2 Hoffman Zip codes have unusually high number of adult site subscribers

SPRINGFIELD - Illinois is below-average when it comes to the number of people paying for adult Internet sites, but two Hoffman Estates ZIP codes have an unusually large number of subscribers relative to their number of broadband users, a new study has found.

An examination of who buys online adult content found Utah topped all other states for adult Web site subscribers with 5.47 per 1,000 broadband users. Alaska, Mississippi, Hawaii, and Oklahoma rounded out the top five, while Montana had the fewest subscribers at 1.92 per 1,000.

Illinois ranked 33rd among the 50 states with 2.54 subscribers per 1,000 households with broadband.

"Even the states that don't have as much still have a fair amount," said Benjamin Edelman, the author of the study and an assistant professor of business administration at Harvard Business School in Boston.

Two Hoffman Estates ZIP codes - 60192 and 60169, one Chicago ZIP code - 60606, and a ZIP code in south suburban Beecher - 60401, had a disproportionate number of adult Web site subscribers relative to the number of broadband households in those ZIP codes, Edelman said.

More precise results are not available due to a confidentiality agreement Edelman has with the adult web service that agreed to provide the statistics for his study.

Hoffman Estates Mayor William McLeod questioned the accuracy of the study and didn't take the results very seriously.

"I think people who think Hoffman Estates and the suburbs are boring should maybe take another look," he said.

The 60169 ZIP code actually includes village hall, while 60192 covers the Schaumburg Township part of the village. McLeod said the village hall computers have censors, so they are not among the ones being counted in the study.

Edelman's study concluded that the likelihood of subscribing was higher among people aged 15-24, people with higher incomes and people with college degrees. People over 65, people with graduate degrees and people living in rural areas were less likely to subscribe. People living in areas with both higher marriage and higher divorce rates were also less likely to subscribe.

However, Edelman's findings only apply to people who pay for online adult entertainment. Of the Web sites offering paid adult content, about 70 percent charge between $20 and $25 per month for access, Edelman found.

At the same time, the Internet is awash in free pornography. The relative anonymity of Web surfing makes it harder to precisely track who views those sites.

Nevertheless, the paid side of online adult entertainment is big business. Adult Internet services took in nearly $2.9 billion in 2006, up 13 percent from 2005, according to AVN Media network, an adult entertainment trade publication. The entire adult sector, including video, Internet, pay-per-view, stores, clubs and magazines, earned $12.8 billion in 2006.

With all that money being spent on adult entertainment at least one state is thinking about slapping a special sales tax on it. A proposal pending in the Washington state legislature would add 18.5 percent to the price of all adult entertainment items and services. If approved, the Washington Department of Revenue estimates the special tax will bring in $133 million over the next decade.

No lawmakers in Springfield have proposed a similar tax, but several have said everything is on the table, when comes to trying to fill the state's estimated $9 billion budget hole. Gov. Pat Quinn will present his state budget plan on March 18.

Edelman's research normally focuses on online advertising fraud. But one of his clients - a top 10 online seller of adult entertainment with hundreds of affiliated web sites - provided Edelman with the ZIP codes of their subscribers from 2006 to 2008 for his study, published in the Winter 2009 issue of the Journal of Economic Perspectives.

Daily Herald Staff Writer Ashok Selvam contributed to this report.

<div class="infoBox"> <h1>More Coverage</h1> <div class="infoBoxContent"> <div class="infoArea"> <h2>Related documents</h2> <ul class="morePdf"> <li><a href="/pdf/redlightstates.pdf">Report on online adult content purchases</a></li> </ul> </div> </div> </div>