The Next Big Porn Trend: Watching It In 3D
In the early days, watching pornography meant going to a peep show or sneaking into the adult section of your local Blockbuster (RIP) to pick up a forbidden VHS. And then the internet came along, and totally revolutionized how people consume on-screen sex. But in the future, we may all watch porn in an entirely different, super futuristic way—through virtual reality.
At this year’s annual Adult Entertainment Expo in Las Vegas, Vancouver-based adult entertainment company Holofilm Productions showed off a pair of Samsung Gear VR goggles, modified with hardware that lets the wearer feel like they’re in the middle of the action. If you move your head, the video moves with you.
“We’re taking porn to the next level to better immerse the viewer in the experience,” the company’s president, Anna Lee, told AFP. “No longer will scenes be flat and two-dimensional. Viewers can now feel like they’re part of the action.”
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Hers ones one of a handful of companies that have forayed into the futuristic world of VR for an experience that makes the viewer feel like they’re, well, in the moment.
Others, like VR Bangers, is compatible with virtual reality headsets like Oculus Rift and Samsung Gear VR, as well as Google Cardboard, a less expensive way to view whatever it is you’re into. The site touts, “You may think porn is great now, but you’ll never go back to traditional porn videos once you’ve tried a VR porn video.”
And that’s only one way the industry is shifted, combining technology and pleasure. At the just-ended International Consumer Electronics show (also in Vegas), it wasn’t a Fitbit that snagged any awards for a new digital health and fitness product—that honor went to OhMiBod’s new Lovelife Kush Kegel exerciser, which uses Bluetooth technology to tell you just how well you’re strengthening your pelvic floor.
Still, some longtime veterans of the porn industry are skeptical. “People always get excited about new technology and internet-connected devices, and I do think there’s a market for it,” Steven Hirsch of film studio Vivid told CNBC. “But I don’t think it’s the primary market.”
It may be a novelty now, but several years ago, so were smartphones and wearable tech. So it’s not out of the realm of possibility that in five or 10 years, you could be hooking up to get off.
