Porn 2.0 is a term derived from "
Web 2.0
Web 2.0 (also known as participative (or participatory) web and social web) refers to websites that emphasize user-generated content, ease of use, participatory culture, and interoperability (i.e., compatibility with other products, systems, a ...
" that describes pornographic websites featuring
amateur content and interactive
social networking
A social network is a social structure consisting of a set of social actors (such as individuals or organizations), networks of Dyad (sociology), dyadic ties, and other Social relation, social interactions between actors. The social network per ...
features, such as user-generated categorization, webcam hosting,
blogs
A blog (a Clipping (morphology), truncation of "weblog") is an informational website consisting of discrete, often informal diary-style text entries also known as posts. Posts are typically displayed in Reverse chronology, reverse chronologic ...
, and comment sections. This is in contrast to the static content offered by "Web 1.0" pornographic websites. Porn 2.0 websites often have features similar to mainstream Web 2.0 services, including video communities (
Meta café,
Vimeo
Vimeo ( ) is an American Online video platform, video hosting, sharing, and services provider founded in 2004 and headquartered in New York City. Vimeo focuses on the delivery of high-definition video across a range of devices and operates on a ...
, and
YouTube
YouTube is an American social media and online video sharing platform owned by Google. YouTube was founded on February 14, 2005, by Steve Chen, Chad Hurley, and Jawed Karim who were three former employees of PayPal. Headquartered in ...
), social sites (
Tumblr
Tumblr (pronounced "tumbler") is a microblogging and Social networking service, social networking website founded by David Karp in 2007 and is owned by American company Automattic. The service allows users to post multimedia and other content ...
and
Twitter
Twitter, officially known as X since 2023, is an American microblogging and social networking service. It is one of the world's largest social media platforms and one of the most-visited websites. Users can share short text messages, image ...
), general blogging platforms (
Blogger
A blog (a Clipping (morphology), truncation of "weblog") is an informational website consisting of discrete, often informal diary-style text entries also known as posts. Posts are typically displayed in Reverse chronology, reverse chronologic ...
,
Daily Booth, and
Lookbook.nu
"Lookbook.nu" was a fashion, youth culture, and community website, created by Yuri Lee in San Francisco. It was inspired by street fashion websites and blogs such as The Sartorialist and The Cobrasnake and designed for users to post their own stre ...
) and photo hosting services (
Flickr
Flickr ( ) is an image hosting service, image and Online video platform, video hosting service, as well as an online community, founded in Canada and headquartered in the United States. It was created by Ludicorp in 2004 and was previously a co ...
,
Photobucket
Photobucket is an image hosting and video hosting website, web services suite, and online community based in Denver, Colorado, United States. Photobucket once hosted more than 10 billion images from 100 million registered members. Li ...
, and
Picasa
Picasa was a cross-platform image organizer and image viewer for organizing and editing digital photos, integrated with a now defunct photo-sharing website, originally created by a company named Lifescape (which at that time was incubated by ...
).
Monetization
Unlike Web 2.0 ventures such as
Meta Platforms
Meta Platforms, Inc. is an American multinational technology company headquartered in Menlo Park, California. Meta owns and operates several prominent social media platforms and communication services, including Facebook, Instagram, Threads ...
,
Myspace
Myspace (formerly stylized as MySpace, currently myspace; and sometimes my␣, with an elongated Whitespace character#Substitute images, open box symbol) is a social networking service based in the United States. Launched on August 1, 2003, it w ...
, or YouTube, Porn 2.0 was initially unable to find a business strategy that was profitable. Hosting large amount of amateur content resulted in high server costs, there was little or no model income, and services were initially free of charge to users, making advertising income the only source of revenue. By the late 2010s, content
subscription service
The subscription business model is a business model in which a customer must pay a recurring price at regular intervals for access to a Product (business), product or Service (business), service. The model Publication by subscription, was pioneer ...
websites such as
OnlyFans
OnlyFans is an Internet content subscription service based in London, England. The service is widely known for being popular with sex workers who produce pornography, and also hosts other content creators including athletes, musicians, and com ...
, were allowing adult-content creators to directly monetize their content.
Controversies
Copyright issues
One of the central issues of Porn 2.0 is
copyright infringement
Copyright infringement (at times referred to as piracy) is the use of Copyright#Scope, works protected by copyright without permission for a usage where such permission is required, thereby infringing certain exclusive rights granted to the c ...
. Porn 2.0 websites have been criticized as potentially harmful to the income streams of the traditional pornography industry such as DVD sales and website subscriptions.
Privacy
The distribution of sexually explicit images or videos of individuals without their consent is called revenge porn. The practice began in
pornographic magazine
Pornographic magazines or erotic magazines, sometimes known as adult magazines or sex magazines, are magazines that contain content of an explicitly sexual nature. Publications of this kind may contain images of attractive naked subjects, as is ...
s in the late 20th century. The uploading of such images to the Internet to humiliate and intimidate people has become a significant societal issue in the 21st century. Uploading material without a model's consent is usually prohibited by a website's
terms of use, although some sites such as Voyeur Web allow non-consensual photos and move offices frequently to avoid the legal problems this might otherwise entail.
Photos and videos of non-consenting models are often obtained through the use of
hidden camera
A hidden camera or spy camera is a camera used to photograph or record subjects, often people, without their knowledge. The camera may be considered "hidden" because it is not visible to the subject being filmed, or is disguised as another obje ...
s and the sexualization of their nudity. A woman taking a shower at a gym, for example, may be filmed without her knowledge and have the video distributed as pornography.
Porn 3.0
News media have suggested the possibility of a future Porn 3.0, based on the use of technologies such as 3D
stereoscopy
Stereoscopy, also called stereoscopics or stereo imaging, is a technique for creating or enhancing the depth perception, illusion of depth in an image by means of stereopsis for binocular vision. The word ''stereoscopy'' derives . Any ster ...
, multi-angle DVD,
, animation using AI technologies,
and peripheral controller and devices.
References
{{Reflist
Erotica and pornography websites
Video hosting
Web 2.0