Admittedly a porn loving country, Germans have never been shy about their lust for pornographic videos, magazines, and Internet content, but this week's decision by the DLM will enable German cable television networks to provide hard and softcore content to subscribers in greater supply than was previously available.
According to a report from Deutsche Welle, the issue of porn access has been debated at length by the regulatory board, and while a great deal of softcore content is available during the late night hours to adults, porn will now be offered as a media service as a way of limiting access by children and teens under 16 years of age.
A condition of the DLM's decision is that all hardcore porn will be offered only on a pay-per-view basis and will only be available to cable subscribers who have a Smartcard.
According to the DLM, Smartcards are the only way to ensure that minors are protected from exposure to hardcore cable content. Deutsche Welle reports that Germany has very strict youth protection laws in place, more so than most other European countries.
Deutsche Welle also states that in response to the DLM's decision, privately held cable service Premier TV plans to use two providers of erotic and pornographic films for pay-per-view content. Beginning in 2004, Premier will begin featuring more than 3,000 films from Erotic Media.
Telemedienst GmbH subsidiary Blue Movie, part of the Premier network, has also issued plans to offer subscribers the choice of three 90-minute porn films per day, which will change on a daily basis, Deutsche Welle reports.