Playboy Wants Female Vloggers to Take It All Off
We're overstating the obvious here, but there is a reason why the face of so many vlogs is a pretty, young woman. You don't need an in-depth study of Social Technographics to figure it out either: This is an admittedly oversimplification, but simply put, Straight men want to be with her and women just want to be her. By catering to prurient interests and role modeling (did we happen to mention that many of these women vloggers are also wicked smart?), a large portion of the online community is a ready-made audience.
So it should be no surprise then that Playboy.com (which has been an online presence since the early days of the public Web: 1994) is looking to capitalize on the popularity of vlogging and blogging and the existing male (for the most part) fan-base by adding a little nudity to the mix:
"Who are some more of the blogosphere's sexiest women? We scanned the web for some of our favorite female bloggers and video bloggers (or "vloggers") from the worlds of finance, entertainment, tech and sex, and we want to know who your favorite is. Vote now and we'll ask the most click-worthy candidate to pose for Playboy.com."
You can think this as Playboy's own "America's Sexiest Blogger" contest. Playboy has identified its nine candidates as:
Hey, what about Mahalo Daily's Leah D'Emilio? Why isn't she on the list?
None of the contestants were asked ahead of time if they wanted to participate or not. In fact, Amanda Congdon Twittered this comment: "did NOT consent 2 being on the playboy list of blogger u want to c naked. I did NOT agree to be on it like the others so pls don't vote 4 me." Sarah Austin seemed a bit more ambivalent: "Not sure how I feel about being in Playboy's popularity contest. Maybe I'd feel better if I was winning? It's odd." Violet Blue actually seemed excited: "Playboy's hottest bloggers lineup includes me!" And Sarah Lacey actually penned an entire blog about it, where more than anything, she seemed rather amused by the whole thing:
"I guess my main reaction was just laughter. It never ceases to amaze me that anyone could describe someone holding one of the least sexy jobs in the world-- a business reporter-- as somehow professionally sexy. And I guess others agree since my vote tally is so low! I'm guessing it's definitely a BusinessWeek first. I just hope they're not embarrassed, because I'm certainly not."
Lacey commented that the description that Playboy provided of each contestant "doesn't insinuate any of us only have jobs for our looks and had a generally respectful tone in all of the pieces." We can't speak for all HotHardware readers, but we actually find intelligence to be pretty darn sexy. Based alone on Lacey's smart response and ability to not take herself too seriously, she gets our vote!
For anyone who truly cares about the outcome of this contest, Brigitte Dale is the current frontrunner. There is no word on how long the contest will go on for or how much money the winner will be offered to pose nude.
So it should be no surprise then that Playboy.com (which has been an online presence since the early days of the public Web: 1994) is looking to capitalize on the popularity of vlogging and blogging and the existing male (for the most part) fan-base by adding a little nudity to the mix:
"Who are some more of the blogosphere's sexiest women? We scanned the web for some of our favorite female bloggers and video bloggers (or "vloggers") from the worlds of finance, entertainment, tech and sex, and we want to know who your favorite is. Vote now and we'll ask the most click-worthy candidate to pose for Playboy.com."
You can think this as Playboy's own "America's Sexiest Blogger" contest. Playboy has identified its nine candidates as:
- Boing Boing's Xeni Jardin
- Open Source Sex's Violet Blue
- Wallstrip.com's Julie Alexandria
- Tekzilla's Veronica Belmont
- Sometimesdaily’s Amanda Congdon
- Cattygirlsdiscuss's Brigitte Dale
- Tech Ticker's Sarah Lacy
- Pop17's Sarah Austin
- CNET TV's Loaded's Natali DelConte
Hey, what about Mahalo Daily's Leah D'Emilio? Why isn't she on the list?
None of the contestants were asked ahead of time if they wanted to participate or not. In fact, Amanda Congdon Twittered this comment: "did NOT consent 2 being on the playboy list of blogger u want to c naked. I did NOT agree to be on it like the others so pls don't vote 4 me." Sarah Austin seemed a bit more ambivalent: "Not sure how I feel about being in Playboy's popularity contest. Maybe I'd feel better if I was winning? It's odd." Violet Blue actually seemed excited: "Playboy's hottest bloggers lineup includes me!" And Sarah Lacey actually penned an entire blog about it, where more than anything, she seemed rather amused by the whole thing:
"I guess my main reaction was just laughter. It never ceases to amaze me that anyone could describe someone holding one of the least sexy jobs in the world-- a business reporter-- as somehow professionally sexy. And I guess others agree since my vote tally is so low! I'm guessing it's definitely a BusinessWeek first. I just hope they're not embarrassed, because I'm certainly not."
Lacey commented that the description that Playboy provided of each contestant "doesn't insinuate any of us only have jobs for our looks and had a generally respectful tone in all of the pieces." We can't speak for all HotHardware readers, but we actually find intelligence to be pretty darn sexy. Based alone on Lacey's smart response and ability to not take herself too seriously, she gets our vote!
For anyone who truly cares about the outcome of this contest, Brigitte Dale is the current frontrunner. There is no word on how long the contest will go on for or how much money the winner will be offered to pose nude.
