porn

Etymology

Clipping of pornography. Attested from mid-20th century.

noun

1. (uncountable, informal) Pornography.
   I just delete the porn before someone else uses the computer.
   Underground boards also carried handy programs for "scanning" telephone codes and raiding credit card companies, as well as the usual obnoxious galaxy of pirated software, cracked passwords, blue-box schematics, intrusion manuals, anarchy files, porn files, and so forth. 1992, Bruce Sterling, The Hacker Crackdown
   There're all kinds of ways to interact with our friends over the network: we can play hallucinogenic games, chat, send pictures, code, music, funny articles, metric fuckloads of porn… The interaction is high-quality! 2004, Cory Doctorow, Eastern Standard Tribe, →OCLC
2. (countable, informal, chiefly in the plural) A pornographic work.
   There are anywhere from ten to twelve chapters in the average porn, so that many blank pages can be inserted. 1982, Florence King, “When Sisterhood Was in Flower”, reprinted in The Florence King Reader, Macmillan (1996), page 181
   — I’ve got it at home. Anyway, there was this gap between the final two porns. 2000, Dennis Cooper, Period, Grove Press, published 2001, page 33
   I remember once watching a porn with some friends of mine […] a. 2004, anonymous study participant, quoted in Todd G. Morrison, “‘He was Treating Me Like Trash, and I Was Loving It . . .’: Perspectives on Gay Male Pornography”, in Todd G. Morrison (editor), Eclectic Views on Gay Male Pornography: Pornucopia (co-published as Journal of Homosexuality, Volume 47, Numbers 3/4), Psychology Press (2004), page 179
3. (uncountable, informal) Material, usually visual, presenting something desirable in a sensational manner.
   car porn
   gun porn
   food porn
   Because software is particularly good at counting, it can be used to create wonderfully compelling visualizations of quantitative data. These can be so compelling that they have even been called “info porn” (see the periodic table of visualizations). 2011, Michael K. Thomas, “The utility and efficacy of qualitative research software in grounded theory research”, in Vivian B. Martin, Astrid Gynnild, editors, Grounded Theory: The Philosophy, Method, and Work of Barney Glaser, page 140
4. (uncountable, informal, often humorous) Material that provides illicit gratification of an obsessive or unhealthy interest in something.