Teledildonics

It may be just August 17 to you, but in the sex-tech world, or at least the U.S. portion of that world, it’s a day of celebration. Today marks the expiration of a patent for a “Method and Device for Interactive Virtual Control of Sexual Aids Using Digital Computer Networks,” also known as Patent 268, also known as “the Stupid Patent,” also known as the teledildonics patent.

Happy teledildonics freedom day everyone!

Feel free to go fuck yourself!#teledildonics #freedom

— Internet of Dongs (@internetofdongs) August 17, 2018

Shakespeare’s dildo, and other secret Early Modern pleasures

Shakespeare’s The Winter’s Tale is best known for what’s probably the most famous stage direction in the history of English drama: “Exit, pursued by a bear” (3.3.57). But the Bard slips in another memorable line that’s sure to get a rise out of lovers of language – and pleasure. At one point, a servant describes Autolycus, a rascally, villainous pedlar who shows up at a local feast:

He hath songs for man or woman, of all sizes; no milliner can so fit his customers with gloves. He has the prettiest love songs for maids, so without bawdry, which is strange with such delicate burdens of dildos and fadings, ‘Jump her and thump her’; and where some stretch-mouthed rascal would, as it were, mean mischief and break a foul gap into the matter, he makes the maid to answer, ‘Whoop, do me no harm, good man’; puts him off, slights him, with ‘Whoop, do me no harm, good man!’ (4.4.190-98)

Burden of…dildos?! That’s right: Shakespeare used the word dildo.