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Underground Globalization: Mapping the Space of Flows of the Internet Adult Industry

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  • Matthew A Zook

    (Department of Geography, University of Kentucky, 1457 Patterson Office Tower, Lexington, KY 40506, USA)

Abstract

This paper develops a case study of the Internet adult industry in order to study the ways in which electronic commerce interacts with geography. Digital products, low barriers to entry, cost differentials, and sensitivity to regulation have created a pervasive and complex geography of models, webmasters, and consumers around the globe. With a series of specially developed datasets on the location of content production, websites, and hosting it is shown that the online adult industry offers people and places outside major metropolitan areas opportunities to become active purveyors of this type of electronic commerce. The roles of these actors, however, are not simply determined by a spaceless logic of cyber-interaction but by histories and economies of the physical places they inhabit. In short, the ‘space of flows’ cannot be understood without reference to the ‘space of places’ to which it connects. This geography also provides a valuable counterpoint to mainstream electronic commerce and highlights the ability of socially marginal and underground interests to use the Internet to form and connect in global networks.

Suggested Citation

  • Matthew A Zook, 2003. "Underground Globalization: Mapping the Space of Flows of the Internet Adult Industry," Environment and Planning A, , vol. 35(7), pages 1261-1286, July.
    • Handle: RePEc:sae:envira:v:35:y:2003:i:7:p:1261-1286
    DOI: 10.1068/a35105
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    1. Hargittai, Eszter, 1999. "Weaving the Western Web: explaining differences in Internet connectivity among OECD countries," Telecommunications Policy, Elsevier, vol. 23(10-11), pages 701-718, November.
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    3. Matthew A Zook, 2000. "The Web of Production: The Economic Geography of Commercial Internet Content Production in the United States," Environment and Planning A, , vol. 32(3), pages 411-426, March.
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    Cited by:

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