Here Are The Top 5 Ways Porn Has Changed Since The ’90s

Because a lot can change in 20 years…

Since humans are inherently horny, we’ve been pleasuring ourselves to porn since the Renaissance, and back then, it was in the form of unnecessarily frilly, romantically articulated erotic literature.

For instance, here’s a ‘naughty’ line from Shakespeare’s Venus and Adonis:

Graze on my lips, and if those hills be dry,

Stray lower, where the pleasant fountains lie.

Here, Venus is clearly telling Adonis to show her what dat mouth do. That’s so hot, right?

No, it’s not. I highly doubt anyone could ever get off to that, but I wouldn’t know. I’m not here to judge the libidos of people who died hundreds of years ago.

Thankfully, we’ve come a long way since the 1500s, and we can peep Pornhub when we’re feeling horny and just rub one out to one of thousands of X-rated videos.

“With laptops, high-speed WiFi, cell phones, and newer technology, we can pretty much get porn anywhere, anytime,” says Shira Tarrant, author of book The Pornography Industry: What Everyone Needs To Know. 

“For better and worse, technology has arguably democratised access to pornography.”

But back in the 90s, the porn industry was a lot different than it is today, because as with most things, advances in technology brings some serious changes.

And so, as outlined by Cosmopolitan, here are five major ways the porn industry has shifted in the past 20 years.

1. Overproduced porn is out, amateur porn is in.

Unlike the 90s, overproduced, high-end porn with plot lines, costumes, and cheesy yet elaborate sets is swiftly losing popularity, and instead, people are favoring low-budget homemade porn, like the ones made by this ballsy couple who made their own porno at Home Depot.

This shift is all thanks to smartphones and the internet, which make it easy to whip out an iPhone and record a 10-minute sex sesh, then upload it to Pornhub or wherever. Simple!

Back in the 90s, however, it was a whole painstaking production, where you needed a director, a cameraman with one of those massive camcorders, a VHS tape or two, a production company, and finally an embarrassing trip to the adult video emporium to pick up a copy of the tape.

2. Porn stars are earning a lot less.

https://www.instagram.com/p/BW_GZNcFYWE

Thanks to piracy, torrents, and streaming sites like Pornhub and Redtube, it’s pretty rare for a porn star to sign a multi-film contract, and instead, they’re getting paid per scene, which ultimately means they’re earning less money for their work.

According to adult talent agent Mark Spiegler, the average porn star was making around $100,000 a year in the late 90s, whereas today, the average is closer to $50,000.

“Performers are hustlers now, and they have to get very creative when it comes to maintaining their income and reaching an audience,” porn star Chanel Preston told Cosmopolitan.com. “They accomplish both of these through feature dancing, selling merchandise, webcamming, [and more].”

3. More people are watching porn than ever before.

According to Pornhub, there’s a 1,424 percent increase in mobile smut traffic since 2010, which is freakin’ HUGE. So many people are getting off to porn, it’s insane. And if there’s such a massive increase in traffic in the past seven years, just imagine how much it’d be since the early 2000s.

Plus, fun fact: Nielsen found that a whopping 29 percent of Americans watched porn on their work computer in March 2010, which really says something.

4. Indie and feminist porn is gaining popularity.

Apparently, more and more people are watching porn because now, there’s porn that caters to all tastes. Lesbian, queer, trans, feminist porn – you name it. It all exists.

“Many relatively new women and men viewers can be attributed to feminist and indie porn,” says Dr. Chauntelle Tibbals, author of Exposure: A Sociologist Explores Sex, Society, and Adult Entertainment. “The work of new performers, directors, and producers may resonate with people who didn’t previously feel stimulated by adult content.”

But different types of porn has always existed, but it just wasn’t popular, therefore wasn’t easy to come by. No pun intended. Now, thanks to a little something called the search bar, it’s super easy to find whatever tickles your fancy.

5. The classic “Porn Star” look is changing.

When you think of a generic porn star, what do you picture? A busty woman with a thin waist, a bad dye job, and a big booty, right? 

Dr. Tibbals says that even though different types of women have always been represented in porn, emphasis has been on the classic big boobs/tiny waist/poorly dyed hair look…but not anymore.

“I think the industry has shifted a lot as far as the body types that are popular—it is definitely more inclusive,” says Preston. 

“Where in the ’90s, the body type used to be an idealized, unobtainable fantasy, now it has shifted to the girl-next-door look…Many performers today you would never guess were porn stars in their everyday life.”