trends

2017 Outlook: Adult’s Interactive Future

2017 Outlook: Adult’s Interactive Future

Adult entertainment, while clinging to its past formats and distribution models, is undeniably moving to a more interactive future, with two-way live content, remote controlled sex toys, increasing immersion and augmented reality bringing models into the viewer’s own environment.

For a glimpse of this future and trends that are driving it, XBIZ asked some of the adult industry’s top executives to reveal their predictions of trends for the year ahead. Here is what they had to say:

More corporations are noticing the power of social media and becoming more active in this segment. I see this across the board, with mainstream, cam sites, tubes, pay sites, and even content producers. -Shirley Lara, Chaturbate.com

Shay Efron
Vice President of Marketing and Business Development

We predict interesting and challenging trends in mainly two relatively new areas that will for sure see advances and increased adoption in 2017. The first one is IoT, or in other words, connected hardware devices with specific functions that interact with and complete the experience of the webcam session. Connected toys are not a new thing and have actually been around for years. However, technology advancements made them smaller, cheaper and much easier to connect and use. In 2016, we already started to see increases in the usage of connected toys by models, which we are sure will continue to grow in 2017. We predict that we will see increasing adoption of connected toys on the users’ side as well for a full bi-directional experience. The second trending area is VR. VR is not new and has been around for a while; however, today’s mobile devices make VR much more accessible to the average user. At the same time, model-side equipment (VR cameras) is also becoming much more accessible, which makes us believe that more webcam sites will start offering VR interactivity experience to users during 2017.

Shirley Lara
COO, Chaturbate.com

More corporations are noticing the power of social media and becoming more active in this segment. I see this across the board, with mainstream, cam sites, tubes, pay sites, and even content producers. There is a growing trend for people relying on social media to stay in touch with friends, get their news, to shop … and it makes sense for the same audience to turn to social media for SFW and NSFW updates in porn.

Ela Darling
Content Manager, CAM4VR

I think we will see a large growth in device interactivity with teledildonics. CAM4VR is preparing to outfit many of our performers with Kiiroo devices to extend the immersive experience even further. I also think we are going to see gamification used to sell experiences, as VR porn companies see more competition and seek to set themselves apart from the rest. I hope to see more novel ways of engaging the users of that particular market and I think that the live cam industry will continue to embrace new technologies that the users can interact with from a distance, allowing them to contribute to the performer’s broadcast as well.

Rick Morales
Community Manager, Stripchat/XHamsterLive

I think one of the biggest trends for 2017 is going to be video sharing or mobile video broadcasting, we can see this in the day to day use of our mobile devices. We, our friends, and family, are sharing our lives (content) through small videos shared on Instagram (My Story) and Facebook (My Day), and of course do not forget Snapchat. Ninety two percent of mobile users share videos on their device with friends — the trend is unmistakable: in 2017, content will still be king — but video will be queen.

If we want to have a successful website, whatever we are selling, promoting, or advertising, doing it by video is necessary. Nowadays, people do not read that much, instead they are watching videos, so I am sure that adding video to your landing page can increase the conversion rate by 80 percent, making this interactivity with videos a big trend in 2017.

Mugur Cosmin Frunzetti
CEO, Studio 20

If interactivity is about toys, I never believed in them and I never will. For us, live cams are about emotions more than about sex. The next big revolution in live cams will be the hologram, and I feel we are so close to it. The market will explode once we can have another person standing next to us — and not only on the screen.

Dragos Costea
CEO, Charm Group

Continuing the trend from 2016, we expect 2017 to be characterized by a huge expansion of augmented and virtual reality in live streaming. [Nowadays everyone is] recording or streaming live — even Facebook implemented ‘Live’ and is ranking it higher in news feeds. More and more platforms are developing and preparing for 360 content using inexpensive VR glasses. I can only foresee that AR and VR will be more than what 3D was supposed to be.

I also believe that the first cam site that will be able to look, feel, and act like a social media network will be the blast of the decade. I can only desire every day to fight with that kind of traffic overflow, and I am confident that someone will be able to integrate it somehow, by the end of 2020.

As the biggest European live cam studio group, Charm Group already signed contracts and is almost ready to stream in VR for those cam sites that will implement the technology faster. We expect the cutting-edge feeling and interactive nature of live cam streaming will continue to drive strong growth in the market as more developers and more viewers get involved. We also believe that TV traffic will grow in 2017, despite mobile traffic.

Derek Devlin
Head of Public Relations, CAM4

I foresee 2017 as being the year that teledildonics comes of age. I expect to see the launch of several new interactive sex toys, as well as increased adoption by existing early movers, particularly those targeting male pleasure. The newest Bluetooth sex toys and other teledildonics are helping to take live cams to new heights for cybersex. By combining them with other cutting-edge technology — such as our 3D 360 VR live cam experience — we’re bringing virtual sex closer to the real thing than ever before and creating the complete two-way experience. We look forward to 2017 as being the year where these emerging technologies start to really get traction.

Copyright © 2024 Adnet Media. All Rights Reserved. XBIZ is a trademark of Adnet Media.
Reproduction in whole or in part in any form or medium without express written permission is prohibited.

More Articles

profile

VerifyMy Seeks to Provide Frictionless Online Safety, Compliance Solutions

Before founding VerifyMy, Ryan Shaw was simply looking for an age verification solution for his previous business. The ones he found, however, were too expensive, too difficult to integrate with, or failed to take into account the needs of either the businesses implementing them or the end users who would be required to interact with them.

Alejandro Freixes ·
opinion

How Adult Website Operators Can Cash in on the 'Interchange' Class Action

The Payment Card Interchange Fee Settlement resulted from a landmark antitrust lawsuit involving Visa, Mastercard and several major banks. The case centered around the interchange fees charged to merchants for processing credit and debit card transactions. These fees are set by card networks and are paid by merchants to the banks that issue the cards.

Jonathan Corona ·
opinion

It's Time to Rock the Vote and Make Your Voice Heard

When I worked to defeat California’s Proposition 60 in 2016, our opposition campaign was outspent nearly 10 to 1. Nevertheless, our community came together and garnered enough support and awareness to defeat that harmful, misguided piece of proposed legislation — by more than a million votes.

Siouxsie Q ·
opinion

Staying Compliant to Avoid the Takedown Shakedown

Dealing with complaints is an everyday part of doing business — and a crucial one, since not dealing with them properly can haunt your business in multiple ways. Card brand regulations require every merchant doing business online to have in place a complaint process for reporting content that may be illegal or that violates the card brand rules.

Cathy Beardsley ·
profile

WIA Profile: Patricia Ucros

Born in Bogota, Colombia, Ucros graduated from college with a degree in education. She spent three years teaching third grade, which she enjoyed a lot, before heeding her father’s advice and moving to South Florida.

Women In Adult ·
opinion

Creating Payment Redundancies to Maximize Payout Uptime

During the global CrowdStrike outage that took place toward the end of July, a flawed software update brought air travel and electronic commerce to a grinding halt worldwide. This dramatically underscores the importance of having a backup plan in place for critical infrastructure.

Jonathan Corona ·
opinion

The Need for Minimal Friction in Age Verification Technology

In the adult sector, robust age assurance, comprised of age verification and age estimation methods, is critical to ensuring legal compliance with ever-evolving regulations, safeguarding minors from inappropriate content and protecting the privacy of adults wishing to view adult content.

Gavin Worrall ·
opinion

Account-to-Account Payments: The New Banking Disruptor?

So much of our industry relies upon Visa and Mastercard to support consumer payments — and with that reliance comes increased scrutiny by both brands. From a compliance perspective, the bar keeps getting raised until it feels like we end up spending half our time making sure we are compliant rather than growing our business.

Cathy Beardsley ·
profile

WIA Profile: Samantha Beatrice

Beatrice credits the sex positivity of Montreal for ultimately inspiring her to pursue work in adult entertainment. She had many friends working in the industry, from sex workers to production teams, so it felt like a natural fit and offered an opportunity to apply her marketing and social media savvy to support people she truly believes in and wants to see succeed.

Women In Adult ·
opinion

Understanding the Latest Server Processors

Over the last decade, we mostly stopped talking about CPU performance. Recently, however, there has been a seismic and exciting change in the CPU landscape, due to innovation by a chip company called Advanced Micro Devices (AMD).

Brad Mitchell ·
Show More