November 20, 2007 | The Biz

Maleflixxx and Naked Sword go bareback

Bareback has taken another great leap forward in its journey from the fringes of gay porn to the mainstream. This week's milestone: the two major gay video-on-demand providers, maleflixxx and Naked Sword, which had until now resisted promoting bareback titles, both reversed their policies.    

Maleflixxx has added 24 bareback titles from a handful of lesser-known studios. No doubt there will be many more to follow.

Naked Sword merged with much larger VOD provider AEBN in January. We forecast at the time that it would not be long before Naked Sword started adding the bareback titles that are a mainstay of AEBN's gay offerings. It took only ten months, despite initial assurances from the Naked Sword executive suite that it would stick to promoting condom-only studios. 

The moves by maleflixxx and Naked Sword signal a shift in the market that has been obvious for some time: there is a strong consumer demand for condomless porn, as the explosion of gay bareback studios and websites attests. At a certain point the ethical concerns of online porn distributors regarding the deleterious effects of bareback had to give in to the overwhelming pressures of the marketplace.

Did someone cure AIDS when we weren't looking?