"The Center of the World," a low-budget movie that opened in some cities Wednesday, tracks the adventures of a computer nerd and the lap dancer he hires for a weekend of sexual fantasy in a Las Vegas, Nevada hotel room.

"The Web is dominated by sex sites," Charlie Buchwalter, vice president of AdRelevance, a unit of Jupiter Media Metrix, told NewsFactor Network.

"There are more and more new users on the Web every month, so I can understand how a popular Web site can help a movie sell tickets, especially for something like this."

Hard-Core Site

To market the movie, Artisan Entertainment is following the same path it used to launch "The Blair Witch Project," which produced about US$100 million in box office sales from an investment of only $2 million.

The film was directed by Wayne Wang, who made the critically acclaimed "The Joy Luck Club." The hard-core site on which the film is being marketed features the dressing room of a cyber-strip club and an interactive session with Alisha Klass, a porn star who portrays a dancer in the film.

Klass appears wearing only an open robe, and responds to sexual suggestions made by visitors to the Web site.

Apparently, the movie's print advertising is running into trouble. An ad showing Klass naked with a Tootsie Pop to her mouth was rejected by major newspapers in New York and Los Angeles.

Artisan said the site, which went live in January, is "quite popular" and will help entice customers to see the movie.

Earlier Movie Set Stage

"The Blair Witch Project" recorded 75 million hits by its opening week, and its Web strategy was widely applauded by analysts that cover both the Internet and the entertainment industries.

Artisan Entertainment is not forecasting how well the movie will do at the box office. While steamy sex has done extremely well online, it usually does not transition well into mainstream movie houses.

On the Web site, the interactions between Web surfers and Klass are limited only by the programming. She will take off the robe if visitors to the site "seduce" her through a simulated form of instant messaging.

The Web, however, allows users to feel private and secure in their homes, which is one of the reasons why it does so well.

The Judge Knows

A U.S. judge seemed to know the monetary value of online porn, awarding $65 million this week to the rightful owner of the domain name Sex.com from a cybersquatter who claimed to have made an estimated $40 million over the past five years using the domain name.

After winning the three-year court battle, owner Gary Kremen relaunched Sex.com Wednesday as a directory of naughty links.

Moreover, as struggling dot-coms scurry to find new streams of revenue, Yahoo! (Nasdaq: YHOO) opened an "Adult and Erotica" store on its shopping site, next to ads for computers and toys.

Yahoo! rivals AOL Time Warner (NYSE: AOL) and MSN, a unit of Microsoft (Nasdaq: MSFT), claim they have no plans to move into the porn business -- at least, for now.