A troubling thought about the girls of the rabbit

[Patty Hearst]

Not trying to beat a dead horse or be a downer, but unless whoever owns them decides at some point to release any of the countless unpublished, unused photos taken of our favorite girls of the month it's entirely possible we've seen all the photos we're ever going to see of Karen Price, Alana Soares, Patty Farinelli, etc.

Any photo shoot results in far more photos than are ever used, so there's no question there are literally thousands of unpublished photos of all our favorite girls that we've never seen. I just wonder if we'll ever see any of them.

I could be wrong but it seems to me that there are less and less "previously unseen" photos of these girls popping up in the Softcore Models sections, and I have to admit it's starting to bum me out.

The idea that I've seen all the nude photos of Karen Price that I'm ever going to see is sad indeed.

Again, not trying to be a downer just trying to face the sad truth.

[Bill McNeal]

There aren't even any playmates any more, and I don't consider anyone after Kristy Garrett to be a real PM. So yeah, it's all downhill from here.

Maybe they will sell the photo archive at some point to raise some cash

[sami_sam]

I think that if the business model of the Cyber Club/Pl@yboy Plus had continued, we would have seen more of those missing shots, through Daily Doubles, retrospectives, and things like that.

It is possible that many shots were discarded at the time for being unusable for some reason or other - slightly blurry, too similar to another, etc.

Regardless, what pictures do remain are definitely an asset, and I would think whoever owns the rights will eventually release them in one form or another. If nothing else, tastes tend to be cyclical. The bunny is unfortunately sort of bland in today's climate of get whatever you want on the Web, but eventually, there will be enough of an audience for the classic girl next door, and we'll see them again.

[SexObjex]

From cave drawings, to Greek vases, to paintings, cinema, and Brazzers ... there is always an audience for hot nude women. It's the one constant through all of recorded human history.

They'll dig em out and sell them when they need dough.

[bajskorv]

So, here they are, opening up the archives a little bit.

https://www.playboy.com/app/pamela_anderson

To the tune of 200 bucks for 9 photos. Are they thinking that the audience for this content is now so small that a few whales will bring in more profit than pricing it for mass consumption?

For me this strategy does not raise hopes for a major archive release anytime soon.

[skippy1729]

Originally Posted by bajskorv

So, here they are, opening up the archives a little bit.

https://www.playboy.com/app/pamela_anderson

To the tune of 200 bucks for 9 photos. Are they thinking that the audience for this content is now so small that a few whales will bring in more profit than pricing it for mass consumption?

For me this strategy does not raise hopes for a major archive release anytime soon.

At that price they'll be lucky to recover the cost of staff time required to put together the package.

They'll eventually get re-posted on the internet, everything is.

[Gordon3]

When it comes to unreleased Playboy material, there's a couple of categories of it. First were thousands of "candids" and videos taken at the mansion. According to the Secrets of Playboy series, at least a sizable cache of that, if not all of it, was burned by Crystal Hefner. That mystery discussed on VEF for years appears to have been solved.

When it comes to professionally shot material, Mindgeek, et.al., of course, holds ownership to that. However, they have been very unwilling to post beyond what they have already put on Playboy Plus (as discussed in my previous post here, though that's been 3 years ago: http://vintage-erotica-forum.com/sho...1&postcount=54). In fact, they have been removing Playmates and other posts in recent months, according to other VEF members. My theory was that they're likely receiving ceast & desist letters from former models, and they simply can't fight over those model releases in court (many were signed under duress). There has also been increasing outrage, as expressed in places like the Secrets of Playboy show, from models over the sale of that content to Mindgeek. It is highly unlikely that a large amount of new, unseen archive material will ever be posted on that site.

Now, there have been some leaks of some slides (some of which have appeared on VEF), though I'm not sure what the source is. However, many former Playboy photographers are still alive, and probably have their own archives which could come out, after death, or whatever. For example, David Mecey has been actively putting out Playboy-like photography in an effort to restart the concept of Playboy magazine.

Playboy Holdings has been offering some content that I assume was held back from the sale to Mindgeek. However, as posted above, the prices have been ridiculous, amounting to about $20 per JPG. This strategy will work about as well as their aborted attempt to sell them as NFT's.

I also think that someday, sooner rather than later, Mindgeek will sell the Playboy assets when it is no longer profitable for them to retain the license to the Playboy Plus name. There has been a significant decrease in new model updates recently to that site, posting only about half as much material as they used to (from about 6-7 updates per week to about 3-4 per week now). This indicates that they're probably losing money on the Playboy name at this point. This money could be used instead for lawyers, as the fleet of lawsuits against them wind their way through the court system.

Playboy Holdings could buy those assets back, even at a small profit, assuming they would be financially healthy enough to afford it. Then, could they subsequently afford to build a pay web site, etc., in order to make a profit on this archived material? That's very hard to say, probably not.

Another possibility is that a private individual, as I posted in the above thread, could just buy the hard drives and slides off of Mindgeek for a paltry sum in the 5 to 6-figure range, strictly as a vanity project. (From personal experience, any physical media like slides have got to be beaten up at this point anyway.) Would that person then dump it into the public domain or put it into a closet to rot as the remaining slides fade and the iron oxide on the hard drives loses its magnetization, thus losing Playboy for eternity? Again, hard to say.

[jawknee]

Originally Posted by Gordon3

Another possibility is that a private individual, as I posted in the above thread, could just buy the hard drives and slides off of Mindgeek for a paltry sum in the 5 to 6-figure range, strictly as a vanity project. (From personal experience, any physical media like slides have got to be beaten up at this point anyway.) Would that person then dump it into the public domain or put it into a closet to rot as the remaining slides fade and the iron oxide on the hard drives loses its magnetization, thus losing Playboy for eternity? Again, hard to say.

My dad's KodaChromes, taken from the '50s through the '70's, still look like they were taken yesterday. I can't imagine they would have abused their slides and negatives, as they are in many ways their principal asset.

[timenstich]

I assisted Phillip Vullo in Atlanta on SE shoots back in the '90s. Cynthia Kaye was the stylist/AD. We sent them every frame of film. l was told that they destroyed all of the out takes. I don't know that it's true . . .

[SexObjex]

I think we need to let Playboy go. It was a time and a place and it's not coming back. We have all the pictures and memories we need.