Usenet NEWS vs. Bittorrent - my 2 cents

[Leo Mauler]

--- On Thu, 7/17/08, David Nicol <davidnicol at gmail.com> wrote:

> so the movement away from open internet and towards gated
> VPN communities in underway, and as usual in technology, 
> so-called "adult entertainment" will lead the way.
> 
> Good morning!

Absolutely.  

[Gutenberg's Printing Press:]
Writers: wouldn't publish anything other than safe religious books for decades.
Pornographic Industry: adopted the new technology and published the first common man best-sellers in the world (including both written and picture books), creating the international writers' market.  Also created all the elements of the "novel".  The first conventional novel, "Pamela", is practically unknown to history, but the first pornographic novel (and itself the second novel), "Fanny Hill", can still be found in modern bookstores.

[VCR:] 
Hollywood: tried to ban it.
Pornographic industry: adopted it and created a market of thousands of VCR owners for Hollywood to eventually, grudgingly, exploit.

[DVD:]
Hollywood: wouldn't touch it right away.
Pornographic industry: adopted it and created a market of thousands of DVD player owners for Hollywood to eventually, grudgingly, exploit.

[World Wide Web:]
Business Community In General: wouldn't touch it.
Pornographic industry: adopted it and was the strongest backer of systems allowing safe, secure credit card payments online, the part which made the Web attractive to the Business Community In General.

Technology owes a lot to the pornographic industry.  We probably wouldn't even have this mailing list, into which we are typing these messages, if it weren't for the porn industry.
 
> "I am porn!" -- Luke-Jr