Thursday, Jan 31, 2008    Text size: 

The finance and technology blog Creative Capital reported that consumers across the web are spending less time on social networking websites. The numbers break down like this:

Just as America Online once ruled the online roost, so too may the social networking giants see their era pass. How would that affect adult? The Web 2.0 movement has influenced the adult industry's marketing and promotion, from the advent of interactive bells and whistles on an adult star's official site to the growing popularity of viral marketing.

Online guru Brandon Shalton told XBIZ that if social-networking websites lost popularity, they'd likely pass the torch to video-sharing sites.

"If people are spending less time mucking around on crappy looking home pages at MySpace or bored of tweaking their Facebook pages with widgets, then they'll probably want to look at free porn," said Shalton, who founded the traffic analysis service T3Report.com. "That means sites like yuvutu.com and similar user-generated, free websites is what people will flock to for their casual porn viewing entertainment."

If that's the case, the adult industry may be in for some headaches. Digital Playground Director of Marketing Adella O'Neal told XBIZ that "illegal video streaming and file sharing has a direct and definite impact on the entertainment industries."

Smash Pictures Vice President Stuart Wall agreed. He told XBIZ that his company loses 15-20 percent of its profits to video-sharing sites.

Adult star Nikki Benz joined the chorus, telling XBIZ that video-sharing sites siphon off profits from the industry. She also said that if the MySpaces and Facebooks of the world disappeared, she would focus her energy on her official website.

"That's where the true fans would go to connect with me, because I feature movies and pictures there that you can't find on any sharing site," she said.

There also are indications that it isn't time for social networking sites to panic just yet. Based on Alexa.com's traffic rankings, MySpace remains the sixth most popular website, while Facebook is ranked seventh and Friendster comes in at a respectable 15th place.

At least one adult industry figure questioned whether the alleged decline of social networking sites is backed up by reality, at all.

"[MySpace] isn't going anywhere," adult star Dana DeArmond said. "I wonder why you'd even ask?"