According to many different surveys conducted over the past decade, it is believed that 30-35% of the total amount of data transmitted on the global Internet is associated with pornographic content. Responsible for this (huge) percentage are mainly two websites: Pornhub and XVideos, which are now among the fifteen most popular sites on the entire Internet. In fact, since many of those who visit these sites, especially from countries in Asia where they are banned by law, hide their footprints digitally, their place on the list is even higher. The story of the Pornhub expansion is now being told by a new documentary on the Netflix platform, the trailer of which has just been released.

Susan Hillinger’s Money Shot: The Story of Pornhub, which airs March 15, includes interviews with former site employees, sex workers and activists who speak out against her from time to time. Most important, however, is understanding how Pornhub has been able to radically change the adult entertainment landscape since 2007, offering erotic content as well as hardcore porn to a huge global audience and effectively “educating” an entire generation about new sexual models. . At the same time, she turned a marginal part of the film industry (pornography) into a billion dollar industry with star actors, brilliant awards and millions of followers.

Of course, this is one side of the coin. On the other hand, which the documentary also details, there are the dark cases of human trafficking, child pornography, and non-consensual sex that Pornhub has sometimes been associated with. “The more I looked at it, the more I was stunned. I have seen too many cases of children immortalizing their worst moments,” says the activist in the trailer. Another points to how the platform actually tracks its users: “Pornhub basically does what Facebook does. In other words, it operates like a giant data-collection enterprise.”

There are, of course, defense voices in the film, mostly from the thousands of erotic performers – professional or semi-professional – who have made their living from pornography for years. In the US, a recent package of laws aimed at restricting/censoring Pornhub and other similar sites has already generated a lot of backlash. “This is not just an attack on pornography. This is an attack on freedom of expression,” says one of the Money Shot interlocutors, while another, a member of the LGBT community, exaggerates: “If it wasn’t for porn, I probably wouldn’t be alive.” Today.”