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Good For Her have announced the official list of nominees for the 2010 Feminist Porn Awards. I’m pleased to say that For The Girls has been nominated for Best Website.

Here’s some info from their press release:

But wait, what is feminism doing getting into bed with porn? At Good For Her, we are feminists and we sell and rent porn. In 2006 we decided that it’s not enough to criticize adult films for not adequately representing women’s – and in many cases, men’s – sexuality. So we decided to do something about it. As porn star and performance artist Annie Sprinkle famously said, “The answer to bad porn isn’t no porn…it’s to try and make better porn!” Good For Her couldn’t agree more. We believe the world is inundated with cheesy, cliche, degrading, and patronizing porn. But we also believe that erotic fantasy is powerful, and that women and marginalized communities deserve to put their dreams and desires on film, too. As feminists and sex-positive people, we want to showcase and honour those who are creating erotic media with a feminist sensibility.

The nominees on this year’s list continue to strive to provide erotic entertainment that is smart, sexy, and continues to appreciate women as viewers. In addition to featuring 51 nominations in total – the highest number of nominated films and websites ever – this year’s nominee list also includes movies from more countries than previous years, and includes filmmakers from: Great Britain, Spain, The Netherlands, France, Sweden, Australia, New Zealand, and of course, the porn epicenter of the world, The United States. Canada is also represented among the nominee list with erotic website, GoodDykePorn.com, and “Kiwi-Canuck” Astrid Glitter.

The Nominees for the 2010 Good For Her Feminist Porn Awards are (in alphabetical order – film title first)

48) 101 Positions for Lovers – Jamye Waxman – Sensual Couples
49) A Man With a Maid: Tales of Victorian Lust – Nica Noelle – Sweet Sinner Video
50) Art of Female Self-Pleasure – Jaiya – New World Sex Education
51) Be My Boy Toy – Anna Span – Easy on the Eye Productions
52) Behind the Red Door – Carlos Batts – HeartCore Films
53) Bordello – Courtney Trouble – Reel Queer Productions
54) Buck Angel’s Ultimate Fucking Club – Buck Angel – Buck Angel Entertainment
55) Cocksucker – Julie Simone – Julie Simone Productions
56) Couch Surfers 2: Trans Men in Action – Brazen Garage Squad –Trannywood Pictures
57) Crash Pad Series 4: Ropeburn – Shine Louise Houston – Blowfish Video
58) Crash Pad Series 5: The Revolving Door – Shine Louise Houston – Blowfish Video
59) Dangerous Curves – Carlos Batts – HeartCore Films
60) Des Jours Plus Belles Que La Nuit – Jennifer Lyon Bell + Murielle Scherre – Blue Artichoke Films
61) Dirty Diaries: 12 Shorts of Feminist Porn – Mia Engberg (producer) — Njuta Films
62) Fluid: Men Redefining Sexuality – Madison Young – Reel Queer Productions
63) Fluid: Women Redefining Sexuality – Madison Young – Reel Queer Productions
64) Glamazons – Carlos Batts – HeartCore Films
65) Handcuffs – Erika Lust – Lust Films
66) Honey Bunny – Vena Virago – Vivid Alt
67) John — Astrid Glitter– Glitter Films
68) Lesbian Adventures: Victorian Love Letters – Nica Noelle – Sweetheart Video
69) Lesbian Hitchhikers – Nica Noelle – Sweetheart Video
70) Maneater: The Prelude – Damali Dares – Desire Street Productions
71) My Daughter’s Boyfriend – Nica Noelle – Sweet Sinner Video
72) Penny Flame’s Expert Guide to Rough Sex – Tristan Taormino & Penny Flame – Vivid Ed/Smart Ass Video
73) Perversions of Lesbian Lust Vol. 2 – Madison Young – Madison Young Productions
74) Queer Manor – Madison Young – Reel Queer Productions
75) River Rock Women’s Prison – Kathryn Annelle – Triangle Films
76) Rock Hard: For Music and Cock Lovers Everywhere – Jelena Lakic – Easy on the Eye
77) Roulette: Berlin – Courtney Trouble – Reel Queer Productions
78) Sensual Massage for Pregnancy – Jaiya – New World Sex Education
79) Seven Minutes in Heaven: Coming Out – Courtney Trouble – Reel Queer Productions
80) Seven Minutes in Heaven: Tender Hearted – Courtney Trouble – Reel Queer Productions
81) Speakeasy – Courtney Trouble – Reel Queer Productions
82) Stories of Sexes – Ovidie & Jack Tyler – French Lover TV
83) Sylvia – Madison Young – Madison Young Productions
84) The Band – Anna Brownfield – Hungry Films
85) The Deviant – Nica Noelle – Sweet Sinner Video
86) Tristan Taormino’s Expert Guide to Anal Sex for Men – Tristan Taormino – Vivid Ed/Smart Ass Video
87) Tristan Taormino’s Expert Guide to Threesomes – Tristan Taormino – Vivid Ed/ Smart Ass Video
88) Tristan Taormino’s Rough Sex – Tristan Taormino – Vivid / Smart Ass Video
89) Women Love Porn – Anna Span (producer) – Easy on the Eye Productions
90) Women Love Porn: Apocalypse Angels – Katie Coxxx – Easy on the Eye
91) XXX Vignettes – Astrid Glitter – Glitter Films

Website Nominations:

www.RubysDiary.com
www.JuicyPinkBox.com
www.ShotWithDesire.com
www.NoFauxxx.com
www.GoodDykePorn
www.ForTheGirls.com
www.OnMyPeriod.com

Congratulations to all the nominees. There’s a lot of great films in there and also some new ones I haven’t heard of; I’ll have to look into where I can get them for review.

I’m not certain but I’m hoping to be able to attend this year’s awards. It will be a bit last-minute if I go but I’m sure it will be worth it.

Here’s the main Feminist Porn Awards 2010 page.

It’s now ten years since I bought my first domain name.

This means I’ve been creating erotica online for a whole decade – 2000 to 2010. When I started out I never imagined I’d be doing it for this long, nor that it would take me as far as it has.

In the last ten years I’ve seen the online adult industry evolve from single images on slow dial-up to a million free streaming movies. It’s gone from an initial startup phase, through a goldrush and into a major bust. It’s has moved from “tease” to full-on hardcore and seriously nasty stuff at every turn. It’s also seen numerous attempts to legislate it out of existence.

It all started for me in 1999 when I decided to write an article about online women’s porn. Conducting research, I went into the local library and started looking up porn sites on their internet terminal. You could get away with it back then. I found a whole bunch of gay sites and not much else – except for Purve.com, the first porn for women site.

I ended up chatting to the Australian woman who ran Purve and, after the article appeared in November 1999, she encouraged me to get into the business of adult webmastering. I set about learning the whole deal – what jpegs and gifs were, how to become an affiliate, how to make rudimentary websites. I went and bought Microsoft Front Page, despite howls of derision from my friends who all hand-coded. I didn’t care. It did the job.

The main aim was advertising. Put up a site with a few free photos, preferably small, under 20kb each and advertise paysites. Hopefully your average surfer would like what they saw and sign up for the good stuff. Back then, you could only get good quality pics and movies (occasionally) if you joined a paysite.

One of my first sites was Grandma Scrotum’s Sex Tips, originally hosted for free by a now defunct company (free hosting was the way to go in those days – bandwidth was really expensive. Unfortunately it made life difficult when the host went under and you had to keep moving your site all the time)

I also had a go at promoting mainstream porn for men but I wasn’t that interested. For me, porn for women was the main game. It presented a whole new “niche” that was being completely ignored by the “big guns” (still is).

I can still remember the day I got my first signup… and then my first cheque. The amount wasn’t huge but the thrill was substantial. I saw the potential to make some pocket money on the side while continuing to be a freelance journalist.

And then the signups kept rolling in, more each week. Suddenly it seemed I could make a living out of advertising porn. Which was cool. I tried selling books as well through Amazon but the commission of 5% could never match the 50-60% I could earn with smut. Especially since making sales was so easy.

I didn’t really tell many people what was going on. It was good for a laugh sometimes, seeing the surprised looks on their faces. Nobody expects me to be doing what I do, even today. They assume I’m some sort of serious, bookish type. Which I am, of course, with a mischievous, evil pornographer interior.

From 2000 to mid 2003 I continued to make sites advertising the five or six subscription sites that existed for straight women. (Playgirl wasn’t part of the equation; they were unable to use the Playgirl domain until 2006 thanks to a court ruling. Shady operators had used the domain for fraud. On top of that, the company seemed to dismiss the idea of the internet as a waste of time.)

I wasn’t alone in wanting to make porn for women. I was part of a small group of other female webmasters who wanted to market to females. Every day we’d chat about the subject on the Women’s Erotica Network message board, discussing what it was that women wanted to see and how best to appeal to chicks like us.

The rest of the adult webmastering sphere weren’t interested. We often had large online arguments where the guys happily pronounced: “women don’t buy porn, they’re not visual, selling to women is a waste of time.” Eventually we stopped arguing. Their loss.

The technology progressed, as did marketing techniques. In the beginning were webrings and picture posts. You could create a seriously ugly page and fill it with ads and make sales. Then came linklists, consisting of large collections of adult links, supported by advertising. Ms Naughty is one of those. The linklist rules about the structure of free sites became rather rigid, requiring a minimum number of photos and a restricted number of ads. Then we saw the emergence of Thumbnail Gallery Posts (TGPs), comprising of single pages of thumbnails rather than full sites.

More and more webmaster message boards sprang up. These became the primary place to network with others and advertise. The first online industry conventions occurred.

The main aim at that point was to get listed in Alta Vista. Number 1 on that search engine was a licence to print money. You’d also submit to Yahoo, Ask Jeeves and about 100 others. The results varied wildly from search engine to search engine. You’d also hope to get listed in the DMOZ Open Directory Project. I think it might have been 2002 when we started to prefer this “Google” thing that seemed to always give better results. I liked it straight away because my sites did better in Google than Alta Vista or Yahoo.

Then, in 2003, our little group of porn for women marketers began to go our own way. I had a disagreement with the owner of Purve, as did fellow webmistress Jane. In the aftermath we decided to set up our own adult site for women, modelling it on Australian Women’s Forum. In June 2003, For The Girls was launched.

Almost immediately we hit a snag: our credit card processor collapsed in the first month and made off with our initial profit. Thankfully we were better off than some who lost thousands. In 2003 American Express had decided to pull out of CC processing and Visa had introduced strict rules and a “danger fee” for adult sites. Not long after that Paypal announced it would not process for adult either and subsequently froze the accounts of many people, confiscating their “sinful” cash. We saved FTG by getting an account with CCBill and carrying on. Thankfully, CCBill is one of the few surviving third-party processors; at least 3 others went under in that year.

2004 saw blogs become popular in the mainstream. I launched the Ms Naughty blog that year in a very simple format; Wordpress wasn’t really an option at that time. I upgraded it to WP in 2006.

In 2004 the Bush administration, with the help of Attorney General John Ashcroft, introduced major changes to the 18 U.S.C. § 2257A law which ostensibly exists to prevent minors from appearing in porn (models must prove they are over 18). The new ruling changed the definition of “secondary producer” of adult content, making adult webmasters liable for any adult image that appeared on their site, even if they had nothing to do with originally creating that image.

The law imposed incredbily onerous compliance rules and allowed the government to essentially raid your house without notice or a warrant to “check your records.” I saw plenty of successful smaller webmasters driven out of the business by this new law, fearful of its implications. In 2005 it all went to court… and stayed there, it seems. A 2007 ruling said it was unconstitutional while another upheld it.

The 2257 thing was yet another attempt to restrict the spread of online porn. The 1998 Child Online Protection Act tried it and was struck down. The Communications Decency Act also had a go at it. There’s also been numerous prosecutions for obscenity, the most notable being John Stagliano in 2008. Nothing ever seems to stick.

Meanwhile, I just kept writing erotic fiction and searching out female-friendly pics and movies for For The Girls and my other sites. We held an annual fiction competition from 2005 to 2008 with much success.

Video On Demand sites had begun to be popular by about 2005, although AEBN had been offering their service since 2000. They began to challenge the old subscription-based paysite model in the second half of the decade.

In 2006 I remember going on to one of the adult webmaster boards and asking my peers: “What do you think of this Youtube thing? Should I embed this code on my page or will it break my site?” At the time I didn’t see that Youtube would become the future of porn. I don’t think many of us did. Yet it felt like only days before flash video was everywhere and porn tube sites sprung up like mushrooms, many offering full-length movies for free. Of course, it hasn’t ended well.

2007 and 2008 saw the Russians and the cheaters move into traditional webmastering in a big way, much to the frustration of the rest of us. A huge influx of new webmasters began catering to a dwindling number of surfers. Free porn was everywhere. The gold rush was over.

In the last two years I’ve seen an awful lot of old-timers sell up and leave the business, frustrated at constantly having to fight cheaters, liars, content thieves and scammers, seeing major companies beginning to rely on dodgy billing practices to keep themselves in profit. In the meantime the audience has come to expect that porn should always be free.

At the same time, I’ve seen the rise and rise of alternative, sex positive and feminist porn. In 2006 Good For Her started the Feminist Porn Awards and they’re due to have their fourth event in April. Early dyke porn pioneers CyberDyke have been joined by Shine Louise Houston and her Crash Pad films and site. Courtney Trouble’s No Fauxxx continues to cut across genre boundaries by offering all kinds of different erotica, gay, lesbian, straight and genderqueer. The original alt porn site Suicide Girls has had its share of trouble but other alt sites have stepped in to fill the gap. Meanwhile, the lovely Tasty Trixie has built her own adult empire, being in this business longer than me.

I’ve seen at least six porn for women paysites go out of business… which is always a pain in the arse because I have to take down ads. In 2010 there aren’t many subscription sites actively targeting straight women as their main audience; I’m proud to say that For The Girls is still going strong after nearly 7 years in the game.

Way back at the start of 2000 , when the new Milennium and the Sydney Olympics made everyone feel shiny and peaceful, I had no idea that I’d be sitting here in 2010, getting wrinkly and hunched and thick around the middle, still making a living from online porn. The internet has been very good to me; it’s provided an opportunity to become my own boss and to create a virtual magazine that publishes the quality work of many excellent writers. It has let me carve out a space where I can promote a healthy and positive version of erotica and given me a small voice for women amid a rising tide of sometimes horrible male-oriented porn.

And it’s let me do all this while wearing pyjama bottoms and daggy old t-shirts.

Will I still be doing this ten years from now? I don’t know. I can’t even think ten weeks ahead at this stage. But I don’t feel the urge to give up any time soon. I’ve still got about 20 domains waiting for me to develop them. And a feature film to make. And an internet filter to fight.

And who knows what kind of technology we’ll have in 2020? Perhaps all those promises of “virtual reality sex” will actually come true. Either that or the internet will have become so controlled and censored by world governments that online porn has become a distant memory.

I do know that we’re going to have to start re-negotiating the concept of paying for porn. The expectation that everything will be free is creating problems. As I wrote in this post, the audience can’t expect producers to keep making porn if it results in a loss. Especially if those producers are trying to break the mould and offer something positive and different. It will all grind to a halt eventually, and I don’t want to see that. I want to see change; it’s what I wanted from the moment I started in 2000. We need better, more positive porn and the way to make it happen is for the audience to get behind those people who are trying to create change.

It’s gonna be an interesting decade, I suspect.

The New Zealand Herald has an extensive profile of Filament creator Suraya Singh, who grew up in New Zealand but now lives in London. The article traces the origins of Suraya’s idea for an erotic magazine and her struggle to get it up and running last year.

There was also the belief that all women are the same. “We had one distributor who said he’d shown a copy to a woman in accounts,” says Singh.

“She didn’t like it, so he decided all women wouldn’t like it. Even if the story was the truth, the claim was ridiculous. That sort of thing got surreal at times.” Another was that most women aren’t visual and that those who are would rather look at other women than naked men. This belief is supported by New Zealand’s self-styled king of porn, Steve Crow.

In his view, marketing erotica to women is notoriously difficult and while he hasn’t yet seen Filament, he says it isn’t something he’d want to back or predict a future for.

Vice blog has some fascinatingg interviews with four of the main stars of the new wave of authentic lesbian porn – Dylan Ryan, Syd Blakovich, Madison Young and Jiz Lee. These women dish the dirt on what it’s really like to be a porn star, share anecdotes about bodily fluid mishaps and also give their views of feminist porn. Worth reading.

Here’s some quotes from Jiz Lee:

So you’re sincerely turned on when you’re working.
Yes, and I wouldn’t do it any other way. Being turned on and having a good time filming is one of the [major] reasons I do what I do. I also do it consciously knowing that I represent queer homo hapa faggy soft-butch dykes…

Even down to aesthetics like hair–I have hair, and I like the way it looks. Every now and then I’ll shave it ’cause I want to play, not because that’s the way beauty has to be. I’d say “Fuck The Man” but lots of straight dudes dig my work and my hairy asshole. I have words for them: All my pubes are my feelers, and the hair around my asshole is my wizard. And it is very, very wise. Some folks say that “disco bush” is back in style. Mine is “disco gutter.”

The Star, a Canadian media site, features an article called What Women Are Starting To Want. Starting? Ahem.

Anyway, it features an interview with Mimi Balfour who last year made the softcore film Man of My Dreams. The film won a Feminist Porn Award and Mimi says she now has distribution for it through the Sinclair Institute. I’m still having trouble finding it on my usual sites, will keep looking.

“What’s been interesting for me is that it’s not for everybody,” says Linton, who attached her real name to Man Of My Dreams. “There are a lot of women out there who like the harder-core stuff, who like the gritty imagery. But I just really believe that women deserve to have choice. We can’t just present one type of sexy to the world’s women.”
….
“I’m aiming my product at moms in their 30s and 40s who are maybe curious about dipping their toes into the adult entertainment waters but who have been put off previously by some of the choices out there,” she says. “I’m providing them with a safe way in.”

The article also has some quotes from Candida Royalle and a brief overview of the research into what women find arousing.

* Does sex sell movies? Not really – I was surprised to find that a Wiccan actress was behind this study. She feels that actresses shouldn’t have to be naked in the name of their art. It’s an interesting idea but her push to remove sex or nudity from film is incredibly sex-negative. It means refusing to portray an important aspect of human experience. The study also doesn’t seem to take into account the ratings system which can impact on box office receipts.

* Embracing Teenage Sexuality – Let’s rethink the age of consent – a great opinion piece on Huffington Post.

* Sorry chaps but please get your kit on! says a former Cosmo editor in the Daily Mail. She trots out the same old “women aren’t visual” argument. Boring. I can’t even be bothered going there except to say: what a pity she was editor of Cosmo for so long, refusing to offer centerfolds. Denied!

Last year my friend Jamye Waxman disappeared to Jamaica (of her own accord) in order to film a new instructional adult movie. She then amused us on Twitter with her ongoing search to delineate all 101 sex positions featured in this film.

I was amazed that she managed to even find 50 positions, let alone 101. There’s only so many places your arms and legs and cock and cunt can really go.

Thus I’m really curious to see the final result. It looks like a lot of fun and all filmed with lush tropical backgrounds. It also features Jamye being her usual irrepressible self.

It’s available on DVD here or you can download it here.

And don’t forget to check out Jamye’s blog!

New York Press reports on the launch of another indie erotic magazine aimed at straight women. Candy Rain (previously “Ligerbeat“) is the project of three New York women, Callie Watts, “Mama D” and “Yung Ho”. It seems that Callie is the main driving force as she has previously worked for Playgirl before it folded and also helps with Bust magazine.

The mag came about because the three joked that they could do better than Playgirl. When a male friend volunteered to be a model, it all became quite serious. Candy Rain’s first issue was funded by a party with a $5 cover charge. It’s only 31 pages and I’m not sure where you can buy it.

What female porn consumers want, according to Watts, is a realistic reflection of sexuality encompassing both carnal lust and the inherent humor of floppy external genitalia. “No one ever gives porn a chance to be both [funny and hot],” she laments. “You can make fun of the dick and still wanna stick it in your mouth.”

When Filament launched last year I expressed doubts about how well they’d do because they decided to be a hard copy magazine. So far they’ve proved me wrong by being very popular. I’ll be interested to see if Candy Rain can replicate that success.

I’m thinking that since I spend so much time stuffing around on Twitter and Facebook that I should start doing a weekly roundup of the interesting links I find every day. I don’t want to include any serious commentary as it will take up time and thus not get done. So this is just a “quick n fast” post:

“Common old fashioned fuck: $2.50″
“Squatting on prick: 62c”
Check out this hilarious menu from a brothel at Johnno dot com

Roseros is a wonderful site featuring the erotic paintings of Anthony Christian. These beautiful images have a passionate intensity to them that may well fire up your fantasies.

Annie Sprinkle reveals why she thinks the concept of “sex addiction is a crock here.

Top 5 Reasons Why Porn-For-Profit is Dying – not sure if it’s all dead just yet.

Disturbing news from the UK that 6 men were acquitted of rape charges after the judge found the victim had expressed a sexual fantasy about group sex. Good comment here.

New law requires women to name their baby and paint a nursery before getting an abortion – hilarious video from The Onion

Gay teen worried he might be Christian – also from the Onion

Who cares about the stupid present? Give her tongue, man!

Alison and the good people at Good For Her have sent out a press release concerning next year’s Feminist Porn Awards. They’re planning to create a jury of members of the public to help judge the films, which is an excellent initiative. You can find out how to become a jury member here.

They’ve also initiated a scholarship for new and upcoming feminist porn filmmakers (hmm… sounds familiar), the Emerging Filmmaker Award (EFA).

The EFA will honor emerging talent in the field of feminist porn production by offering monetary scholarship to an individual who is breaking boundaries, creating sexy feminist porn and who is committed to the representation of women and alternative sexualities in erotic media. Each year, Good For Her will strive to select new, up and coming talent with the hopes of creating more accessible opportunities for those whom are traditionally challeng ed by the process of securing finances for their creative projects.

The EFA is intended for the completion of a film project to be released for film screening and/or DVD distribution in 2010-2011. The EFA is intended for individuals working on their first erotic film project(s) only.

Full terms and conditions are on their site.

Despite all my best laid plans early in the year, I have nothing to submit for nomination. I could, however enter the EFA as I have plenty of exciting ideas in the pipeline.

The year is drawing to a close and thus it’s time again to take a look back at all the newsy and interesting things that have occurred in porn for women in 2009. Overall it’s been a big year with plenty of media attention and what appears to be a growing recognition within the adult industry itself that yes, women do enjoy porn.

In The News

* The big deal this year was that Oprah featured a show about women and porn. Stunned by the idea that 1 in 3 porn surfers are women, the show’s producers decided to look into the topic. The show featured web sex expert Violet Blue and a brief piece on Kelly Holland, director of many Playgirl’s films, but the main focus was an extended interview with Jenna Jameson, hailed as the most famous porn star in the world.

The end result was a mixed bag. While Violet did a great job at promoting women’s erotica and sex-positive attitudes to porn, Jenna was made out to be some kind of feminist icon, which stretches the truth a little. She seemed to put a lot of female viewers off, judging by the negative comments in the Oprah Forum. It also emerged that Candida Royalle had initially been asked to appear, only to be swept aside when the focus turned to Jenna.

Nonetheless the show did prompt a larger interest in porn for women with several media outlets featuring articles on the topic. Most seemed amazed at this “new” trend, but for me it’s old news.

* In July Violet Blue again made waves thanks to her article on CNN about women and porn which caused a surge of media interest in the topic.

* In August Nightline featured a report on women and porn. The item included interviews with Candida Royalle and Nica Noelle.

* In September a kerfuffle erupted in Sweden thanks to the public funding of a feminist porn film called Dirty Diaries. Filmmaker Mia Endberg and several others created images of female eroticism with home cameras and mobile phones. Naturally the government funding had conservatives frothing at the mouth of the “waste of taxpayers’ money” while fellow feminist porn makers could only sigh wistfully at the thought of it.

* Playgirl was heavily in the news in November thanks to its almost-nude spread of Levi Johnston, Sarah Palin’s ex-son-in-law. They were also reportedly offered naked photos of Tiger Woods post scandal but declined to publish them.

* In October I was interviewed by Spanish magazine 20 Minutos about porn for women.

Hatches, Dispatches… and Outings

* In May Filament magazine appeared on the scene and was met with the usual tired “women aren’t visual” response. The editor Suraya Singh also met with difficulties in getting the second issue published because the printers refused to print photos of erect penises. She managed to turn the problem into a useful awareness-raising campaign and the magazine has been a huge success. I published an exclusive interview with Suraya on the blog in July.

* In the same month it was announced that major women’s erotica publishing label Black Lace was shutting up shop, a fact that caused a great deal of distress for readers and anger for authors who said the company had abandoned a profitable arm of the business. Many bemoaned the loss of one of the few outlets for female sexual expression.

* In July it was also announced that HBO would be producing a new television series based on the idea of an old-school feminist starting a porn magazine for women. Diane Keaton is said to be in the lead role.

* November saw the media world explode with the news that sex blogger/writer Belle De Jour had outed herself. The fact that highly intelligent research scientist Dr. Brooke Magnanti was behind all those explicit tales of unrepentant prostitution had the moralists in a tizz.

New Porn Movies For Women

2009 was really a big year for diversity with a wide variety of new erotic films released that don’t fit into easy-to-define genres. Independent films and movies made for women have been making headway even as the mainstream porn market has collapsed in the wake of the global financial crisis and growing piracy.

* Director Nica Noelle made a big splash this year with the release of her Sweet Sinner line of erotic films. Rejecting many porn traditions, Nica has created an impressive, female-friendly series that’s high on storylines and good-looking porn stars.

* Petra Joy released Her Porn 1, a compilation DVD featuring the work of numerous female directors such as Marianna Beck, Maria Beatty, Emilie Jouvet and Candida Royalle. Candida also released Petra’s film Feeling It under the Femme label in November.

* Anna Span launched her new line of films for women called Women Love Porn, with two films: Apocalypse Angels and Rock Hard. The third eponymous title was delayed due to censorship issues in the UK – see below.

* Queer pioneer Courtney Trouble has moved into film directing, releasing her debut Roulette along with follow-ups Nostalgia, Speakeasy and 7 Minutes In Heaven. Her movies cross all genre boundaries, featuring lesbian, gay, transgender and straight sex scenes.

* BDSM and Queer trailblazer Madison Young was a veritable powerhouse in 2009, directing and starring in six of her own films as well as running her San Francisco art gallery Femina Potens.

* New Zealand director Astrid Glitter released Triple X Vignettes, her straight follow up to her impressive gay debut John.

* Australian filmmaker Anna Brownfield made waves in Berlin when The Band opened the Berlin Porn Film Festival. Her impressive film is now available on Amazon.

* Shine Louise Houston continued to prove that lesbians are making the porn of the future with her feature film Champion, an epic that went on to win awards all over the place. She also released more episodes from her successful dyke site Crash Pad Series.

* Tristan Taormino pushed the boundaries of feminist porn with her amazing film Rough Sex. The movie explored the idea of consensual power play where women act out submissive fantasies through rough sex. She also helmed several more releases in her Vivid Ed series.

* The Playgirl production line continues apace, releasing at least one film each month of the year along with a line of gay male masturbation titles.

Awards and Festivals

* The Feminist Porn Awards had another successful year. It was the first time the awards offered a large list of nominees – a sign of how far we’ve come, perhaps. I’m pleased to say that For The Girls was a sponsor this year and the event was sold out. The announcement of the winners saw Pink and White’s Champion named Film of the Year and, indeed, many of the awards went to queer and lesbian movies. My one gripe about the awards was that the subsequent press and blog reports were rather one-sided and an outsider may not have realised that there were any straight films at the awards at all.

* The AVN awards in January didn’t offer much in the way of nods to women’s films. The preceding Adult Entertainment Expo offered a “marketing to women” panel at the expo starring Kelly Holland and a bunch of other women I hadn’t heard of. Madison Young made headlines by walking the red carpet with dyke porn star Syd Blakovitch, causing the AVN people all sorts of genre headaches. (AVN magazine later went on to cause outrage due to several unsavoury articles – one promoting racist porn and one discussing BBW porn in the most derogatory terms possible. They also had dust-ups with Violet Blue and Madison Young over the racism issue.)

* The inaugural Poryes awards were held in Berlin in October. Instigated by Sexclusivitaeten adult store owner Laura Merrit, the awards acknowledged the contribution of Candida Royalle, Petra Joy, Annie Sprinkle, Shine Louise Houston and Maria Beatty. The awards aim to promote sex positive, feminist erotic films.

* Also in Berlin, the Petra Joy Awards were handed out to first-time female erotic filmmakers at the Berlin Porn Film Festival. My film That’s What I Like won first prize.

* The Berlin Porn Film Festival was a bright point in the erotic calendar because this year the focus was really on female filmmakers and female sexual perspectives. With roughly half of all films shown made by women, the festival waved a flag for the growing movement of feminist, indie adult filmmakers. My short doco about the festival is here.

* There were a number of other erotic film festivals making waves around the world in 2009. Cinekink was a huge success in New York and went travelling around the US afterwards. Rated X in Amsterdam also attracted positive reviews. Meanwhile the Sexy International Film Festival in Melbourne has expanded and now has outposts in Perth, Paris, New York and Los Angeles.

Research, Surveys and Reports

* 2009 saw an awful lot of news reports and research into the “mystery” of female desire. As usual clueless editors and writers asked the question “What do women want?” with the inevitable generalisations and shrugging of shoulders. One lot even opined on “the real reasons women have sex” – which caused much derision in the blogosphere. Thankfully, the idea that female desire is a paradox was mentioned in one piece, which needs to be said more often. One interesting piece of research suggested that women enjoy being lusted after a-la Twilight and Pride and Prejudice. There was also a refutation of the idea that “women aren’t visual” which is always welcome.

* I also encountered numerous studies into the way teenagers use porn – some enlightening and some accompanied by the usual hysteria. What has become apparent is that teens are not turning into monsters because they use porn; research shows they often view it with very critical eyes. Meanwhile, the US government-funded Internet Safety Taskforce found that teens were rarely in danger from sexual predators while online.

Censorship

The battle against censorship has continued apace this year. My focus has mainly been on Australia thanks to the ongoing battle over the planned mandatory internet filter but also due to other ridiculous incidences of censorship and sexual oppression.

* In March it emerged that the muddled and very flawed net filter plan involved using the AMCA blacklist, a secret collection of URLs that only selected politicians and beaurocrats were allowed to see. Thanks to the inherently anti-democratic nature of this blacklist, it was promptly leaked to the public on Wikileaks. The list revealed that perfectly legal websites such as Abby Winters, I Shot Myself and Whale Tale had been banned, along with political sites such as an anti-abortion site and a pro-euthanasia one. The ACMA scrambled to change their list and maintained that it only contained child porn links but the incident proved just how much of a slippery slope mandatory censorship will be.

* STOP PRESS – I was still writing this post and the news has come through that Conroy has given the filter a green light. Suffice to say I am NOT HAPPY JAN.

* In July police raided the offices of Garion Hall, owner of AbbyWinters.com, the largest Australian adult site. Egged on by a tabloid journalist who told them the models were underage, officers seized computers but in the end did not press charges. The incident brought to light a lesser-known law that means it’s illegal to shoot “objectionable films” in Australian states. No cases have been brought to test what “objectionable” means.

* In August the Melbourne Underground Film Festival was due to screen Jennifer Lyon Bell’s Matinee, a relatively tame yet explicit depiction of two consenting adults having sex. The Australian Office of Film and Literature Classification banned the film without having seen it, preventing the festival from screening it in public. The festival directors pointed out that the OFLC had passed Lars Von Triers’ sexually explicit and violent film Antichrist for another festival because it was “art” but that Jennifer’s beautifully shot example of erotica was considered too dirty for everyday people.

* In July I looked at the inconsistent and hypocritical decisions made by the OFLC with regards to “art vs porn” using 9 Songs as the example.

* In the UK Anna Span celebrated a small victory over the British film censors. Her movie Women Love Porn had been held back from release for almost two years due to the presence of a female ejaculation scene. The BBFC said it was urine; Anna brought in experts to prove otherwise. The censors begrudgingly gave way although they still maintain that female ejaculation isn’t real. The case highlights how censorship often discriminates against expressions of female sexuality.

Ms Naughty In 2009

It’s been a bigger year for me than I expected. In February I shot my first erotic short film That’s What I Like under the name Louise Lush. The film has gone on to screen at Berlin and Melbourne and, as mentioned above, it won the Petra Joy Award. It’s available at For The Girls and should be out next year on the Her Porn 2 DVD.

I had every intention of making more erotic films this year but fate intervened. My husband was diagnosed with mild epilepsy which meant a lot of worry and doctor’s visits for several months, although everything is fine now. Meanwhile, Garion Hall’s arrest in July created legal uncertainty about whether I should make more films. Right now it seems I will have to move overseas to pursue my artistic vision.

I did make a couple of small films including Paddling The Pink Canoe and my Berlin doco. I also attended a short course in guerilla filmmaking in March that was extremely educational and motivational. Going to the Berlin Porn Film Festival in October was probably the most important thing I did all year because it meant I was able to meet so many wonderful filmmakers and other porn industry people. I can see the future and it’s very bright indeed.

For The Girls continues to grow. We’ve published such a wonderful variety of high quality erotic fiction this year and we were also joined by Jamye Waxman, who makes vodcasts for us, and porn star Tyler Knight who writes moving and funny accounts of life in the world of mainstream porn. In the next few weeks we’ll launch our exciting new member’s area.

Some Larger Blog Posts From 2009

The joy of my sex education – how I learned that sperm should wear top hats
How did “yes” become “yes I’ll fuck the whole football team”? – Musings on consent amid the Australian rugby league sex scandals.
This is why we need porn for women – a few glaring examples of why the phrase is still relevant
I’m not really a sex blogger – why I don’t get too personal on this blog
How long is the ideal sex scene? – ruminations on how long it takes to shag on film
Why you shouldn’t assume all porn should be free – my thoughts on why people should be prepared to pay for good porn.

Oh yeah, and then there was the silly Hunks In Aretha’s Hat post. Now that’s quality porn.

It’s been a while since I posted a sexy pic.

I like this one because it makes me wonder what this hunky guy with the nice butt is preparing. This photo makes me hungry, as it were.

I’m kind of bemused at some of the recent news articles that discuss the idea of women enjoying porn. Since the Oprah show they’ve been popping up here and there and they all seem to breathlessly report the “1 in 3 porn surfers is female” like it’s a brand new phenomenon.

It’s not.

I’m now approaching a decade of making porn sites and I’ve been catering to an eager female audience the whole time. And I wasn’t the first person to do this. Women have been seeking out decent porn for years now and even Nielsen Netratings acknowledged this with a “1 in 3″ statistic back in 2003. Hell, when my old employer Australian Women’s Forum launched in the early 1990s it was an old idea.

Perhaps the one difference is that it’s now considered more normal, perhaps because the internet generation have become adults. For them, porn is nothing to be ashamed of; it’s part of their everyday lives. And I’m talking about both males and females here.

Still, it’s nice to get see mainstream outlets acknowledging that women enjoy porn.

Here’s a couple of the pieces that prompted this small rant:
The exploding world of soft porn for women (exploding? Phew!)
Women Love Porn, Too!

It took five weeks but here, finally, is my little doco about the 2009 Berlin Porn Film Festival. It’s a little over 4 minutes and you’ll hear some great comments about feminist porn by some of the fab female directors I met including Shine Louise Houston, Anna Brownfield, Candida Royalle, Anna Span, Petra Joy, Jennifer Lyon Bell and Renee Pornero. Plus a quick cameo from Joe Gallant and footage from the Petra Joy Awards presentation.

A much longer version went live at For The Girls yesterday and I’ll also be uploading more footage there soon. Candida Royalle’s lecture about her films is particularly interesting – that’s waiting for a future update. I also wrote an expansive article about my experiences in Berlin for FTG.

The short blog version is that I had a ball, won an award, met lots of wonderful people and wished it could have gone for another 3 days. I didn’t get to enjoy nearly enough films because I was so busy with the Petra Joy Award but the ones I did see were amazing.

It was the people I met that really made it worthwhile. I interviewed Shine Louise Houston from the Crash Pad Series and was so impressed with her drive and knowledge. She’s a woman with a plan and she’s going to become even more of a force to be reckoned with in the future.

Well-known director Joe Gallant could well be the nicest man in the world. We talked the future of porn and hopefully we can work together at sometime next year. He said he thought I’d like Bong Water Butt Babes but I wasn’t so sure. He made me aware of how disconnected I am from the mainstream porn industry… something for which I’m kind of grateful.

Anna Brownfield is a card. We were so pleased to meet each other and had the comraderie of two Aussies lost in Europe, trying not to slip into slang when giving interviews. Her film The Band was such a standout and it shows you can easily marry explicit sex, comedy and great storytelling.

I also got to meet Lisa Vandever from Cinekink who is so much fun and easy to talk to, as is Vena Virago, a wild, pink haired artist who just happens to make porn for Vivid Alt. And I found myself getting stupidly protective towards the gorgeous Julie Simone, who is very quiet and shy, despite being a fearsome BDSM Mistress who can rock a rubber dress.

And then there’s Jennifer Lyon Bell of Blue Artichoke Films who I met last year. Jen is kind of like the social glue of the event, introducing people and arranging dinners and you couldn’t encounter a warmer, more positive person.

I even got to say hello to Candida Royalle, albeit briefly. Indeed, I cringe a little when I think about it. I was feeling a little starstruck and eagerly handed her my card which read Louise Lush. “That’s my new pretendy name,” I said.

Pretendy name??? Sheesh! I like to flatter myself that I have a decent vocabulary but do you think I could remember the word pseudonym for love or money at that moment? My husband has been teasing me about my pretendy name ever since.

OK, enough name dropping. Suffice to say I made lots of contacts and, as you see in the film, we all feel like we’ve found a family in Berlin.

I’ve since discovered quite a few of the short films on Youtube or other free sites around the web. I’m hoping to feature these on the blog in the future.

And as expensive as it is to travel all that way I think I’ll have to go back in 2010. The festival is too much fun and far too useful to miss out on.