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Playboy Is Featuring Naked Women Again -- After Dropping Nudity a Year Ago Due To the Internet (nypost.com) 259

mi quotes a report from New York Post: The 63-year-old legendary men's magazine is bringing back nude models in its upcoming issue -- one year after banning naked photos in an effort to boost circulation and attract more mainstream advertisers. That effort obviously has failed. One of the main reasons why Playboy dropped nudity in the first place was because the internet filled the demand. Ravi Somaiya reports in the New York Times, "For a generation of American men, reading Playboy was a cultural rite, an illicit thrill consumed by flashlight. Now every teenage boy has an internet-connected phone instead. Pornographic magazines, even those as storied as Playboy, have lost their shock value, their commercial value and their cultural relevance." The issues published under the no-nudes policy, which featured both scantily clad models and could-be naked women with strategic parts of their body covered up, will all change with the March/April issue now hitting newsstands. The issue trumpets the change with a cover headline: "Naked is normal."
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Playboy Is Featuring Naked Women Again -- After Dropping Nudity a Year Ago Due To the Internet

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  • Where are all the Nerds? Oh, right. They read computer mags.

    Never mind...

  • by rubycodez ( 864176 ) on Monday February 13, 2017 @09:12PM (#53862361)

    Only in Trump's American can a naked Playboy emerge from the ashes of clothed boringness! We're going to make America undraped again!

  • by dohzer ( 867770 ) on Monday February 13, 2017 @09:13PM (#53862365)

    Has anyone here ever actually paid for porn?

    • Re:Free (Score:5, Insightful)

      by quonset ( 4839537 ) on Monday February 13, 2017 @09:14PM (#53862369)

      Has anyone here ever actually paid for porn?

      Companies wouldn't still be in business if people didn't.

      • Re: (Score:2, Flamebait)

        That's like saying Wal-Mart couldn't exist if it didn't treat its employees with respect and pay them livable wages.

        • That's like someone injecting a leftist rant on Wal-Mart into a discussion on something totally different.
      • Has anyone here ever actually paid for porn?

        Companies wouldn't still be in business if people didn't.

        Sure they would, they give away the movies and make their profit from live shows and merchandising, right?

      • I worked for IEG (Seth Warshavsky, Wikipedia it...). People pay for porn.

    • Re:Free (Score:5, Interesting)

      by buss_error ( 142273 ) on Monday February 13, 2017 @09:31PM (#53862465) Homepage Journal

      Has anyone here ever actually paid for porn?

      I used to admin (on a retainer, they called when they needed something) the bookkeeping system for a adult store chain. in the early 90's they booked over 2 million net profit per month. In 99 when I stopped, it was less than 300K. Company was sold off and it is now owned by a company whose name you know if I said it, and appears to be making profits again. I dunna know.

      • Re:Free (Score:5, Interesting)

        by swb ( 14022 ) on Monday February 13, 2017 @10:03PM (#53862621)

        I worked at a 4 location local video store chain in the early 1990s. Our location was one of the two locations that had porn titles.

        We used to run reports near close and there were some nights where we made 80% of our revenue on porn movies. 75% of that gay porn.

        At this store, the actual tapes were shelved behind the counter and an empty box with a hunk of foam inside was on the shelf. You brought the box, we put the tape in a plastic VHS carry case when you rented it.

        The porn room was a separate room in the back of the store, but the whole empty box selection routine worked the same. But the porn boxes were probably 50% larger in area than the regular titles, but people would always walk out of there and grab the FIRST title they could reach (the A section of drama) in some vain attempt to cover the box, which of course it never did. And they would do it when no one else was in the store, too -- like, umm, I have to read the title to give you the actual videotape to take home. No secrets here.

        One night I moved the tiny self-help & how-to section to where drama was supposed to start because I figured nobody rented them anyway, and if the nervous porn hounds were going to just grab random titles they might as well not decimate the As out of the drama section.

        The biggest hoots were when we people whose name you recognized -- or people you knew! -- came in for porn, especially gay porn.

        • Re:Free (Score:5, Funny)

          by Anonymous Coward on Monday February 13, 2017 @10:32PM (#53862771)

          The biggest hoots were when we people whose name you recognized -- or people you knew! -- came in for porn, especially gay porn.

          I was only renting those for the articles.

        • Ali Davis, is that you?
          XXX1 [lee.org]
          XXX2 [lee.org]
          XXX3 [lee.org]
          XXX4 [lee.org]
        • by haruchai ( 17472 )

          "We used to run reports near close and there were some nights where we made 80% of our revenue on porn movies. 75% of that gay porn"
          In the 80s, I worked at a magazine chain that also rented movies. Several locations would rent adult films but the revenue champ was the main location downtown that included gay porn. All employees with less than 5 yrs seniority were required to rotate among several locations; the worst part of working downtown was when a customer wanted a refund because of problems with the re

    • by swb ( 14022 )

      I read that one of the dirty secrets of the mainstream entertainment business was how much money they made selling pay per view porn in hotels.

      Which I guess makes sense since it just shows up as "MOVIE" on the bill, allowing people who stay in hotels to buy it (and often expense it) and watch it and no one was the wiser.

      When I used to stay at a Hyatt in Irvine, they had a single porn movies and some kind of 6 hour, all-you-could-eat extravaganza of porn. I always wondered who bought the extravaganza. Bach

      • Was. PPV porn revenue has plummeted in recent years.

        The Hilton chain dropped it entirely last year. They made a big announcement about 'values' and 'family,' the usual stuff to try to score points with a certain demographic, but the real reason was purely financial.

        • by Pascoea ( 968200 )

          but the real reason was purely financial.

          Probably happened around the same time the unwashed masses started demanding free wifi. I never thought of it that way, but I can only assume that's why hotels resisted offering wifi for the longest time.

    • Twice, two issues of the Playboy magazine from the same model (Tiazinha) in 1999 and 2000. I was a teenager but I still have them for sentimental value.

    • Re:Free (Score:5, Insightful)

      by MBGMorden ( 803437 ) on Monday February 13, 2017 @11:25PM (#53862985)

      Yes. Not directly for quite a few years, but even in modern times I'll tip girls on cam sites and such. Not huge amounts (probably no more than $20 per month in total), but I try to support the content I like in some way. I also subscribe to a few Twitch streamers and am a Patreon of a handful of Youtubers.

      If you don't, eventually the content goes away.

      That said, while I think they'll certainly sell more issues with nudes, the whole concept of nude vs non-nude isn't Playboy's problem. The problem is that it's a magazine. While people might still be willing to pay for content, they're not willing to pay for content in that particular format anymore.

      To a large degree I the shift the in the market is just making huge companies with a big staff just not profitable. Sure some things like a blockbuster movie is hard to do at home, but what Playboy is selling can be provided by any pretty girl with a camera in her bedroom. She can provide the product with a LOT less overhead than a huge company.

      • Re:Free (Score:4, Interesting)

        by gl4ss ( 559668 ) on Tuesday February 14, 2017 @01:23AM (#53863479) Homepage Journal

        playboy is more of a brand than anything nowadays.

        also playboy does some non-nude variations internationally already.

        the thai version is non-nude for example.. and they got a thai tv channel thats non-nude too.

        this new "we'll have nudes but they're not going to be 100% sexual but just natural" thing sounds like a disaster though.

      • The problem is that it's a magazine. While people might still be willing to pay for content, they're not willing to pay for content in that particular format anymore.

        Personally, I always found magazines much more comfortable than tablets or laptops for, er, reading.

    • Not just to view, no, but I have paid to commission pornographic artwork.

    • I think as a high school senior I bought 2-3 porn VHS tapes:
      One was of Aria Giovanni, one of Akira Fubuki, and one hentai tentacle porn vid "Urotsukidoji: Legend of the Overfiend".
      Then as a college freshman I bought the French "movie" full of unsimulated sex, "Baise Moi", which was basically a graphic version of Thelma & Louise, but with porn actresses in the lead roles.

      On a few occasions I've bought Japanese porn mags in the convenience stores if a particular model catches my eye, and they often c
      • by dbIII ( 701233 )

        "Urotsukidoji: Legend of the Overfiend"

        That's not porn, it's no more porn than "3x3 Eyes", all those Masamune Shirow books and ... damn I see your point - so many tentacles.

    • Some people must do, I guess they subsidise the rest of us.
  • by hambone142 ( 2551854 ) on Monday February 13, 2017 @09:31PM (#53862463)

    When I was young, my uncle left a Playboy Magazine at our house. I saw it and my mother said "go ahead and look at it, the people in them are all the same".

    No, they weren't. Even today, I have never seen a woman that is "the same".

    When a kid/teenager can't get the real thing, good ol' Playboy did the job. It opened the wonder of women and all of their "parts" that I had never seen before. It was good old home entertainment. I wore out some pages on my favorite issues (no, they didn't get stuck together but they came close.... oops, pardon the pun).

    When I read that Playboy eliminated the nudes, I couldn't believe it.

    I'm glad they went back to their roots.

    • by AmiMoJo ( 196126 )

      The problem they had was an increasing need for novelty when simple nudity (and much more) was widely available online for free without the need to make an embarrassing purchase. They would get celebrities to pose every month, getting as desperate as featuring Marge Simpson.

      Even that was not very effective because of course the images were instantly scanned and put online for free anyway.

      Basically, you can't make much money out of printing soft porn these days. Playboy was always more than that though, it h

    • Well, I can't say I was ever a fan of Playboy, but surely the nude photos were the only interest it had? I think there is a lot to be said for good quality (and perhaps even artistic) erotic photography, and if I remember correctly, Playboy actually tried to achieve that. But I think what let them down was their lack of real taste - there was too much in the way of glitter, fur and high heels, back when I had the opportunity to look at them (I could never be bothered to actually buy it). I'm far more intere

      • I can't say I was ever a fan of Playboy, but surely the nude photos were the only interest it had?

        They do/did publish work by proper writers, like Ray Bradbury and Vladimir Nabokov.

  • Maybe Playboy is just preparing for the Trumpocalypse. When we all are running oil lamps, not questioning where the precious resource actually came from (humans), and staring at nude Playboy posters that have become illegal (hypocritical) because God only talks to Republican US presidents and the Pope, we will be glad for when your flame flickers, it is as if she seductively dances only for you. The humming of the night drones and screams of those that missed curfew canceling out the spank noise. The audio
    • man are you clueless on Trump's views about Playboy. Trump was even interviewed in Playboy in the 90s and also appeared in a couple of their videos.

      • Trump was even interviewed in Playboy in the 90s and also appeared in a couple of their videos.

        Yeah, of course, have you seen the women he imports? On the other hand, after Trump gets impeached and Pence becomes president, everything liberal had better watch the fuck out.

        • And THIS is exactly why Trump won't be impeached.

          For Trump, Pence is better than any insurance policy.

          • by dskoll ( 99328 )

            Completely true, and Trump is saving tons of taxpayer money by not needing Secret Service protection. Nobody would think to take out Trump because Pence is waiting in the wings...

      • Trump doesn't really have a lot of views on social issues. He has positions of convenience. He has already signed a pledge to fight against the evils of pornography, not because he personally believes in that cause, but because that is the expected thing for a Republican to do and he needs the party behind him. His position on abortion is exactly the same: Once he joined the Republicans, he suddenly decided to switch sides on that too.

        On economics, and on border security, he appears to have some strong view

  • by DontBeAMoran ( 4843879 ) on Monday February 13, 2017 @10:29PM (#53862761)

    I'm sorry, but naked women are anything but natural.

    • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

      by geek ( 5680 )

      I'm sorry, but naked women are anything but natural.

      What fucking planet do you come from where being naked isn't natural? Are people on your planet born in scuba gear or something?

      • Re: (Score:2, Funny)

        by Anonymous Coward

        In America, naked women look like planets.

      • by Anonymous Coward on Monday February 13, 2017 @11:09PM (#53862921)

        Do you want to get wooshed? Because this is how you get wooshed.

      • by mjwx ( 966435 )

        I'm sorry, but naked women are anything but natural.

        What fucking planet do you come from where being naked isn't natural? Are people on your planet born in scuba gear or something?

        Whilst I firmly believe that sex is one of the most natural and wholesome things money can buy... the kind of naked women in Playboy are not natural. They have always, at the very least, been airbrushed the hell out of. Add to that the fact a lot of them are surgically altered (boob jobs, arse implants, now we've got thigh and ab implants), I wouldn't call them natural.

        Also the notion that sex and sensuality is wrong and immoral comes from growing up in a religious environment. This also tends to be repl

    • Hush, we're trying to establish a precedent here!

  • Went back east to Illinois to mom's sister. Her husband took me to the basement, which had a TV and pool table. He showed me where the beer was, and the playboys. I was, um, enjoying the playboys when the lights went out. Went upstairs to adults deciding to investigate. Went with them, some drunk off his ass dude had nailed the power pole maybe half a mile from Archie's place (Archie was the uncle, Maxine mom's sister).

    Never got back to the Playboys nor the beer, but I've told this story dozens of
  • by RubberDogBone ( 851604 ) on Tuesday February 14, 2017 @12:37AM (#53863263)

    I used to be a stockholder in this company, before Hef threw a fit and took it private. Why did he do that? Because investors like me were telling him he was full of shit and his ideas sucked and it was costing the company money, all of which was true. He didn't like it. He took is bat and balls and went home.

    The truth about Hef is that he ran the magazine with final editorial control and final say on EVERY business effort they made, worth mentioning, and he was well into senility by the end, making just awful decisions one after another.

    One great example was the annual 'contest' the magazine and website held to have readers vote for PMOY. None of that shit mattered. Hef and Hef alone picked the winner and that's why for a long time they were all the same blondes, and why he had three of them at once as girlfriends. Hef didn't give a shit about the readers or the company. The decision to drop nudity was actually the first idea in decades that didn't come from Hef. Somebody else came up with it and Hef was so out of it, he waved it through.

    Which was a disaster. Like most of Hefs ideas.

    Cooper Hefner has a much sharper idea of what he wants to do and he gets what the reader wants. Um well, he gets the girls AND what the readers want to see. So maybe he will be able to make a miracle out of it.

    Thanks to Hef, the company has spent decades ignoring massive IP they could have been monetizing, like the bunny girl costumes. That outfit is famous worldwide and isn't considered nearly as adult as the magazine. So why hasn't Playboy had their bunny girls everywhere? All they do license is the rabbit head logo, and then for shit like bad cologne sets and stickers. WTF.

    I hope Cooper turns the merchandising around. I really do.

    • by Baron_Yam ( 643147 ) on Tuesday February 14, 2017 @08:49AM (#53864859)

      Playboy Clubs should have been so entrenched in our culture that Hooters never happened. You'd have to tier the branding, but it should have been done.

      Same thing with Maxim - it never should have launched because Playboy should already have owned the space. Instead of taking their magazine no-nude, they should have had a 'skimpy clothing' variant years ago. (If they did, I never heard of it so that's a different kind of fail)

      Basically, if you are a guy with money in your pocket, you should have been seriously tempted to peruse a Playboy Men's Health magazine at lunch, eat dinner at a Playboy restaurant, and go for drinks at a Playboy bar and maybe later on go to a Playboy night club. While wearing Playboy cuff links.

      And women should have had 'Playboy for women' (Not Playgirl) as a Cosmo-alternative to let them know '6 tricks in bed to please your Playboy' or something.

      SO much marketing potential wasted.

  • Good, I'm glad to hear they're putting back the Playmates.

    Even though it's primarily a men's magazine, I still pick up an issue on occasion. It just hasn't been the same over the last year; the faux high-culture style of the magazine lost something essential when it lost the nudes. They aren't the only reason to read the magazine, but it makes for this interesting mix of wit, beauty, and far too many ads for liquor.

  • The reaon being... (Score:4, Insightful)

    by OpenSourced ( 323149 ) on Tuesday February 14, 2017 @03:23AM (#53863855) Journal

    One of the main reasons why Playboy dropped nudity in the first place was because the internet filled the demand

    Like the Internet didn't fill the demand for news and opinion articles.

  • i wondered when i saw some new PB girls on youtube, all nude, and very nicely shot and sexy.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?... [youtube.com]

  • They can't compete with scratch and sniff magazines!

  • I'm a nudist ("naturist"). Nudity is prosaic. I see more naked people every weekend than many of you have seen in your entire lives.
    American society makes such a big deal about nudity, when our media is literally saturated with it. People like nudity, and not just for porn. There's a vocal minority of never-nude types who raise a fuss. I do photography as a hobby. If I post a beautiful flower online it might get 4 views. If I post a non-sexual nude photo it'll get 107 views. People like nudity.
    I've observ
    • I used to come across nude beaches when I live in California.

      There is a difference between those nudists, and the nudes in Playboy.

      Most people are best not viewed nude. This may be especially true of nudists.

      The woman featured in Playboy are exceptional, and then they are professionally made up and photographed, and then the photos are photoshopped.

  • Apparently there's nudity on the internets!

    PS please post link.

  • The Internet did not kill Playboy. Playboy killed itself. I once knew a girl that worked at Playboy. She told me that by far, the majority of employees are women. I am not surprised. As far as I know, the DAUGHTER of the founder is in charge of the magazine but I may be wrong. So women writing and designing a magazine made for men. Not surprised this is heading for disaster. If I remember correctly, they once showed Marge Simpson (from the comic series) naked. I mean, really? Besides that, I find the pi
  • by uncoveror ( 570620 ) on Tuesday February 14, 2017 @12:13PM (#53866623) Homepage
    Nude or clothed, print is dead.

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