Celebrities and Porn on the Internet

Being the old codgers we are, at The 'Wart, we've bemoaned the growing celebrity bubble which is marked by redundant paper-wasting glossy magazines, redundant blonde starlets, and fame minted on the cheap.  It's only fitting that Google's year-end Zeitgeist report, which enumerates some of the most searched for items in 2005, includes Janet Jackson, Brad Pitt, Michael Jackson, Britney Spears, and Angelina Jolie.  Oh wait, did we mention that these are among the top news searches.  It's plain to see what people see as being important news.  #1 and #2 go to Janet Jackson and Hurricane Katrina respectively.  Let that sink in.

Now there's been a lot of talk lately about the Google/AOL mashup as being some sort of big deal.  AOL, as you recall, was once a big deal on the internet--some sort of ISP or something (we wouldn't remember), that now is famous for webcasting the Live 8 concert.  Few recall that it was (and this is true) their steamy adult chat rooms that fueled AOL's meteoric rise.  Back in 2000, Time Warner basically made a huge investment in the adult content biz. 

Well, the more things change, the more things stay the same.  In Silicon Vally, a new VC fund, AdultVest, has been launched to make, yes, investments in porn.  Why not?  According to some, a staggering 25% of internet searches are porn-related (I imagine that percentage is much higher on the Google image search)!  So the original adult empire "hooks up" with Google, the new XXX-emporium.

Of course, it's nothing new to note that the enormous adult industry is a driver of technology.  Everybody's been waiting for the Silicon Porn-valley outside of LA to weigh in on the HD-DVD vs. Blu-Ray battle for the next generation DVD.  That being said, I don't believe that it was adult content which fueled the rise of Microsoft; something which is really quite impressive

So yes, Google's a great company, and they might stick around a few years, but for all the talk about indexing the world's information, the browser as the OS with Google Inside, and entire industries based on AdSense, it's important to remember that this company, like AOL before it, very much rests on the much-less august pillars of celebrities and porn.  Oh yeah, and mortgages too.

Comments

[Kazim Merchant]

It's quite possible that the reason hurricane katrina is not #1 on Google News is that we didn't have to search for it. The relevant news about the hurricane was more likely to show in headlines. Janet Jackson, although newsworthy is not likely to be a front page top headline on Google News.

Same can apply for other topics. We search for things only if we can't find them without having to search.

[Air Jordan Flight 9]

Great distinctions. It is so important that we identify who is around and keep them separate in our dealings. and ou know, instead of telling people to implement comment moderation, you could just stop leaving stupid looney-bin spam comments everywhere.