FreeSex, the open source teledildonics network

So you say you want a revolution...

Yeah, we all want to change the world. In this case, we can. All you need is a computer, a sex toy you don't mind fucking up, and a vast knowledge of electronics, programming, and electricity.

So you have the first one, unless you're reading this from a printout, in which case, well, that's pretty hardcore. Esp. if it's dot matrix.

The second, well, that's cheap. You can go get a sex toy from your local dildo shoppe for $10. As long as it takes a battery and the leads to the battery are easily accessible, no problem there.

The vast knowledge of everything? That's where we come in. We're here to share and to teach, so you don't have to deal with all that college crap. A few tutorials, a few second degree burns with a soldering iron, a little singed pubic hair, and you're on your way to subverting the adult entertainment industry.

Where we are right now, and why it fucking sucks

(If you've seen/read Violet Blue's teledildonics presentation, you can probably skip this, and I'll link to her when it's up, but I'll leave this here for the moment)

Let's take a look at the big 3 in teledildonics right now.

VR Innovations

Pros:

  • Serial port, possible cross-platformedness
  • They send you movies with specially encoded values in the frames that tell the pump what position to be at during a certain time. Head moves up and down, pump moves up and down. Pretty cool idea.

Cons:

  • I certainly wouldn't stick that shit on my dick. It's a big ol' vacuum pump. It isn't very comfortable according to the reviews I've read.
  • They keep you paying by using proprietary content. The movies I mentioned? They are the only manufacturers (the porn market didn't catch on like they were hoping), and they aren't cheap.
  • The damn thing costs $400.
  • No online service whatsoever. Hope you like those movies.

Highjoy

Pros:

  • Serial port, possible cross-platformedness
  • Nice little matching service

  • It's currently free to sign up and play with. Not that I'm into advertising commerical services, but it is fun to see what other people are doing. Just note that they will own your soul if you sign up. Cons:

  • Toys apparently bond to the service, though I'm not sure how (I even straight out asked the founder of the service. I'm stupid like that.)

  • Would be a monthly fee, assuming they had any members (It's been a fucking desert every time I've been on there.).
  • Windows-only software. Come on, it's fucking serial, how hard is it to port that shit?

Sinulator

Pros:

  • Wireless!
  • Supposedly adapt to any toy that takes a plug, but I can't confirm this

Cons:

  • Toys are only usable through a pay service, which uses a Flash client. Sure, it's cross-platform, but I don't know if I trust my screwing to Flash.
  • Monthly fee. You don't pay, it don't vibrate.

So, there you have it. Everything requires a recurring cost to operate. All will work alone without recurring cost, but that's not the idea. If the service dies (which could easily happen when it comes to something like sex), your toy dies with it.

And the thing no one ever thinks about? Security. You are most likely going to be transmitting naked pictures of yourself doing very, very naughty things over the net. In today's society, this has very bad implications. Jobs lost, relationships shattered, lives ruined type of implications. Now, of course, there's the initial problem of the fact that if you're going to be getting naked on the internet at all, you assume some sort of risk. But really, shouldn't you have some sort of guarantee that your penis won't be the next headline on (or masturbatory aid for) Drudge?

Where we could be, and why it won't suck to get there

Why ain't this shit free yet? Probably the fact that no one realizes how fucking simple teledildonics is. This is not new technology. Like the SexBox, this could've been built a decade ago.

Let me give you a quick overview of how any teledildonics system works. User A is the fucker, User B is the fuckee.

  • On whatever teledildonics GUI is currently the newest and best, User A moves the "vibrate slider" from 0 to 50 (out of 100)
  • The message "50" flies over the internet through the use of starlight and magic and the wishes of children and TCP/IP to User B
  • User B receives the message on their computer, which is processed by their software and sent through whatever port (USB, Serial, Parallel, etc...) to the processing hardware.
  • The processing hardware turns the "50" into a pulse width modulation (PWM) value. Basically, it means that it will send roughly half of the full voltage over to the toy.
  • The PWM is set, the "Go now" pulse is sent from the processor to the motor driver at the needed frequency to make the motor run at half speed.
  • The motor driver converts the "Go now" signal into a "Go now at a much higher voltage in order to make the motor actually go" signal
  • The motor goes. The end.

So, that probably sounds hard, right? Wrong. (I'm going to be explaining this in depth in a How Shit Works article next week)

Steps 1 and 2 are incredibly simple to take care of. The Qt toolkit has all of the classes you need to set the GUI and network communications up in a few hundred lines of code, if that. It's free, and will cover Windows (at least, in v4), Linux, and OS X.

Step 3 can most likely be handled by Qt if we're talking serial, or by another library for parallel or USB.

Step 4-7 is the basis of pretty much every single hobby robotics kit in existance. You can buy boards with this functionality or you can build one for < $20. a little pic chip and a little motor driver chip and you're ready to go.

let's see. free software to build the communications and gui with. highly documented hardware specifications to build the board side with. what the hell is holding us back, eh?

Why I think we should be there

I am not an open source zealot. I'm using Windows to write this. You can pull my Visual Studio from my cold, dead hands. I like stuff to be open source, but I'll pay for a good piece of software. Source is a priviledge, not a right.

Except when it comes to shit that could fuck up your life, or could save your life.

Sex on the computer is a very dicey thing, as I mentioned before. Geeks are in the minority of end users for things like this at the moment, but if we freak out because we don't know what's in the core of our OS and what it might be doing to our Emacs plugins (that's right, Emacs.), what the HELL are we gonna do when we're supposed to use software to PLAY WITH OUR GODDAMN GENITALS and we can't see what it's doing? Oh hell no, fuck that. Fuck a whole bunch of that.

Then there's the privacy issues. Wanna get in on a group chat with nude people? Log on to a service! Want a quick fuck with someone playful? Log on to a service! Oh wait, you have to put your credit card in. The second you pay for it, you are in a system somewhere. Somewhere traceable.

Finally, there's what teledildonics could do, cost or no. Teledildonics could be huge. Fucking oh my god ginormous huge. Long distance relationships consumated. Old loves rekindled without awkward meetings. Lovers torn away from each other brought back together thanks to the internet. There's some really cool shit that could be happening, and it could be happening for free. Knowing what's in your kernel, what your GUI is doing? Yeah, that's nice and all, but this is a matter of actual human emotion. People are making money off of a genetic drive to fuck, something that is programmed into your brain at conception. Not cool. Not cool at all.

Time to stop ranting, and start doing.

FreeSex: Intro, Architecture, and Implementation

FreeSex is my solution to this. It consists of one basic thing. A simple communications protocol between hardware and software. All we need is a standard to say "When this is sent over the port, do this". It needs to be easily extensible, and it needs to be open. After that, the sky and the developer's mind are the limit.

Since I'm the first developer on this, lemme throw the ideas I have out there.

So our first basic requirement is sending messages over the network and transfering them to a toy connected on a port. That can be handled quickly and easily by Qt and any hobby robotics board. Time investment is under a week, but it's not going to get us very far.

For a simple teledildonics service, we want to have the above set of requirements, plus a user system, server, and chat system. Thank god for Jabber. From what I've read on Jabber (which hasn't been much, so someone correct me if I'm wrong), we should be able to use some pre-existing client program, add our own specialized XML packet in for control, and be on our way. This turns FreeSex into a decentralized network, so you can have a gigantic group online, or else just yourself and one other person for a server all to yourselves.

The other way to do this is to use someone else's chat system with an open source client, like GAIM. Write a plugin that parses incoming messages (i.e. "vibrator1 50" to set whatever port vibrator1 is on to 50PMW), send message off to the port, and you're done. This has the additional buy-in of video chat already being done in most clients. However, it's not exactly the most opensourcey way ever.

That's all FreeSex is. Simple enough to explain the requirement and two implementation methods in 2 paragraphs. Do you really want to pay $40/month for this?

Where it could go

Here's some of the ideas I've had for FreeSex. Usually, I'm not this open with ideas, but I'm just going to brain dump. I'm more interested in seeing this stuff actually done than I am egotistical enough to wait to do it all myself.

  • Movie Synchronization

    • VR Innovations did it, we can do it better. This would probably be a very simple MPlayer plugin to write. Person in video pushes in, vibrator goes faster. Person in video pulls out, vibrator goes slower. The interface to program this would be a simple slider on a GUI, so you could sit there with a mouse and move the slider back and forth, programming the reaction file. Reaction files would be in a text format, stored in a database on the web, the same way subtitle files for movies are these days. Download the reaction file, start up a porno, and get a lot more out of every movie you watch.* Circle Jerks

    • Lovely name, isn't it? This adds on to the movie synchronization idea. If you've ever cruised the stalls (or gay message boards), you're aware of the vast number of bi-curious guys that want to get together to jack off to straight porno. Chat room + Movie Synchronization = big ol' bi-curious hand bang. One person starts the movie, timing is sent over to keep everyone in sync, people can talk about the porn while watching it. This would also be a cool idea for real movies. You owe me if you market it, fuckers.* Game Reaction

That's just a few of the ideas that could be implemented. Build your software to be extensible enough, and who knows what people will come up with. New forms of sex will be created. People will be much calmer. Peace will spread over the world.

All because of lil' ol' me. Or maybe it'll be the sex, but my ego won't let me think that.

How you can help.

So, there it is. Free sex with other people. Real people. 24/7. Maybe these people will be loved ones. Maybe these people will grow to be loved ones. Maybe these people will be total strangers. Who knows. It's all up to you.

That's it. I'll be posting progress in the form of project reports and articles. I'll also be updating the front page with what other people are doing, assuming they tell me.

Together, we can all GLAGHLAHGHLAGHALGHALHGLAHG.