I Don't Think "Sex Tape" Means What It Used To Mean???

So, back in the day, there were these things called “sex tapes.” Like people would record themselves having sex on a phone or something, and then they’d email it around, and then, blammo, on the Internet. And people would be like “oh no, don’t show that to everyone, oh my stars.” And then — or maybe from day one! — people would realize the publicity value in this was immense. So then a number of sex tapes “leaked” with varying degrees of publicist denials or threats of legal action. (Most legal action in the sex tape arena has to do with dividing rights for sale. It’s actually a fun aspect of copyright law, too! Like “Oh I am the copyright holder of this sex tape, I was holding up my T-Mobile whilst doing Fred Durst” or whatever.) People love to watch the sex tapes! It was all about the shock and scandal and delight and then judging the doing of the sex acts. Like “oh that person who I’ve never heard of who is now famous sure is good at doing that sex thing.”

So it’s confusing that we’ve finally flipped from covert ops to overt ops in the sex tape arena. Here is a young woman making announcements about her sex tape. Apparently it was shot yesterday! And it is going into edits! And she hired porn star James Deen! And now it is being shopped to porn companies.

This is not a sex tape! This is a good old-fashioned porno. And so we have come full circle.

ALSO MY GOD, we are calling them “tapes,” that is so unreal!