By Dina Alexander
With millions of hours of free online porn, pop-up and banner ads, free adult apps and adult game apps, the porn industry is one whose sheer volume and online presence ensures that your child will be exposed young and possibly hooked to their products and services. In fact, hooking your kids to their product is their end goal. More habitual users and addicts equal more money. They are an industry that is relentlessly pursuing your kids’ hearts, minds and dollars. Your children represent their next meal, their next home and their next investment.
Every year (and more often), the porn industry rolls out their newest products, methods, and strategies to increase revenue and help their proprietors be more tech-savvy and sophisticated in acquiring new customers and enhancing sales. This article is sourced right from the porn industry’s business magazine, Xbiz, as they guide pornographers, marketing strategists, and social media managers to expand their reach further into our lives.
In the past few years, the industry has driven mobile and video technology, increased bandwidths, and mobile payments to make it as easy and quick as possible for consumers to use their porn tube sites and paid sites.
So where will the porn industry prey upon your children this year?
Snapchat: A photo and video-sharing app made popular by teenagers, the porn industry and its sex workers have found a new avenue here to peddle their wares. As Lauren MacEwen (2015) of Xbiz reports in her article about which social media networks are most porn-friendly, “Snapchat is definitely accepting of adult content. This can be a great platform for performers to give free content, or reward their followers with content.” She also acknowledges that “Snapchat (and Tumblr) have the youngest audience of all the networks, with the majority being below the age of 24.”
According to the Daily Dot, “Snapchat doesn’t seem too interested in acknowledging that a solid portion of its user base is made up of people in the sex industry” (Dickson, 2014). Since its inception, sexting has also been a major part of Snapchat’s growth and popularity. Although it is continually in the news for stories related to predators, stalkers, and underage pornography problems, its administrators continue to turn a blind eye and make only token efforts to protect its users. Porn actresses see it as the most profitable social media (SM) platform, followed by Instagram, with Facebook and Twitter being seen as more difficult networks to generate actual profit (Tracy, 2015).
With so many kids and teens using Snapchat, they will almost certainly be exposed to porn and sexting.
Virtual Reality (VR) Porn: According to Mikandi (the world’s largest adult app store) blog writer Emma McGowen, “2016 really is shaping up to be the year of virtual reality porn.” The Oculus Rift VR headset made by Oculus VR (and recently bought by Facebook) is ready and being released at the end of March. Although some VR porn has existed in the past, the viewing equipment and video creating equipment has become better and far more accessible this year.
Tech start-up PrimaVR has introduced new videos to use with the headset that can incorporate any body part into the video. As Prima VR spokesman Anton Bailey says, “After all, how can you become a virtual porn star without your private parts in the virtual world?” He notes that the demo video depicts the lower body of a male user interacting with a female hologram. “We wanted our users to be able to see their own body instead of generic 3D avatars. It looks a lot more realistic and is more relatable” (Yagielowicz, 2016).
There are also plans from several companies to create virtual porn that can be used from Play Station and Xbox gaming consoles, creating the perfect marriage between porn and gaming (Sengar, 2016).
Live Web Cams: Web cams have long been used in the porn industry. But in the past they were seen as more of a voyeuristic tool to peek at a supposed private sexual encounter between two or more people. Now live cams are being used to create a more laser focused, psychological experience: a personal “one-on-one” session between the viewer and the porn actress. A viewer can not only watch the actress in action but also can instantly message her and get her reactions and have her attention.
“The cam sector will continue to be both highly profitable and highly competitive,” say Xbiz writer Alex Henderson (2016). He attributes this to the much-improved mobile technology that allows spectators to participate in live cam sessions via cellphones. With many sites aggressively advertising live experiences for free, many teens will no doubt fall into this trap as well.
Adult Apps: Although many adult apps require payment, there are plenty available for free to anyone with a cellphone or other internet-enabled device. Any child or teen with access to Amazon or Google Play (and even occasionally on the Apple App Store) can find a variety of pornographic, hook-up/dating, and/or game-related adult apps. But Mikandi has more free adult apps and adult gaming apps than any other website.
Many adult apps contain pornographic photos or videos, but there is an increasing number of cartoonish, comic-type games with names like “Strip Ninja,” “Glory Hole Arcade” and “Licker Woman,” all with similar objectives to win: degrade, strip or violate the female character(s) in the game.
Industry insiders report strong growth in the apps market and are working hard to increase availability to non-Android users (Yagielowicz, 2016). They hope with more advertising and availability to be able to expand this market to new customers, including our kids.
What can parents do?
- Start talking with your kids. Discuss the dangers and benefits of various technologies your family is using or may use in the future. Virtual reality has unlimited educational potential. Hopefully it will become affordable for educational outlets and schools. Help your kids understand the great potential but also the immense danger that can come from spending time in virtual games, such as disconnecting from real people and from real, human experiences.
- Be wise and slow down in your purchases of the latest and greatest in technology, including virtual reality headsets. Talk with your kids about addiction and the physical and psychological effects of viewing pornography. Take inventory of how much time you and your child are spending in front of screens (gaming, TV, laptop, desktop, cellphone etc.), and cut back on your time with these devices.
- If you allow your children to use certain social media (SM) platforms like Snapchat, Tumblr or Instagram, you need to follow or be friends with them in that SM platform. Know what your kids are posting and receiving. If you see an app on your child’s phone that you don’t recognize, research it or delete it. Use the opportunity these networks provide to connect with your kids, share moments from your day, talk about something maybe you couldn’t verbalize in person, and discuss information you learn from news and worthwhile sources.
- Spend at least 20-30 minutes a day with your child, face to face without screens. Chat about your day, the challenges in your life and his life. Connect, laugh, discuss and argue about important issues.
- Educate your child about the . Educate and Empower Kids has recently released How to Talk to Your Kids About Pornography, available on Amazon. For discussions about healthy sexuality, check out , also available on Amazon.
Being a parent in our technology saturated culture, it is now critical to stay up-to-date on the trends and changes that affect our kids lives. It is easier than you think.
For more information on this subject, check out our book How to Talk to Your Kids About Pornography, which is also available in .
Dina Alexander is the founder and president of Educate and Empower Kids, an organization determined to strengthen families by forging powerful connection. She is the creator of How to Talk to Your Kids About Pornography and the 30 Days of Sex Talks and 30 Days to a Stronger Child programs. She received her master’s degree in recreation therapy from the University of Utah and her bachelors from Brigham Young University. She is an amazing mom and loves spending time with her husband and three kids.
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Citations:
Bilton, N. (2015). Strippers Go Undercover on Snapchat. Retrieved February 20, 2016, from http://www.nytimes.com/2015/02/26/style/strippers-go-undercover-on-snapchat.html?_r=2
Dickson, E. (2014). Thanks to Snapcash, Snapchat is about to become a haven for paid porn. Retrieved February 20, 2016, from http://www.dailydot.com/technology/snapcash-snapchat-porn/
Fleishman, C. (2014, October 02). The NSFW Snapchat Stories where boys are pimped out for followers. Retrieved February 21, 2016, from http://www.dailydot.com/lifestyle/snapchat-stories-amateur-porn-ring/
Henderson, A. (2016, February 17). Live Cams Keep Blazing. Retrieved February 20, 2016, from http://www.xbiz.com/articles/203188
Larson, S. (2015, July 31). What it’s like running an anonymous sexting forum. Retrieved February 21, 2016, from http://www.dailydot.com/technology/snapchat-sexting-reddit-porn/
MacEwen, L. (2015, October 06). Sizing Up Today’s Social Media Networks. Retrieved February 20, 2016, from http://www.xbiz.com/articles/educational/199355
McGowen, E. (2016, January 25). 2016 Just Started And We Already Have News About Virtual Reality Porn. Retrieved February 20, 2016, from https://mikandi.com/blog/news/2016-just-started-and-we-already-have-news-about-virtual-reality-porn/
Sengar, S. (2016, January 21). Virtual Reality porn gets more real. Thanks to Oculus Rift and Samsung Gear VR. Retrieved February 21, 2016, from http://www.catchnews.com/tech-news/kindle-your-fantasies-virtual-reality-porn-is-here-oculus-rift-samsung-gear-vr-1453364879.html
Tracy, L. (2015, June 09). How do camgirls use Snapchat? Retrieved February 21, 2016, from http://www.dailydot.com/lifestyle/snapchat-camgirls-camcon/
Yagielowicz, S. (2016, January 06). PrimaVR Offers Holographic Sex Videos for Oculus Rift. Retrieved February 22, 2016, from http://www.xbiz.com/news/web/202907
Yagielowicz, S. (2016, January 15). The 2016 XBIZ Show Puts Mobile, Traffic and Cams in the Spotlight. Retrieved February 22, 2016, from http://www.xbiz.com/news/news_piece.php?id=203323