I agree, what an awesome launch. And it looks great too. This might well dwarf every preceding Denton venture, especially as it has global appeal.

The Paris pictures (is it 100% certain Paris?) were up in the alt.binaries.mulltimedia.nude.celebrities newsgroup yesterday (Yes, I was trawling for the full tape, yes, I would have told everyone where to go get it, no, no luck yet, why, because some people set themselves up so spectacularly that they are destined to have sex tapes splayed all over the internet. Spamela Anderson, anyone?)

Bigger picture now: Paris still has a chance at turning this into a mainstreaming of porn gesture, and in doing so would be riding a rising tide (har har). Same with Fleshbot: If porn goes mainsstream (and it only sorta has until now) Fleshbot and Paris could be the two new vanguards.

Look, if Nick Denton wants to help porn go mainstream, that's his business. But Paris Hilton is a young girl who is entitled to her privacy. It's a bit like saying that people who are outed as gay against their will should embrace the fact, because being out is a wonderful thing and because such outings help the world become more gay-friendly. Stefan, if I found a tape of you having sex I would not post it on the internet; if you and your partner were cool with it, you could do it yourselves. Good porn, like good sex, is always consensual. Non-consensual sex is rape; non-consensual porn -- like this -- is something similar.

Oh the sex was definitely consensual (if it is her, if there is a tape). And the recording of the act was consensual too. So it's not akin to rape. Rape is a lot worse.

On a different note, Fleshbot's popularity I think has a lot to do because we're allowed to see it -- "it's not porn, it's a blog". Like buying Playboy for the articles.

Yes, rape is a lot worse. But there are three stages to porn: (1) having sex; (2) recording the sex act; (3) publishing. Consenting to (1) and (2) does not mean consenting to (3). Yes, if she hand't consented to the recording, that would be worse, and if she hadn't consented to the sex, that would be rape. (In fact, some reports say that she's so out of it in the video that it comes very close.) But the fact is, this video is being released without Paris Hilton's consent, and that's just wrong.

Yes Felix what you say may be true but there is not much public desire to see a tape of Stefan having sex.

By the way, when have you seen a picture or video of Paris when she's not "out of it?"

There's a glaring error in this line of yours, Felix: 'But Paris Hilton is a young girl who is entitled to her privacy.' In which universe is that true of someone whose entire reason for being revolves around the relentless courting of publicity? Just like public-figure defences in libel cases, the basic rules of privacy don't count the same for everyone.

Deep links removed because Charles did not have a hissy fit.

Matthew: An analogy might make this clear -- young women can't say no if they dress like that...

Courting one kind of attention doesn't imply consent for another.

OK I checked it out. Needs a lesbo section.

So here's what I didn't have a hissy fit about and why I'm very grateful to Felix for mangling his story:

I admit that this is a harder argument to make with Paris Hilton than with anyone else apart from possibly Madonna.

But if someone had taken a picture of me having oral sex , then plastered it on a website without my consent, I'd rather it was on the Auckland Dispatch's website and unlinked, than the CNN website, linked to by 50,000 other sites. Given its my privacy that's been pointlessly invaded, I think my feelings should be a factor in the decision of people to post and link. Obviously not linking from memefirst will make an infinitessimal difference to the number of people who view the piccis, but its the principle of the thing.

I would feel different if Hilton willingly published photos of her having sex all the time, so that she'd given up any rights to saying that intimate details of her sex life was something she wanted to keep private. But I'm not sure this is quite the case (and Felix apparently agrees).

So, I was worried that linking to the pictures brings memefirst down to a level somewhere below the National Enquirer, too (well, alright, keeps us down at a level below the National Enquirer). So I'm glad memefirst doesn't anymore.

Paris finally does have a purpose in life... helping us figure out some kind of linking guidline.

The "problem" is this: We're a site whose purpose is discussing memes. But it is impossible to do this without also contributing to the propagation of these memes, whether they be "good" memes or "bad". If it's a good or fun meme, then we have no qualms about whether our mentioning it helps in the propagation. When it is a bad meme, we'd be shirking our duty if we ignored it rather than speak out against it (or indeed argue about whether it is bad or not).

Describing a bad meme is not the same as condoning it -- I think we all agree on that. But what we've learned from Paris is that it feels wrong to some of us to link directly to the "bad" meme's meat and bones. I happen to think linking to graphic stills of the video is functionally the same as linking to a site that links to the stills, but symbolically we're separated from the meme by one extra degree, and this is more palatable to some of us. I would certainly never argue that it is always alright to link to something I disapprove of. I'm thinking of Daniel Pearl's execution.

In the end, it's about imagining yourself in the shoes of the people that would be affected if you facilitate the propagation of a meme by linking to it. Personally, I'd be flattered if tapes of my sexual prowess were admired far and wide, but that's just me.

In sum: The new consensus is, inform, don't facilitate. Stay two degrees removed from bad memes.
Feedback?

Stefan, although in practical terms I agree, I don't think that we are quashing discussion of a "bad" meme. If anything this particular meme has shown considerable evolutionary staying power on this blog, and it has also mutated into new species of ideas, both ethical and legal. Surely there is a difference between discussing the ramifications of linking or not to a distasteful website, which by the way could use some Japanese fetish content, and actually making that link. Just like it's okay to talk about how to build a bomb as long as you don't actually build it.

Oh, I think it Fleshbot is wonderful, it was their hosting Paris that hasled to all this.

Don't think they actually hosted the vid. Just pointed you in its direction. Pics, yes, but v. obscure and tame.

Matthew's right. The video was never hosted on the Fleshbot server.

I wasn't clear. It was the hosting of the un-worksafe Paris stills from the video and us deep-linking to them that led to all this. What prudes we are!

what is this site?

Happy new year 2005 from Playboy!