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Ford's profile in the business really skyrocketed last year, though, when he broke the story about porn star Mark Wallice being HIV-positive. Like Matt Drudge's early stories of Monica Lewinsky's blue dress, at first Ford's reports were taken as evidence that he had become a dangerously irresponsible rumor-monger. At one point, after enduring vociferous criticism from the industry, Ford even apologized to Wallice.

Four months later, Wallice tested positive -- under mounting pressure, a colleague had dragged him to the clinic. To this day, many in the industry claim that Ford got lucky -- that just because the story was true doesn't mean he was right to publish it without hard evidence. "Just because he turned out to be right that time is no reason to applaud him as a great reporter," says Alexandre. Ford himself says he had no way to be absolutely sure about the story when it ran -- "I just had so many sources that told me he was positive that I took a chance and went with it." Either way, Wallice had been regularly working without showing his test, and by reporting the story Ford caused the truth to come out. He may have saved lives.

Last month Ford published his first book, "A History of X," which is, as he readily admits, a mess, a rambling and formless account that attempts to squeeze 100 years of sex on film into 232 pages. Huge dramas are condensed into a few sentences. Relating one of the biggest scandals in porn history, he simply writes: "In 1991, Jim Mitchell, frustrated by his brother's erratic ways, murdered Artie. He then hired a clever lawyer who bamboozled judge and jury into a 'voluntary manslaughter' conviction carrying a maximum punishment of six years in prison. After serving three years, Jim was released in 1997." End of story.

Ford insists that the reason the book is so bad is because his publisher, Prometheus Books, made him chop it from 1,000 pages to its current length (largely for legal reasons). One is tempted to dismiss this as a self-serving rationalization, but South, who saw the original draft, backs up Ford's account. Nevertheless, the book is suffused with Ford's trademark sarcastic contempt, making it frequently amusing. He deadpans, "Meyer was not the type of guy who reduced women to their tits. 'I've had more than my share of ass,' says Meyer." He relishes recounting the shattered dreams of porn actresses, like the story of Marilyn Chambers (whom he calls by her real name, Marilyn Briggs) and her blown shot at a Hollywood career. "She later moved to Los Angeles, where an important producer offered her a deal: He'd provide her with an apartment, car, acting lessons, spending money, roles in major films and career guidance in exchange for Briggs being his mistress. Not wanting to be tied down to an old man with a big paunch, she rejected his offer. On his way out the door, the shocked producer told Briggs that she'd never make it in the biz. He was right. Briggs never succeeded in mainstream entertainment." The book is often a jeremiad against the business disguised as a behind-the-scenes history -- though, to be fair, Ford also debunks certain stories that have bedeviled the business, including the myth of snuff films (he says they don't exist) and Linda Lovelace's insistence that she made "Deep Throat" under threat of violence (no one present on the set corroborates her account).

It's startling, given Ford's blatant hostility toward porn, that anyone in the industry talks to him. The fascinating thing about Ford, though, is that he's so charming that even those who have every reason to despise him are often won over when they're in his presence. Ford has the gift of making you feel like you alone, of all the idiots in the world, really get it, are really on his wavelength. "Last year I was at [the Adult Video News Awards]," says South. "I was talking to a lady in the business. She had never met Luke, and she wanted to know who he was because she was livid about something he put on his site about her. Luke comes up, I introduce them, and she immediately goes into a very obvious attack mode. Within two minutes she's sitting in Luke's lap."

The lady? Alexandre, who still maintains friendly relations with him. "Personally, on a one-to-one level I talk to him every now and again, but on a professional level I hate his guts," she says. "He's one of those angst-ridden guys that draws women in. They want to ease his suffering. He might lay on the charm to get people to open up -- we good-looking people use that all the time. The problem is he turns around and hurts people with it."

"He's essentially an unhappy person based on the work that he does," Alexandre continues. "In one breath he embraces the industry because it supports him, and in the other breath he shuns it. He hates it but he needs it, and whatever the need is based on only he and his psychiatrist know. But he is nice, soft-spoken and friendly." Adds Paul Fishbein, the publisher of the industry trade magazine Adult Video News, "He's a really charming, nice guy when you meet him and talk to him, but he's not trustworthy." At one point, Fishbein considered hiring Ford. Now he's considering suing him. "He'll print anything, anything anyone tells him. He says things like, 'I heard that Metro Home Video threatened to pull all their advertising' -- if we didn't put all their girls on stage [at the Adult Video News Awards] and give their videos better reviews -- 'so Paul Fishbein acquiesced.' I had to threaten him with a libel suit. Luke Ford is interesting, but he screwed me."

Besides being charming, Luke Ford is also smart, though he believes he's not as smart as he used to be. Ford was an economics major at UCLA in 1988 when he grew ill with chronic fatigue syndrome, the amorphous sickness once dubbed yuppie flu. In an e-mail that Ford posted to his site, his sister apologizes to the world for her brother by attributing his odd proclivities to his long illness.

"In the mid-eighties he contracted glandular fever, which wiped out his energy and therefore his activity," she writes. "It is accepted by medical science that glandular fever, caused by the Epstein Barr virus, is often followed by depression. What still remains controversial is the diagnostic entity chronic fatigue syndrome. But whatever the label I saw my brother slide from an energetic and fun loving boy to an invalid ... Luke in some ways is not the boy he used to be. He seems to lack a degree of insight and balance in his life. I suspect he does not feel the tension which exists between being involved in pornography and gossip associated with that industry on the one hand and his religious beliefs on the other. He was brought up in a very balanced, loving and Christian family. His involvement in pornography is heartbreaking to us."

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