Wednesday, Mar 25, 2009    Text size: 

Foreign Ministry spokesman Qin Gang said that the government was banning the site for the nation's own good.

"China's Internet is open enough, but also needs to be regulated by law in order to prevent the spread of harmful information and for national security," he said.

An informal survey of industry professionals indicated that the Chinese ban wouldn't have a major impact on adult — at least for now.

X2K Consulting and Media Services Owner Stephen Bugbee told XBIZ that China's ban might cause other countries to follow suit.

"That is not good for the new wave of social-networking traffic," he said.

Joe Fredricks of FMG Media told XBIZ the ban probably wouldn't have any effect, but he speculated that the Chinese government's authoritarian policies would inevitably spark a backlash that adult could take advantage of.

In any event, the site remains an important promotional tool for the industry, despite YouTube's ongoing prohibition against adult content, which includes a recent crackdown.

Industry professional Ralph Meow handles PR and other related duties for Shane's World, a company that epitomizes how an adult property can get the word out on YouTube without drawing the wrath of its censors.

The studio maintains a YouTube channel where they post funny videos that include no nudity and no sex — both banned on YouTube. He told XBIZ that he would keep an eye on his company's traffic to see it the ban affects it, but in the meantime, he suspected the Chinese government of having ulterior motives.

"I thought China was going the other way and becoming more lenient and accommodating to western cultures in wake of the Olympics," he said. "This comes as a shock to me. More than likely this is in an attempt to control propaganda from anti government protesters.

Adult performer and talent manager also Lisa Ann has a YouTube channel that a fan regularly updates. She's not using it to promote her clients yet, but she told XBIZ that she might include it in her future plans.

Meanwhile, Google officials have responded by saying that they'll do everything they can to restore access to their sites in China. China has blocked both YouTube and Google for brief times before.