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T A B L E__T A L K

Life in the information age: Share your stories and rants on password snafus, multiple area codes, incompatible software and server failure in Table Talk's Digital Culture area

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R E C E N T L Y

Renaissance geeks
By Simon Firth
Silicon Valley sees itself as the new Florence. Then why is it so godawfully ugly?
(03/26/98)

Pictures from an exhibition
By Scott Rosenberg
With the Smithsonian's new Web site, getting around is half the fun
(03/25/98)

Please, Mr. Postman?
By Andrew Leonard
Netscape's and Microsoft's software just don't get along -- and God help anyone who tries to get them to make up and be nice
(03/24/98)

21st Challenge
By Charlie Varon and Jim Rosenau
Bright ideas for techno-schools
(03/23/98)

Mutiny on the Net
By Andrew Leonard
Music pirates cross swords with the recording industry
(03/20/98)

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BROWSE THE
21ST ARCHIVES

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tricks_ O F_ T H E_ T R A D E

A WEB RADIO SHOW GIVES PORN-SITE WEBMASTERS

A PLACE TO TALK SHOP AND SCHMOOZE.

BY DAVID FUTRELLE | When I was a kid in the '70s, I imagined the world of the future as a pristine suburban mall writ large -- a mixture of Bucky Fuller and "Logan's Run." It never would have occurred to me that, just a few short years from the magical date of 2001, I might find the advance guard of the future sitting in the blue-gray glow of a computer screen, idly exchanging notes and comments on the best way to market naked pictures on the Net.

But there you have it. I have seen the future -- for better or worse -- and his name is Sharky.

Leave it to the adult webmasters -- who've pioneered the use of streaming audio and video and other kinds of interactive entertainment on the Web -- to get to the future before the rest of us. "Sharky Live," webcast from the offices of the Web site Cybererotica, is a twice-weekly, real-time, radio-style talk show devoted to the ins and outs (as it were) of the Internet porn industry. It is, as Sharky himself explains at the start of every show, "the Internet's premier RealAudio show dead mmpphh that'll help you get a feet on the pulse of the adult Web."

Or something along those lines. With RealAudio, it's often a little hard to tell for sure just what people are saying. But you get the idea. "Sharky Live" is a show dedicated to the fine art of "takin' care of business," as the snippet of the Bachman-Turner Overdrive song in the background reminds listeners who may not be perfectly clear on the concept.

The topics range from the vaguely salacious ("Dokk has Phonesex with Marina!") to the mundane ("How to generate productive traffic!"). Aside from the inevitable detours into technical arcana -- like true geeks, those responsible for the show are obsessed with matters of T-3 configuration, retransmission rates and network congestion -- the show is mainly a chance for various adult webmasters with fanciful names like Webfather and Fantasyman to shoot the shit about the strange business they're in.

N E X T_P A G E .|. Is this thing turned on?