A colleague recently asked me what some of my favourite erotic Internet sites are. I scratched my head trying to think of some. I tend to go to sex news-and-information sites more so than erotic sites. Of course, don’t get me wrong, if I’m feeling randy, reading the latest theory about monogamy is not what I’m getting off on.

I’m a bit of a “guy” when it comes to explicit online material. I tend to rely on good old traditional porn as long as it’s decently lit and the people are hot and not too plastic looking. I just Google the kind of image I’m feeling would do the trick and find whatever free stuff I can. I find that a lot more fun, if sometimes challenging, in terms of the unpredictability of Googling “porn” online. You search for threesomes and end up on a site full of images of people having sex with horses.

However, I think the ever-growing glut of smart, fun writing and information about sexuality is more interesting and varied than the erotic material available. I find that stuff pretty predictable, even when it’s trying to be edgy, as with a website like suicidegirls.com.

And some of the really edgy stuff is more fascinating than erotic to me. Like eroticred.com, which features homemade menstruation porn with models eroticizing, well, menstruation. An interesting concept, for sure, but more from an intellectual and political perspective than something that’s going to get me off.

I do think the Internet is a wonderful place to challenge traditional sexual cultural and political dialogues. I like the Internet for its ability to democratize porn and erotic material. The fact that people can make it independently is very cool and tells us a lot about human sexuality.

I love that people like Buck Angel, the female-to-male transexual that I wrote about here earlier this summer (he calls himself the man with the vagina, as he’s transitioned but didn’t do genital surgery because it produces lousy penises and he didn’t want to lose pleasure), is making his own hardcore porn because he wants to represent himself and avoid the “freak show” treatment traditional porn might give him. Even if it’s not your turn-on, it shakes up the traditional corporate porn industry aimed mostly at heterosexual and gay men.

The rise of amateur porn on the Internet has actually forced mainstream porn to change its tune and switch things up. I’m seeing more interesting stuff and interesting people moving from the margins into the mainstream, like Tristan Taormino or Candida Royalle. These women bring a fresh, female esthetic and perspective to mainstream porn.

I don’t know that I’d still be writing about sex if it wasn’t for the influence the web has had and the way it has pushed and expanded the dialogue around sexuality. I mean, how else would I be able to find and write about a guy who likes to dress up as a donkey to get off?

While I know the web has brought people together, especially those from the margins, I do wonder sometimes if it also feeds that immediate gratification thing. Also, because we can be sooooo specific about what we want, there may be a risk of narrowing our sexual tastes. Because we can shop for exactly what we want, we might not try other items on the rack.

Sites I like

• nerve.com (online mag about sex)

• world-sex-news.com (fun sex news from around the world)

• sieccan.org (Sex Information and Education Council of Canada)

• janesguide.com (reviews of online erotica and porn sites)

• dailybedpost.com (U.S. sex writers Em & Lo)

• puckerup.com (sex columnist and porn director Tristan Taormino)

• sexualintelligence.org (Marty Klein’s social commentary on sex in America)

• www.drpetra.co.uk/blog (British sexual commentator Dr. Petra Boynton)

• reginalynn.com (former Wired sex and tech columnist Regina Lynn)

• susiebright.com (site of longtime sex writer and activist Susie Bright)

• planetmidori.com (San Francisco-based sex educator and Japanese rope bondage expert Midori)

• ishotmyself.com (a self portraiture project where women can submit hot images of themselves)

• seska4lovers.com (XXX amateur site by Montrealer Seska Lee and her husband James)