Tales of a Fourth Grade Nothing

A number of writers are doing quite well selling short erotic stories for between 99 cents and $2.99. The latter may seem outrageous if you think of it as the price of a short story. It's less so if you think of it as the price of an orgasm.

The whole article is a really interesting read, not least because it explains the subtle dance authors have to carry out when putting up their self-published porn in order to ensure that interested readers can find something that matches their precise tastes without using any forbidden terms on the cover material:

Marketing on Amazon is done largely by inputting keywords when uploading your book. Keywords and phrases are search terms readers use. For instance, "gay young adult novel" or "strong female characters" or "zombie steampunk." In erotica, you can use the real terms in keywords even if they're banned from blurbs. So if you go to Amazon and type in the banned word "orgy," you'll get books that used that as a keyword but have discreet titles like The Arrangement. (Or less discreet titles that at least don't include "orgy.")

Amazon is aware of this, of course. It seems that they're less interested in outright banning all erotica than in banning certain types and in keeping a virtual brown paper wrapper over graphic language visible in the storefront.

Call me as out of touch as a high court judge, but I had no idea dinosaur erotica was a thing until I read about it in a Guardian books post and now I know, I'm not sure whether it is something I wish my wife or my servants to read or not...

But it gets more interesting. There is already evidence from animal research that males increase the amount of sperm in their ejaculate when there is more competition around. In 2005, Kilgallon and Simmons conducted an experiment to see whether human males viewing “images depicting sperm competition” also had a higher percentage of motile sperm in their ejaculates.

God knows what the right wing press would make out of the grant proposal for this bit of research...

Flynt and Francis, who say that adult DVD sales have dived 22% over the last year, argue that they, too, deserve a helping hand.

"Congress seems willing to help shore up our nation's most important businesses [and] we feel we deserve the same consideration," Francis said in a statement.

"In difficult economic times Americans turn to entertainment for relief. More and more, the kind of entertainment they turn to is adult entertainment."

Owen Moogan, a spokesman for Flynt, told CNN: "The take here is that everyone and their mother want to be bailed out, from the banks to the big three.

"The porn industry has been hurt by the downturn like everyone else and they are going to ask for the $5bn. Is it the most serious thing in the world? Is it going to make the lives of Americans better if it happens? It is not for them to determine."

Initially I thought this was a spoof, a la Julian Gough in the NYT, but I'm starting to wonder whether the pornographers might actually be in earnest...

"Regarding the position..." he says when we return in our hospital gowns. He wants us on our sides, spoons-style. "I think facing the wall is better," Deng says. As opposed to facing him. "That will be more romantic," he adds. On the wall, someone has hung a painting of a hillside harbour town. As though by looking at it we could convince ourselves that we were on the Amalfi Coast - or, just as good, that Deng was. "And I will switch off the lights."

"Where are the candles and soft music?" Ed asks.

"Oh, I am sorry," Deng says, straight-faced, chagrined. Then he brightens. "I can turn on my laptop. I have the soundtrack to Les Mis." His efforts are sweet, though pointless. There is no way to make this situation romantic, normal, sexual.

Deng goes next door and returns with an envelope, which he hands to Ed. Inside is a copy of Maxim. "This is very erotic," he assures Ed. The implication being, I suppose, that the sight of one's wife in a baggy, knee-length hospital gown and threadbare socks is not.

Well, at least they eschewed the offer of Les Mis as more of a mood killer than a scientist with a probulator...

silvershooter

A few years ago, I was complaining to a fellow writer about my inability to find a publisher for my second novel. It was a fairly typical outpouring of frustration and incomprehension at the state of British publishing. "Have you ever thought of writing porn?" he asked. "It's easy to get published, and you sell a lot of books." As these are the only words that a writer ever really wants to hear, I rushed home and embarked without much thought on a filthy homosexual rewrite of Robert Louis Stevenson's Kidnapped, entitled The Low Road.

Why couldn't he have written a porn version of Catriona? I mean. We all want to know what really happens between David and Miss Grant, plus, the whole Alan Breck, James More thing? It's got dodgy slash potential coming out of the wherever. Actually, now that I think about it, I can't quite recall whether Alan and James every actually meet up — it's been 20+ years since I last read Catriona — but I seem to remember something about A running off with J's portmanteau, which, blimey, sounds pretty damned filthy to me...

matociquala

Sex is not effortless. Nor is it necessarily a complete mess every time it happens, unless you're stuck with somebody who can't read signals or carry off teamwork. (Hint: Before you sleep with somebody, get them to help you move a large piece of furniture. This will tell you a great deal about whether you really want to go there or not.)

I hate to think what this says about Richard McDuff...

A word of warning though: don't try to read this in public unless you want to spend time explaining to your family, friends and colleagues why you're laughing hysterically.

Talk about pioneering!

You could, alternatively, move to Australia. It worked for our Barbara: "I began using several of my favourite tantric techniques to circulate sexual energy between me and Sydney. Before I knew it, a little blissgasm shivered up my spine, followed by an actual clitoral orgasm ... I was so amazed, I had to stop and lean against a wall." The tantric beginner is advised to start off slowly, perhaps with a short walk through Filey and a good cough.

I wonder where on the scale of difficulty expectorating in Exmouth falls? Answers please, on a post card, to Kenneth Horne, 78 North Horseposture Road...

Word reaches us that the sheer glut of coffee houses in Seattle, home of Starbucks, has led to some unorthodox new sales techniques, dubbed "Sexpresso". Waitresses have been donning bikinis, lingerie or fetish outfits, while the drinks have been given "sexy" new names. Two points, really. One, is anyone really tempted to drink a coffee/white chocolate mix called a "Wet Dream"? Two, isn't the easiest way to sell more coffee just to make a better brew?

I wonder if they got the idea from Mike Judge's Idiocracy, a film set in the year 2505, where, "every commercial transaction has been sexualised: at Starbucks you can get coffee plus a handjob (or a "full body" latte)." Talk about progress: in less than a year, reality has managed to do what fiction thought would take 498 years to achieve...