Adult Video Trade Magazine Proposes New Revenue Figures for Adult Entertainment

Adult Video News (AVN) is something of the document of record for all things porn related. There are other magazines, and countless websites, that cover the adult industry, but AVN remains king of the porn hill. But they survive (and thrive) because they are there to represent manufacturers, and their reportage ranges from genuinely useful to painfully self-promoting. Much of their content comes directly from industry press releases. For this reason I take what I read in AVN with a large grain of salt and a healthy dose of scepticism.

This week they have released figures proposing that adult industry revenue is poised to top 12 billion dollars for 2005. While this could be true, many of their numbers either come from "internal data" or from articles in reputable sources (New York Times, Forbes), except that those articles relied on AVN interviews to reach their conclusions about the financial value of the industry.

I have no doubt that once the mainstream media picks up on these figures it will make a very titillating 30 seconds of news, the problem is that we just can't know if it is accurate. Almost all adult companies are privately held, and reporting is voluntary and only done in their best interest.

Adult Video News - New Study Finds Adult Revenue Eclipses $12 Billion This Year

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