Dearly beloved: our subject this morning is online pornography and what to do about it. The fact that there is a good deal of erotic material on the Internet is beyond dispute, though the precise amount is unclear. Let us assume that X percent of websites contain porn, where X is a number between five and 15. What does that tell us? Answer: An awful lot of people seem to be interested in pornography. If there wasn't a demand, then presumably there wouldn't be such an abundant supply.
In the early days of the Web, things were pretty straightforward. As with any novel communications technology, pornographers were early and enthusiastic adopters. In one respect at least they were no different from their predecessors (who likewise exploited photography and movies when those media were new): They had a business model. In the 1990s, smut peddlers produced pornographic movies and put them on the Web. But they weren't free: Punters had to pay by credit card, which effectively meant that hardcore porn was only available to adults.
This kept the problem apparently within manageable bounds. The fact that pornographers found it worth their while to produce and disseminate their wares (which involved some investment and expense) suggested that there was a real market for the stuff. And given that the Net effectively lowered what one might call the "shame threshold" (instead of having to sneak furtively into a "specialist" shop, punters could view from the comfort and privacy of their own homes), the Internet undoubtedly expanded the market for commercial porn. However much the puritan lobby might dislike this seamier side of human nature, at least the commercial nexus confined it to adults and kept it out of the reach of children.