Solid business move. The Playboy brand is popular in China. Which is sort of weird as they have an official ban on porn. The flagship magazine does little to support the brand. Eliminate the nudes, and they have something like Maxim or the SI swimsuit issue. Both can be sold fairly openly.
Licensing provided half of Playboy’s revenue in 2013.
Uhhhh … no. No, you don’t! :o
Yeah, but think of all the 18–22 year old females whose career options are now seriously limited. 
Haha, yes!
The writing and current events/edgy stuff was very good; concentrate on that and they’ll eat Maxim’s lunch.
Plus, think of how many starlets would Now consider being a centerfold with a snarky blown kiss and a “ha-ha”.
…but there will be no kinky Gabriel Byrne three-way…
To me it seems like the onward march of prudery, perhaps inevitable after years of increasingly skimpy attire becoming standard for women heightened their objectification. The opposite message has been going out to men and, to a definite extent, older women as well: you’re ugly! Cover up! I’ve always held that this is a very unhealthy trend.
As for Playboy, it’s certainly true that teenage boys can find pr0n online. But what the publishers seem to have overlooked is that those who really do value Esquire or GQ type journalism can find that online as well, and usually for far less money if not actually free.
A-men to that, brother!
But it may not be all doom and gloom. This writer sees it as a sign that porn is on the rise.
That may be, but one thing about Playboy is that it really did, and probably still does – haven’t seen one in donkeys’ years despite there being a Thai version – have good articles. And did we little kids buy, or more often steal, it for the articles? No, we obtained it for the pictures, and only then, once we reached a certain age, did we discover the stories. What child is going to get his hands on one now, just for the stories?
And keeping a secret stash of Playboys is yet another rite of passage that will disappear. Sigh, more proof I’m getting old.
Playboy’s problem is there are a couple of holes in this theory.
First, it’s not like those other magazines are doing all that well either. Maxim’s circulation is way down. The US edition of FHM ceased publication years ago and the British edition is hurting.
Second, it’s doubtful Playboy will be able to steal any readers away from Maxim or GQ. I doubt there are all that many men reading Maxim who have stayed away from Playboy because of the nude women and will now make the jump over if they’re gone. I suspect there will be a lot more readers crossing over the other way; Playboy readers will switch over to Maxim now that Playboy has given up its main distinguishing characteristic.
For the last few years, Playboy has essentially been Maxim magazine for guys who also want naked women. Without the naked women, Playboy is just an imitation Maxim. And the guys who want to read a magazine like Maxim will read Maxim.
If anything it was the opposite. Before their demise magazines like Penthouse increasingly went towards hardcore pornography to try and satisfy the tastes of those that were no longer content with simple posed nudity as wanking material. Though there probably remains a healthy market for softcore, air-brushed cheesecake shots, I suspect it is no longer the major demographic it once was. Not when hardcore pornography is readily available to the masses in the privacy of their own homes, essentially for free.
Not if you can’t open the pages. :eek:
At my undergrad uni in Texas, I worked a student job in the campus library. They kept all the Playboys, even the new ones, in the Rare Book Room. To check anything out of there, you had to sign in and leave an ID, so it was an anti-theft measure. They too had all the Playboys back to day one, each year bound in hardcover. But I don’t think they’d be worth much, because in the early days some old-lady prude librarian had taken some scissors and cut out all the naughty bits.
And how.
Sometime in the mid-late 90s, they made the decision to cut the average interview from 10,000 words to 3,000. The edits became insanely bad.
I dunno.
Playboy is synonymous in American culture with naked women. Perhaps they will be able to make it work by cutting back to artfully posed models with hands, feet, and furniture between their nipples and the camera.
But I’m also thinking of a fair number of people who really don’t give a rat about anything ELSE, and will feel betrayed if this iconic publication all of a sudden goes all tame. I’m not sure what they think they have to gain, here. Can you think of a single library or church lady who will say, “Oh, well, they got rid of the naked girls, we can leave them all around the lobby and reading room NOW…”
Porn? Nudity is automatically porn. Besides, not all porn is bad anyway.
Nekkiddidditty will NEVER be obsolete! Now get of my lawn.
Not all nudity is porn, but nudity intended to cause sexual arousal (which, let’s face it, is most of it) is porn.
Huh? 
I don’t care for porn, but I’ll happily look at naked women 24/7! :o
Dezombiefying this thread to link to an imgur post on Reddit that has images of every Playboy Playmate in Playboy’s history. Archival, indeed!
NSFW of course
The woman from the cover of the first no-nudie pics mag was on Stephen Colbert. Sarah something - has eyes that are different colors. She was in a dress she was constantly adjusting - Colbert was adroit in making it funny without coming across as skeevy.
::quick search::
Ah - here it is: - YouTube