End of an Era: Playboy to Stop Publishing Pictures Showing Full Nudity

Wait, did they ever really show full nudity? I haven't looked at it in a decade; I don't know if they tried to keep up with Penthouse. (Penthouse followed Playboy's lead in not showing female genitalia for a while, then broke ranks and began showing it.)

At any rate, apparently Playboy won't be showing naked breasts, either, though they will be showing, um, I don't know. They suggest they'll still have sexy women in sexy poses and I imagine that means the occasional whoops-there's-a-nipple exciting "accident."

But they're definitely repositioning themselves.

Playboy's been a feathered fish for a long time: though it was the most famous nudie mag, the perverts migrated to Penthouse and more aggressively ugly fare (like Flynt's horror show magazine).

Playboy's creed as far as their models was always "The girl next door." Um, unlikely.

They always seemed to attempt something contradictory: Wholesome pornography. A corn-fed Iowa girl with a big friendly smile, and enormous hooters and just a hint of southern climes below.

But how you gonna keep them on the farm once they've seen big-city pornography?

Playboy succeeded in making porn slightly mainstream. That door opened, porn became, over a couple of decades, first a business, then a phenomenon, and now, for good for ill, the unremarkable background of every day life.

Which means Playboy succeeded in legitimizing porn so much it pretty much made itself obsolescent within ten years of the Marilyn Monroe shots. They were always trying to get into other businesses -- the famous Playboy mansions, I think some casinos, PPV video, etc. -- because the core of the company, the magazine, just wasn't making much money.

So they have a brand that everyone knows but doesn't generate much income. I guess they're trying to clean it up so that Disney or someone can buy it and turn it into a nightclub at Epcot Center.

posted by Ace at 07:44 PM

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