pornochromatic

After all the debates and hand-wringing, L.A. County has announced that it can not and will not enforce mandatory condom use in porn production in California. According to the Chief of the county’s Public Health Department, it would just be too difficult and expensive to try to police an industry that’s so fragmented. Public Health officials passed the buck to the state legislature, but as the L.A. Times notes, “not a single California lawmaker has been willing to sponsor such legislation.”

While interviewing Belladonna at the Adult Entertainment Expo, I asked her what she thought about the idea of condom mandates and her answer captured the ambivalence many performers and producers feel about the topic.

The University of Nevada, Las Vegas sociology department released the results of surveys conducted during the 2008 and 2009 AEEs. They asked both fan and trade participants about their demographics and attitudes on various topics. The results are pretty much what I would have expected, but there were a few pieces of info that I found interesting.

Only about 20% of the trade attendees were female.
This seems incorrect to me. Even if you don’t count the performers (although I’m not sure why you wouldn’t), I’d guess that 30-40% of the people I saw or met while working the show were female. In my experience, most companies are owned by men, but have a good number of female employees.

Click images to enlarge

Most companies report business is flat or down
We’re in a recession and battling the biggest threat (piracy) that porn has ever seen. That 67% of companies are seeing flat or reduced sales is unsurprising. What is surprising is that almost no one at the show seemed to be talking about what to do about that.


More than half of respondents watch free porn online
One star I interviewed told me that when she has tried to sell her movies at conventions, fans will actually say that they’re just going to download her movies for free online. It seems insane to me that people could be this insensitive, but the numbers don’t lie.


If you’re interested, you can read the report here.

I’m pretty sure there are approximately 37,000 AVN awards, but here’s a selected list of winners. The full list can be found here.

Best New Starlet: Kagney Linn Karter
Best Actress: Kimberly Kane – The SEX Files: A Dark XXX Parody
Best Supporting Actress: Penny Flame – Throat: A Cautionary Tale
Female Performer of the Year: Tori Black
Female Foreign Performer of the Year: Aletta Ocean
MILF/Cougar Performer of the Year: Julia Ann
Unsung Starlet of the Year: Shawna Lenee
Best New Web Starlet: Lexi Belle
Web Starlet of the Year: Sunny Leone
Hall of Fame: Gina Lynn
Director of the Year (Body of Work): Will Ryder
Best Director, Ethnic Video: Jules Jordan – Lex The Impaler 4
Best Director, Feature: David Aaron Clark – Pure
Best Director, Non-Feature: William H. – Evalutionary
Best Male Newcomer: Dane Cross
Best Actor: Eric Swiss – Not Married with Children XXX
Best Supporting Actor: Tom Byron – Throat: A Cautionary Tale
Male Performer of the Year: Manuel Ferrara
Male Foreign Performer of the Year: Toni Ribas
Unsung Male Performer of the Year: Derrick Pierce
Transsexual Performer of the Year: Kimber James

I took photos on the red carpet at the AVN Awards tonight. Here’s a slideshow:

Friday was the day of Digital Playground. I interviewed all of their contract girls (except for Kayden Kross for some reason) and I really enjoyed talking to Katsuni. I loved that she was able to laugh about her arrest in Mexico in 2004 while acknowledging that she definitely wasn’t laughing at the time.

It was also nice to finally meet Jesse Jane. She’s so effervescent and friendly – admittedly refreshing after talking to some of her fellow contract stars. Our legs were touching during the interview. I wanted to put her in my pocket – the one I’m not already using to hold Belladonna.

I headed back to the Evil Angel booth in the afternoon and talked to Kelly Divine and Angela Summers. I was struck by how authentic and almost vulnerable Kelly is. She’s faced a lot of disrespect and outright meanness because of her choice of career and it clearly hurts her deeply. I really enjoyed talking with her.

Angela Summers was a fun interview to do because she’s been out of the business for 10 years. She came to the show to promote the DVD release of her first movie, Wild Goose Chase. She didn’t stay in the booth very long – she felt that the younger girls were who the fans were there to see – but when I asked about the possibility of a comeback, she said “never say never.”

It was a good day and I got to hang out with America’s Beloved Porn Journalist, Gram Ponante, later that evening. We talked a little bit about the amount of “mainstream” media at the show this year. It seems like a lot. It’s great that the girls get the exposure, but we wondered how they’d end up being portrayed. I think once you start meeting and getting to know these girls you develop a protectiveness of them. They’re real people and that’s easy to forget sometimes.

I learned a few things today. Creepy fans follow Sophie Dee into stores and peek out at her from behind shelves. Ashley Fires likes pretend to be a fembot and to have her toes sucked (though perhaps not at the same time). Asa Akira has one good and one evil Puggle.

I also learned that porn is in worse shape than I thought. In comparison to years past, this show is kind of tiny. People talked a lot last year about the show seeming smaller than years past, but I didn’t think it was all that noticeable. I almost couldn’t believe how few booths (and people) there are this year.



That said, I’m still having a great show. Joanna Angel is a spunky little cutie. Ashley Fires is the friendliest porn star in the universe. Sophie Dee’s got extremely squishy boobs and some serious junk in the trunk. Bobbi Starr is a beautiful and empowered lady. Asa Akira is really fun and totally gorgeous. And Belladonna remains the apple of my eye.

I only have a few photos up on Flickr, but I was pretty busy talking to beautiful women all day. I hope you understand.

Tomorrow will be even busier because I’ll be interviewing Digital Playground’s entire stable of contract stars including my personal faves Jesse Jane and Katsuni. I’ve also got Angela Summers, Kelly Divine, and Tarra White on the schedule. Should be fun. I’ll keep you posted!

I’ve got 7 interviews scheduled for tomorrow and I have to admit that I’m a little giddy about a few of them. I’ll be tweeting that sort of stuff throughout the day and you can keep up with it by checking Twitter (AlisonAEE) or the Twitter digests that will post once a day on the blog.

It’s been a really great day and I’ve gotten to meet some amazing folks including the legendary and beautiful Nina Hartley. Can’t wait for tomorrow!