December 2014

• The 51st edition of Pirelli’s infamous calendar, 2015, was shot by Steven Meisel (he shot Madonna’s book “Sex” back when dinosaurs roamed the earth). The 2015 Pirelli Calendar features its first-ever plus-size model Candice Huffine alongside Adriana Lima and Natalia Vodianova in a lightly fetish-themed shoot.
  Steven Meisel’s Pirelli Calendar (Fashion Copious; image above via)

• UK porn filter flop: While tiny minorities of users at Virgin Media (four percent), BT (five percent) and Sky (eight percent) opted to keep the filter, TalkTalk ranked as a significant outlier: it reports that 36 percent of customers enabled the government-mandated filters on their home router. TalkTalk puts it down to the fact it pre-ticks the selection box, meaning more customers are likely to keep the option enabled on their account.
  The majority of Brits are disabling government-backed porn filter (Engadget)

• Daily Dot reviews 2014′s intersection of sex with technology in our everyday lives, from an automated blowjob machine to a smart vibrator that replicates human sex to Oculus Rift porn to a cunnilingus-giving teddy bear.
  2014 was the year sex went high-tech (Daily Dot)

• As a rule, I never link to porn that shows many of these objects being inserted. It is time for a Deadspin holiday tradition like no other: [its] annual trawl of the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission’s database of emergency room visits to discover the strangest, unlikeliest, and most awkwardly shaped objects America inappropriately shoved into its various orifices.
  What Did We Get Stuck In Our Rectums Last Year? (Deadspin/Gawker)

• The amount that the British spend on prostitutes and illegal drugs has boosted the country in the rankings, according to the independent forecasting group, the Centre for Economics and Business Research. As a result of the new calculations — it is the first year the U.K. has included the figures — Britain’s GDP rose to $2.82 trillion in 2014, up from $2.53 trillion the previous year.
  Illegal Sex And Drugs Pay Off For Britain (NPR)

• BuzzFeedBlue (seriously!? they had to name it BuzzFeedBlue?!) released a YouTube clip highlighting the four stages of sex: excitement, plateau, orgasm, and resolution. A scantily clad couple demonstrates each of the stages; they never take their underwear off at all.
  This is what your body actually does during sex (Daily Dot)

• “A night at The Ball (for randy single Jews) includes encountering a guy you’ve never met before bragging about making out with a girl who looks like his sister that he “apparently was an asshole to on Tinder,” before pointing out “you have ink on your tit” (I had a leaking pen, and he was actually right).”
  The Craziest Date Night for Single Jews, Where Mistletoe Is Ditched for Shots (Daily Beast)

• A teacher who lost her job when she was found moonlighting as a porn star is appealing against the ruling saying she can still promote “Christian values”. The 38-year-old woman – who works under the stage name Julia Pink – worked for 17 years with the Diakonia Germany Evangelical Federal Association in the city of Munich in southern Germany teaching children and supervising adults with disabilities.
  Porn star sacked as teacher appeals ruling (NY Daily News)

• Like many around the state, students at St. Louis Park High School learn about sex education in health class. But some students thought that the class structure didn’t allow enough time for any meaningful discussion about sex. So they decided to start a sexual health education club which could be the first of its kind in Minnesota.
  Students say sex ed club will be better than health class (Minnesota Public Radio News)

• An exciting new partnership announced last month may soon shake up the field of teledildonics: two of the biggest players in the game have joined forces, and could be on the verge of becoming the new power couple of remote sex. KIIROO, a Dutch company that is one of the latest teledildonic innovators, has partnered with the American company Fleshlight, the makers of the world’s most popular male sex device. They’ve come together to produce the KIIROO Onyx, described in the press release as the “first fully interactive” personal sex device.
  KIIROO CEO Toon Timmermans on Teledildonics, Patents and the Onyx (Future of Sex)

• Brits, apparently under a “Fifty Shades of Grey” spell, have splurged an unprecedented £50 million on sex toys, erotic novels and pleasure products this Christmas, according to new consumer research.
  Brits Spend £50 Million on Sex Toys This Holiday Season (XBIZ)

• In what might be the best study of the year, a report in the journal Archives of Sexual Behavior and highlighted this week by Science of Relationships revealed that couples who cuddled after sex felt more satisfied with their sex lives and with their relationship. In fact, post-sex cuddling mattered more to sexual and relationship satisfaction than foreplay or the duration of sex.
  Best Study Of the Year Makes A Scientific Case for Cuddling (News.Mic)

• China’s anti-pornography authorities on Thursday announced that it had confiscated a total of 15.79 million illegal publications in 2014. In a press release that reviewed so-called “anti-pornography achievements” in 2014, the National Anti-Pornography and Anti-Illegal Publications Office revealed key statistics and publication violations. I think Google, Facebook and the UK government should each release a summary of 2014 anti-porn achievement reflections as well.
  China Reflects on 2014 Anti-Porn Achievements (XBIZ)

• If you’re in a relationship with a narcissist, you’re probably already aware of the characteristic behaviors associated with this personality type. When it comes to sexuality, similarly, the narcissistic individual expects you to do the satisfying while you patiently wait to have your needs met.
  Why Sexual Narcissists Make Unfaithful Partners (Psychology Today)

{ Comments on this entry are closed }

• Get Hung for the Holidays. Highlights include “Oh, Poly Night,” the bitterly hilarious “12 Fights of Christmas,” and lyrics like “This holiday’s nothing but wholesome / so why you gotta turn it into Folsom?” The wonderful, local, sex-positive Rachel Lark is beloved for her bawdy jams, which have been heralded by folks like Margaret Cho and Dan Savage. And now she’s brought us all some Christmas cheer with a surprising, subversive holiday album. It’s sure to terrify your family and delight your friends.
  ‘Hung For The Holidays’ Is The [SF] Xmas Album We’ve Been Waiting For (SFist)

• If law has been slow to recognize mainstream BDSM, however, BDSM has not forgotten law. Far from locking law out of its bedrooms, mainstream BDSM has deliberately imported one unlikely legal form: contract.
  Nonbinding Bondage: Exploring the (extra)legal complexity of BDSM contracts (Harvard Law Review)

• Print Your Own Dildo is a new company that is so dedicated to personalizing an already quite personal experience that they’ve named themselves for it. PYOD is here to do exactly that: let you design and 3D print your own sex toy. PYOD has just launched their Kickstarter campaign, seeking to get their novel idea off their drawing board and into your… er, hands.
  PYOD Launches Kickstarter: Customize your own 3D printed sex toy (3D Print)

• Fashion Happy Dolls manufactured in China have made some unsuspecting parents fashionably unhappy. You can buy the discount fairy doll in several versions, blond or brunette, blue dress or purple, silver wings or gold. But no matter which model you choose, she appears to come with penis.
  All I want for Christmas Is A Transgender Fairy (The New Civil Rights Movement)

• Drone porn is a con as old as the handicam: “Bang Bus” fooled viewers into thinking it was actually picking up random girls from off the street. “Amateur” and “casting couch” porn shot by companies fools people into thinking the participants have “never done that before.” Same with “girlfriend revenge” porn sites from large porn companies: the women are under contract. Now one of Manwin’s sites is proffering “drone porn” — ostensibly to cash in on the voyeur market. That site really freaked out one very naive writer at The Verge (who has apparently never heard of 2257 laws).
  This drone porn isn’t real, it’s just really creepy (The Verge)

• Citizen science sex hacking! For anyone who wants to dip their toes into science, but then leave the heavy lifting to the professionals, citizen science might be the answer. (Science Hack Day was at the forefront of this.) One way we might be interested in getting involved? Help scientists learn about human sexual activity via Kinsey Reporter.
  Here’s How You Can Help Scientists Study Sex, Whales, and Distant Galaxies (Mother Jones)

• A Japanese woman who makes art based on her vulva has been charged with obscenity, in a case that has sparked discussion on censorship. Mass media continues to confuse ‘vagina’ (inside) with ‘vulva’ (outside) in this case, and it’s really annoying everyone with a brain.
  Japan charges Tokyo vulva artist with obscenity (BBC)

• Two centuries after his death, the descendants of the notorious Marquis de Sade have finally embraced their once-reviled relative. The French aristocrat scandalised his contemporaries with his erotic works which saw him locked in prisons and an insane asylum for 32 years. Now, the eldest member of the dynasty, Elzear de Sade, has said the family are no longer ashamed of their controversial ancestor and has reclaimed the title of marquis which has not been used since his 1814.
  Descendants of notorious 19th Century writer the Marquis de Sade reclaim his title after 200 years of disowning novelist (Daily Mail)

• In my last news roundup, I pointed out that 50 Shades actor Jamie Dornan revealed he thinks kinky people are gross. IBT picked up the story. Stephen Elliott told IBT, “To me it’s the equivalent of making a movie about gay people and making homophobic remarks.” Morgana Maye: “A team of oxen couldn’t drag me into a theater to watch this trash.”
  Will ‘Fifty Shades Of Grey’ Movie Accurately Depict BDSM? Two Dominatrixes And A Submissive Tell All, ‘Fifty Shades Of Grey’ Star Jamie Dornan Angers BDSM Community With Elle Interview Comments (The Mary Sue, IBT; video autoplay alert)

• Former gay porn actor and escort Luka Magnotta was found guilty Tuesday of first-degree murder in the dismemberment of a Chinese student.
  Ex-Porn Actor Luka Magnotta Guilty of Dismembering Chinese Student (NBC News; video autoplay alert)

• Nerve interviews MasterJ, who runs the Jonai Academy for Bad Girls, specializing in tantric therapy, specifically Japanese bondage, or Shibari.
  The Real Work of a Bondage Therapist (Nerve)

• Jezebel and Washington Post report a fake study: Jezebel (Isha Aran) and Washington Post (Roberto A. Ferdman) have been taken in by that religious anti-porn study I warned you about this weekend (and was debunked by Reason). It’s not a study, it’s a “discussion paper” based on a religious survey that was put in headlines on conservative news sites. It’s amazing to see Jezebel and Washington Post get so obviously suckered. (Jezebel, Washington Post)

• First-time sponsor Trannies in Trouble has announced its support of the 7th Annual Transgender Erotica Awards. The 7th Annual Transgender Erotica Awards will be held on Sunday, Feb. 15, 2015 at the Avalon in Hollywood.
  Trannies in Trouble to Sponsor Transgender Erotica Awards (XBIZ)

• China’s most prolific underwear thief terrorised his neighbours in a one-man crime wave that was anything but brief … it lasted more than a decade. The underwear bandit, named only as Tan, had hidden more than 2,000 pairs of pilfered pants and brassieres in the cavity above his bedroom in the Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region’s second-largest metropolis and was caught when the ceiling of his apartment collapsed under the weight of his stash. He had amassed the vast – and colourful – trove of lingerie by creeping into his neighbours’ homes and snatching their smalls when they were at work.
  Underwear thief is caught after ceiling collapses under the weight of the 2,000 sets of lingerie he had hidden in China (Daily Mail)

• Australian artist Tully Arnot has constructed a simple little mechanized sculpture that spends its solitary days constantly liking every person that comes up in its Tinder feed. Titled Lonely Sculpture, the piece uses a rubber finger attached to a small motor. It’s all been perfectly timed to Tinder’s refresh rate for potential love.
  Robot Finger Continuously Cruises Tinder As ‘Lonely Sculpture’ (Animal New York)

{ Comments on this entry are closed }