Adult entertainment studio Pink Visual announced the release of an API yesterday so Web and mobile developers can take advantage of the company’s content to create dynamic games, websites and native applications. There was once a time when this would have been significant news. It is not. The porn industry was once the leading pusher of technological adoption. If porn adopted a new innovation, it indicated that tech would likely flourish.
The classic example of this is VHS. Betamax was a better technology but it was more expensive than VHS. So, porn went with VHS and that became the dominant standard for nearly 20 years. The early rise of the Internet was also filled with porn and, like it or not, has been part of the definition of the Web for nearly 20 years as well. The time has come for porn to move over. If you really want to see what the next great Web technology is, the best place to look is at cutting edge game developers working with HTML5.
So, a porn studio released an API (NSFW link warning). Man, APIs are so last year (please note the general sarcasm, APIs are still important). The real innovation is coming with HTML5. In that ecosystem, game developers are the ones pushing the bounds of the Web.
For instance, look at HTML5 framework provider appMobi. We have wrote about their work several times on ReadWriteMobile. The appMobi XDK gives game developers all the tools they will need to create, accelerate, test, debug and emulate mobile games straight from the desktop. The goal of appMobi is to provide the tools and functionality needed for HTML5 developers to create great mobile Web games.
“Porn used to be the industry known for pushing technology,” said Sam Abadir, CTO and chairman of appMobi. “Game developers are really the ones now pushing the bounds of innovation.”
Game Studios Looking to Flourish With HTML5
Game studios pushing the bounds of what HTML5 can do include MocoSpace, which set up a $1 million fund for mobile Web app development recently, and Moblyng. Both have committed to HTML5 developer and are working hard to create dynamic games that will work well in the mobile browser. That is not an easy task. As Stewart Putney, the CEO of Moblyng said to me recently, “do you know how hard it is to create a Texas Hold ’em’ game in HTML5?”
The porn industry liked the Internet the way it was. Studios could dump content online, add a pay wall and a bunch of ads (maybe partner with some spam creators) and watch the money roll in. It is not that easy anymore. Porn could take a lesson from the history (and future) of Facebook. When Facebook opened its API to developers in 2007, the real growth of the platform accelerated.
If it took several years for a porn studio to create an API, how long will it be until they create dynamic HTML5 mobile Web applications? Another several years? The game developers will be on to the next innovation phase by then. The days of porn as a leading technological indicator are over.
