A/N/N/A/R/C/H/I/V/E
▻http://annarchive.com/cybersex.html
“Just imagine yourself in the near future getting decked out
in your cybersensual suit for a hot night on the nets. You plug
your jack into your cybernetic interface device, which then
enables you to receive and transmit realistic tactile sensations.
Suddenly, you are in a strange new world where you can run your
hands through virtual hair, touch virtual silk, unzip virtual
clothing and caress virtual flesh.”
The Joy of Cybersex, published in 1993 by Brady (publishers of
those BradyGames strategy guides), is a newcomer’s guide to the
boundless and enticing world of digital sex. This being 1993,
before the rise of the internet, cybersex here means porny
CD-ROMS, vague promises of “virtual reality,” and most of all:
adult BBSes, or Bulletin Board Systems.
This book is a fascinating snapshot of these things. Content
warnings are in order, though. The authors of the book are
prone to casually mentioning bestiality, though there’s no
depiction of it anywhere, and trans women exist to the staff of
The Joy of Cybersex exclusively as a fetish.
The book is written as an advertisement for cybersex, the
concept, and the text is very rarely critical. For all the
techno-utopianism of the book - cybernetic fucksuits! - The
Joy of Cybersex upholds lots of very normative ideas about sex.
It’s nevertheless a fascinating artifact of a little-documented
time in the intersection of sex and technology - especially Part
Three, a survey of online BBS networks from the perspective of a
woman author. Despite the generally affirmative tone of the book,
this chapter nonetheless paints a really familiar portrait of
what it’s like to exist as a woman online.
Because of the sheer size of the book (over 350 pages!) and the
varying archaeological interest each part caters to, I’ve split
the scans up into five different parts. Descriptions below.
Thanks to Simon Carless for donating the book and ANNARCHIVE
supporters for crowdfunding my efforts to archive it!
