I've looked at old newspaper archives from the 70's and I notice that, on the movie pages, X-rated films and hard-core porn were advertised alongside mainstream movies.  A newspaper from 1974, for example, will have an ad for The Sting or a family movie like Herbie while the next page will be filled with ads for Deep Throat, Behind the Green Door, or Teenage Fantasy Girls.  You definately no longer see this in newspapers today.  What do you think the reason(s) for this is?  Considering that this was at the height of the sexual revolution, do you think it's because we've grown more conservative as a society? Or is it simply the fact that porno theaters have since gone out of business and most X-rated films now go straight to video/DVD? 

Or is it simply the fact that porno theaters have since gone out of business and most X-rated films now go straight to video/DVD? 


...there's porn on something other than the Internet?

You've pretty much nailed it.  In the 70s, the only - and I mean only - way to present video content to an individual consumer was to film it, copy the film, and show it, frame by frame, through a projector, in a theater.  There were no VCRs, let alone DVDs. 

Television existed, but it didn't count because cable TV wasn't widespread, and networks had to work within the limits of the FCC.  Nobody in their right minds would risk a multi-million dollar trasmitter, broadcasting license, and chunk of spectrum for the advertising revenue (remember, this is the 1970s tech of broadcast TV, so not only are you not able to charge anybody per view, you don't even know who's watching!) that could be brought-in by... well, there are only two ways you can insert commercials into pr0n, and I'll leave it to your imagination to figure out why neither of them are gonna work.

The instant cable TV became widely available, you saw the Playboy Network open up as its own premier tier of cable programming.  (You may have seen it in the squiggles of tri-mode sync suppression or SSAVI video encoding, but by Glub, if you were male and of a certain age, you probably saw it... and may or may not have learned something about analog electronics from a couple of notable issues of Radio Electronics, but I digress... :)

The 80s not only saw cable, but they also saw VHS (and Betamax), which revolutionized video distribution - not only could video content be viewed in the privacy of one's own home, it could also be copied.  You'd bring your big clunky VCR to your friend's house, press "Play" on his VCR, "Record" on yours, and dub from one VCR to the other.  Just like audio tapes, but more cumbersome.  The rest is history.  I'll buy that $60 copy of Star Wars, but rather than go to the back shelf of that icky video store, I'll just bring the VCR over on poker night and tell the missus that the five extra blank tapes are because I'm copying Star Wars for my friends.

Why did pr0n theaters die and the regular movie businesss thrive?  Well, the movie studios simply refused to release movies to video until they'd stopped making money in the theaters.  Where the content is important, as in first-run movies, that model lives on - do you see it in the theater, or do you wait for the DVD?

With pr0n, the content's not so important.  It's all functionally identical, so pr0n went into an economic race to the bottom centered about cost of production, which - in an age of $300 HD video cameras and $0.00 distribution costs thanks to the Internet - are effectively zero.  To the extent that they mattered, production values went with it.  The fact that it's still a viable (albeit struggling) commercial business is proof that production values didn't matter.

this is why i sold my old copies of of SWANK ;D

NOT FOR NUTHIN',  PORN MOVIES IN A THEATRE ENVIRONMENT IS KINDA SKEEVY!

yuck!

Adult movie cinemas starting closing during the height of the video revolution of the 80's so there was no more need for advertising.

Adult movie cinemas starting closing during the height of the video revolution of the 80's so there was no more need for advertising.


They're still around in the red light districts of bigger cities.  They're basically cruising areas. 8-P

I've looked at old newspaper archives from the 70's and I notice that, on the movie pages, X-rated films and hard-core porn were advertised alongside mainstream movies.  A newspaper from 1974, for example, will have an ad for The Sting or a family movie like Herbie while the next page will be filled with ads for Deep Throat, Behind the Green Door, or Teenage Fantasy Girls.  You definately no longer see this in newspapers today.  What do you think the reason(s) for this is?  Considering that this was at the height of the sexual revolution, do you think it's because we've grown more conservative as a society? Or is it simply the fact that porno theaters have since gone out of business and most X-rated films now go straight to video/DVD? 


Well, there were many things behind that.

For example, in Los Angeles, only one newspaper would run ads for porn theatres, that was the Herald-Examiner.  The Daily News and LA Times would not run them.  I always thought that was rather strange, but that is how it was.  And the last of the theatres pretty much died when the Herald went under in 1989.

And Foo pretty much got it right.  From 1972-1987, you had the "Golden Age Of Porn".  I have always chosen those years because it covers the time from Deep Throat to the unmasking of Traci Lords' real age.

But porn was largely dying already in 1987, with more and more production companies moving from film to video.  This allowed for a drastic reduction in production and distribution cost, and an equal lessening of quality.  Within a few years scripts pretty much dissapeared, and also any pretense of acting.

And a lot of areas simply never had porn theatres, where they did have porn videos.  I know that in Idaho they were illegal, but with a wink and nod you could rent them from the corner video store.

  In the late '60s and early'70s, X rated movies would often play in normal "respectable" theaters. I remember one called "I Am Curious  Yellow". When I was about 13 or so a friend and I went to "Five Easy Pieces" and were treated to a five minute preview of some upcoming show which featured total frontal nudity. We were impressed to say the least. When shows like "Deep Throat" came out, they were catergorized as XXX, and relegated to the seedy theaters in the part of town you didn't want to be after dark. There were no more X rated shows. I guess those seedy theaters still exist, but with DVDs and the internet, I don't know why the hell anyone would frequent them.

  In the late '60s and early'70s, X rated movies would often play in normal "respectable" theaters. I remember one called "I Am Curious  Yellow". When I was about 13 or so a friend and I went to "Five Easy Pieces" and were treated to a five minute preview of some upcoming show which featured total frontal nudity. We were impressed to say the least. When shows like "Deep Throat" came out, they were catergorized as XXX, and relegated to the seedy theaters in the part of town you didn't want to be after dark. There were no more X rated shows. I guess those seedy theaters still exist, but with DVDs and the internet, I don't know why the hell anyone would frequent them.


Why?  As stated above, for the company.
8-P

XXX was an advertising gimmick created by the adult entertainment industry.  X was an MPAA certification, but too stigmatizing for major motion pictures, so NC17 was introduced in the late '80s.  "A Clockwork Orange" and "Midnight Cowboy," both acclaimed films were released initially with X ratings.  There's nothing explicit in "Midnight Cowboy," but the references to homosexual prostitution were too much for the prudes at the MPAA!

  You're right that XXX was an invention of the adult movie industry. There was a point where X rated suggested that it may have been a good movie with an actual plot and that maybe somewhere along the line things got too sexy or violent for the R rating. After XXX the plot became a thin little device to attach a whole lot of very explicit sex to. But still, "for the company?" Big Ick factor.

  You're right that XXX was an invention of the adult movie industry. There was a point where X rated suggested that it may have been a good movie with an actual plot and that maybe somewhere along the line things got too sexy or violent for the R rating. After XXX the plot became a thin little device to attach a whole lot of very explicit sex to. But still, "for the company?" Big Ick factor.


Story told before, the only time I went to an actual porno theater was in the twilight of the institution only to discover that, though ostensibly showing heterosexual features, it was still a gay cruising area and I got hit on, whereupon I bolted out of the place!
8-P