk with my publisher on the phone, and realized how serious this all is. For anyone who writes, publishes and reads books. Bottom line: get ready to say goodbye to many indy/small book publishers.

The New York Times article quoted an “anonymous” (um, yeah) publishing executive, stating that “authors and readers were unlikely to be affected by the bankruptcy filing”. Nothing could be further from the truth.

Let me explain, with what I’ve learned tonight. Publishers Group West is the largest book sales and distribution company in the US — it is the distributor that my publisher, Cleis Press, uses and PGW doesn’t just do indies but also their parent company AMS distributes biggies like Random House. Here’s their active list of publishers. PGW was founded as company on their own, and then in 2002 became part of a behemoth book distribution company called Advanced Marketing Services. AMS filed for bankruptcy, and as of December 29, 2006, all assets were frozen and are now held. So even though book sales were terrific last year and PGW (and all the publishers they distribute) had a great year, the book publishers’ money now belongs to the court.

The money, exactly, is from sales months September though December — the most profitable book sales months of the year. This is calculated as roughly a third of most publishers’ yearly income. For those months, publishers like Random House are now out to the tune of $43 million. Imagine what’s going on at all the small book publishers, where $20K is like a million dollars to them. Off the cuff legal advice tonight told me that it may be possible that some publishers *might* see about 70% of those funds by the end of the year, but that it will likely take longer, and making it to that point will be the question. I have now received emails on this topic from friends who run publishing companies who have laid off their entire staff. Happy New Year. Say goodbye to small publishers. Only the big boys are going to make it.

The effect this is about to have on the book culture is gruesome. Many small publishers live month to month as it is, and many bank on the holiday season to make it through the rest of the year. Small and indy publishers are valuable for culture and speech, essential in the face of corporate information distribution and represent the foundations of diversity within communications media. When they start dropping out, you better bet readers will feel it, and notice. Imagine a Good Vibrations with only books from Harper Collins in it, or a world without Cleis Press.

And us authors — well those of us who have chosen the path of indy publishing because it’s something we believe in and (most importantly) can say what we want to, even if the money is small change — we’re fucked. I get royalty payments, as do others: it’s the same calculations, none of us are getting the money from our book sales for the last four months. I pay rent month to month; I have just lost a third of my income, and hope that my publisher will recover. I’m out at least four months of rent, boom. Right now I’m not sure what I’m going to do.

Just what did AMS do to screw everyone over so royally? I’m not sure, but they are a dirty, dirty company. NYT tells us that AMS has “been looking for additional financing or a buyer for the last 18 months”, but in the beginning of December 2006 former AMS vice president of advertising Sandra Miller Christie was sentenced to 3 years in prison for her role in falsifying earnings, a scheme that occurred from 1999-2003. A closer look at AMS and it’s like Enron in there. Two other former AMS employees were sentenced earlier in 2006: Marcy Wilson Roke, the company’s former marketing director, was sentenced in June to five years’ probation, with 12 months to be served in a halfway house; Karyn Ann Larko, the company’s former director of advertising for customer accounts, got five years’ probation and a $2,500 fine. The SEC has been investigating AMS for a while: this litigation release from 2005 states that the investigation (beyond Christie) was continuing.

What the fuck is up with these greedy old ladies? More importantly, what is going to happen to the rest of us? The court has granted PGW permission to resume business, so book sales will continue for all publishers — at least, those who can stay afloat with a huge hole punched in their earnings, cashflow and ability to pay debts. What small publishers need now is survival cashflow for the next few months. So if you want to buy a book, buy it directly from the publisher whenever possible. Cleis Press and I are moving forward on all of our book projects and they feel confident that they can survive. But if you’ve ever loved a Cleis book, have ever wanted one, or appreciate what contribution this indy press has made on the world — from queer culture to sex-ed books to erotica — buy a book from their website this month. Or three — not surprisingly, Cleis is now having a sale, buy three get one free, with free shipping.

And what am I going to do?

I told myself I wouldn’t think about it until this blog post was finished.

Update: Felice Newman offers a minor correction, saying “One little correction: PGW doesn’t distribute Random House. AMS is a wholesaler of books from Random House, and all the other large publishers.”

Also, there is now a sizable collection of links to a variety of blogs on this topic over at Edward Champion’s blog. Includes this great quote from Paul Collins: “Innumerable small publishers working with AMS and their subsidiary PGW — just about every good small publisher you’ve ever heard of — woke up in the street on New Year’s morning with their clothes missing and a pair of black eyes.”

Update 1.8.07: Galleycat now has this post with a link to my post (and a quote, thank you), and adds a bit more info about the hyooge conference call PGW publishers had last friday (right before my call with Cleis), and notes that yes, everyone’s in dire straits, all the way to the UK.

Also: Boing Boing posted a link to my post (and quoted, thank you), this a new link and comment about AMS’ monopoly.

Update, reader comment 1.8.07: Adam Parfrey, publisher, Feral House / Process Media emails saying,

“The AMS/PGW bankruptcy will hurt those publishers the most who will
have trouble tiding themselves over without receiving due revenue for
at least a few months. Perhaps things will right themselves with PGW
after the bankruptcy paperwork is settled, but this is what I
understand to be the case. I’m not sure that the 70% repayment after
a year is true, either, since PGW is a separate operation from AMS,
and this book company would fail utterly if the company did not
continue to send out books and publishers were not paid for 12
months. There are people I know that are trying to right this ship,
like Charlie Winton, the same man who sold the company to AMS.

Feral House moved from PGW to Consortium distribution about a year
ago. It’s not an easy thing to move your distribution. PGW still has
thousands of our books in their warehouse, and now we can’t get our
hands on them until this bankruptcy thing is sorted out.

There were at least several big reasons for Feral House’s move, and
one of the biggest reasons was this: I met the AMS execs, and felt
that these people could not, would not understand or appreciate the
kind of books I publish. Got a bad feeling from them. They seemed
like 40 year old Bush-loving frat boys. This in contrast to the old
Charlie Winton, a post-hippie hipster of sorts. Then when I heard of
the SEC investigation of AMS, that was the convincer. Get the hell
out of there. I’m glad I did, no matter the difficulties of moving
your operation.”

* Bra Slows Bullet Fired Into Air in Florida (sfgate) Snip:
“Bingham, who was in town from Atlanta, said she is thankful for the undergarment, which she said was ‘very cheap.’

‘I’d love to have a couple more of those bras,’ she said.”

* Viviane reminds us of the lack of sex blogs ever nominated for the Bloggies, which is now open for noms. Reading her post, I didn’t even know I was once nominated, wow. I never win anything (except the book that got the award) so I’m like, huh, back to blogging…

* Independent book distributor PGW is in bankruptcy (see also): this is a death sentence for many indy publishers. Of course, there is a satire blog about it…

* Gawker, again: Pubes Aid. Don’t you just hate it when a “priceless work of art” gets lodged in the back of your throat?

* I want this pink kettle.

* Beyonce’s boobs in dustruffle bondage (gofugyourself) It really is a hideous gown, but the girls look ready to spring into action. Snip:
“Now, I do understand that for a lot of people, the very promise of a one- or two-gun salute may be precisely why this is a “Best Dress” contender. But as a girl who loves gowns, all I can see is a bodice that looks in serious danger of making her mother cry. Does she want to make her mother cry?”

Considering that I just turned in the final edits and rewrites on this book last night, reading the following headline produced an explosive, cat-terrifying cinema display coffee shower: Fox Admits G-Spot Not Worth the Trouble (Gawker).