 Nude & Natural Magazine Naturism is the Way. |
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Nude & Natural Magazine Naturism is the Way. |
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IN THE JARGON OF THE ever-evolving Internet, blogging is becoming the latest craze. A blog is a program that allows one to publish material on the Internet without the need for a substantial amount of programming knowledge. Blogs are often limited to personal musings, journals, or commentaries which are presented chronologically on a Web site. It’s a bit bare bones in presentation but quite functional. In some ways it’s similar to posting to a message board or sending an e-mail, but with the potential to reach a wider audience; in that sense it’s more of a personal Web publishing tool. With that in mind I decided to use some of this column to blog you with some current thoughts.
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As a person involved with the Internet on a daily basis, I try not to think of myself as being of any specific importance. After all, there are as many Internet users as there are visible stars in the sky. Yet somehow, I have become well known by the strangest people from the four corners of the earth.
For example, numerous foreign dignitaries have come to know me rather well, it seems, and after an apparent check of my finances and good character, they want me to help them transfer millions of dollars to some bank account in the United States. While flattered, I often wonder why the U.S. State Department cannot handle this problem for them.
Then there are the financial institutions that seem to want to offer me the greatest mortgage rates going. Apparently they are not aware that I have a nice apartment here in the city and am not in the market for a home loan. While I don’t have much of anything to sell, I am consistently offered access to millions of e-mail addresses to send spam to. I ate Spam as a kid. I got over it.
The disheartening part of being so well known is the number of pharmaceutical sales people that have an urgency to sell me Viagra (or a clone of the little blue pill) for very cheap prices because, apparently, I am not satisfying my woman properly. (Their words—not mine.) This is compounded by the marketing efforts of those who wish to sell herbal remedies or mechanical devices to make me, er... longer. Truly these advertisements are probably the most effective; after months of getting pounded several times a day by these messages, you can easily become emasculated to the point that you start to think maybe you need something. So far, I have resisted.
Curiously, my wife never receives any of these kinds of messages in her e-mail box. Is she satisfied? (Gee, I hope so.) Does she not warrant a mortgage like me? And what about transferring those millions of dollars for the foreign countries? Does she have a secret life that I am unaware of? Enquiring minds want to know!
Maybe it’s just the fact that she uses the online medium less than I do and is less a target for the increasing number of moronic attempts to shaft the American public by taking advantage of the inexperienced, easily swayed or weak-minded. Of course, if you spend any amount of time on the Internet you already know that there are a lot of them out there on both sides of the sales pitch.
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RECENTLY WHILE PERUSING In-ternet newsgroups related to naturism I came across a number of images that were taken at popular skinny-dipping sites. These seemed innocent enough, if taken out of context. After checking the header information (that hen-scratch that tells where it came from and where it’s going), however, I found that the same images were cross-posted to some sexually oriented news groups as well. Indeed, they were intended for that audience.
It seems a new fad amongst the pornsters is going to tolerated nude sites and taking photos of a sexually communicative nature which are then sold on CD or via pay-to-view Web sites. The Usenet postings are teasers to get you to go to their Web site. These are not just photos of everyday naturists at the local skinny-dipping beach, but material specifically meant to be sexually arousing for the voyeur audience.
I can think of nothing more detrimental to our movement than the hijacking of our family-friendly free beach spaces and making them into something they are not. Those voyeurs who are able to identify the site from the images will get the wrong impression as to what the tolerated activities are. Certainly our adversaries will see it that way and double their efforts against us.
Landed clubs are not immune either. Photos taken without the permission or knowledge of club administrators are just as likely to show up.
Beach mayors and “friends of” groups should be aware of this and be on the lookout for offenders who may arrive after the fact thinking that anything goes. Educate, and then hope.
AN INCREASING NUMBER of people are finding themselves arrested for sending nude images of themselves via the Internet. Now, at face value this sounds like it’s a threat to naturists, and it is. Most of the situations currently in the pages of the press relate stories of pedophiles who have coaxed minors into sending them nude images and who have done the same in return. Even with the intent of honestly promoting the clothes-optional lifestyle, sending nude images to a minor is something that a naturist should never do.
More recently, taking advantage of the high profile issue of illegal transmission of nude imagery to minors, an enterprising Florida teen engaged a Maryland man in an exchange of photos while claiming to be an adult. Once the teen had the images in hand, he began a campaign of blackmail, threatening to send the images to the police and have the man arrested. The fellow paid out quite a bit of extortion money over several months before he finally had enough and went to police himself. The Florida teen was arrested and is pending trial for extortion. The press was not clear on what position the authorities will take on the extortion victim.
There is a lesson to be learned here. Know who it is you are communicating with and never take any chances. There is no way to determine who is on the other end of the e-mail for sure or what their motivations might be.
IN THE LAST ISSUE of N we noted a change of address for the Prodigy Naturist message board. In the ensuing weeks Prodigy announced that it would close all of its message boards at the end of October. While the domain name prodigy.com will remain active for e-mail and other limited purposes, its future remains uncertain. Prodigy Internet and several other small Internet providers have been purchased by Southwest Bell Corp. (SBC), which offers its own branded Internet service in partnership with Yahoo.
Former Naturist message board moderator Cheri Alexander has set up a Yahoo Group (list and message board) for former Prodigy users to congregate and meet at http://groups. yahoo.com/group/P_N_R.
Web Reviews
Lupin Naturist Club, California
SET IN THE SANTA Cruz Mountains south of San Jose, Calif., Lupin is a special gem for West Coast naturists. Lupin’s Web site is comprehensive and answers all the common questions of naturism in narrative fashion. Click about at random or follow tabs that take you on a tour from screen to screen. The site is light on images but the few that are included tell a wonderful story of the beauty of the grounds. I found one picture of the morning mist over the adjacent valley quite spectacular. The Lupin Web site does prefer more recent versions of Web browsers that can handle the latest in Java so that pop up menus display properly. It might do well for the club to consider a second alternative navigation bar, at least on their home page, as a way of helping people with older or text-only browsers view all the pages.
NESTLED IN THE FORESTS of Washington state, Fraternity Snoqual-mie has a long history in naturism. The FS Web site is text-oriented, like Lupin’s, and carries information on many area naturist activities, including the Bare Buns Fun Run. Of specific note is the Henry Yuen watercolor image that graces the home page. While the club is known as Fraternity Snoqualmie, the grounds are also known to some degree as Park Forestia, hence the domain name. This is a very easily navigable site. Images are clickable and display larger, giving viewers a story of life at the club.
Standing Up for Standards
Sharing Photos—
Your Risks Online
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www.lupin.com
www.parkforestia.org
DENNIS KIRKPATRICK maintains archived copies of the column at www.sunclad.com/nifoc. Comments are welcome. If you would like your club or personal web site reviewed drop him a line at sunclad@sunclad.com.
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