CES is going back and forth on sex toys again.
The giant Las Vegas trade show said this week that its yearly event in January will allot floor space for sex-toy makers to exhibit their wares and compete for prizes — a year after the tech bash made headlines for stripping an award it had given to a high-end vibrator.
At this year’s CES, a $250 gadget called the Osé Robotic Massager, which uses “intricate engineering and robotics” to provide an “elusive blended orgasm,” was deemed “obscene” and “immoral” by CES organizers after CES judges awarded it a prize for robotics.
Lora DiCarlo, the startup that makes the vibrator, at the time slammed CES for an “obvious double standard” against female sexuality, pointing out that the show has had no issue with exhibits of sex robots and VR porn in the past.
The decision was eventually overturned, and CES organizers apologized.
Moving forward, sex toys will be eligible to be displayed on the show floor in its health and wellness section. The Consumer Technology Association, which runs CES, said that 2020 will be a “one-year trial basis” for sex toys, and that a determination on their future inclusion will be made after.
In addition to the new “Sex Tech” section, CES said this January a ban on pornography will be “strictly enforced with no exceptions.”
CES also will crack down on the practice of hiring “booth babes” — or scantily clad women showing off gadgets.
New rules forbid booth personnel from wearing clothing that is “sexually revealing” or that “hugs genitalia.”
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