Porn, Economics, and Old Babies

Top of Mind

Pornhub? More Like Porn-Stop (If You Live in Ohio)

Starting September 29, Ohioans looking to enjoy a little private, adults-only screen time will need to whip out their… photo ID. That’s thanks to a new state budget provision requiring anyone accessing “obscene or harmful” online material to verify they’re 18 or older. And no, your old Blockbuster card doesn’t count.

Here’s how it works: Before you can click “play,” you’ll have to upload your state ID or personal information to a third-party service, which will cross-check it against government or financial databases. In some cases, facial recognition technology might be used, meaning you could be smiling awkwardly into your webcam just to watch two consenting adults do something they’d never admit to at Thanksgiving. The state promises your info will be deleted “immediately,” though cybersecurity experts, and anyone who remembers the city’s recent data breaches, might be skeptical.

Supporters, like Reps. Josh Williams (R-Sylvania) and Steve Demetriou (R-Bainbridge Twp.), say the law is about “protecting the innocence of our kids.” Critics, like the ACLU, say it’s vague, overreaching, and a privacy nightmare. Pornhub’s parent company, Aylo, warns that laws like this just drive viewers to sketchier, unregulated sites,  the digital equivalent of skipping the grocery store for gas station sushi.

Ohio isn’t alone. Two dozen states have passed similar laws, and in many, Pornhub simply pulled the plug rather than deal with the paperwork. They’ve already left 17 states, and it’s unclear if they’ll keep serving Ohio or leave us with only the internet’s darkest back alleys.

The law even tries to block VPN workarounds by using geofencing, so if your device pings Ohio, you’re not getting in,  unless, as lawmakers helpfully point out, you “go old school” and buy DVDs. Yes, in 2025, your elected officials are suggesting you stroll into an adult store like it’s 1998.

Whether you see this as a win for child safety or a leap toward government-approved bedroom behavior, one thing’s certain: come September, Ohioans are going to need a lot more excuses for why they “just use the internet for email.”

Scarlet Letter Trivia

Question: How many people attend the state fair each day?
A. 82,405
B. 100,420
C. 67,987
D. 53,812

By the Numbers: Ohio’s 12-Day, Multi-Million-Dollar Fried Food Frenzy

 Every summer, the Ohio State Fair transforms Columbus into a 12-day economic engine disguised as a celebration of livestock, live music, and deep-fried creativity. Drawing close to a million visitors each year, roughly 900,000 of them from right here in Ohio,  the fair pumps tens of millions of dollars into the state economy annually. From concession stands to concert stages, the event fuels small businesses, fills hotel rooms, and proves that nothing stimulates commerce quite like funnel cakes and the Butter Cow.

Here’s how that broke down:

• $8.3 million in vendor concession sales across the fairgrounds, plus $3.2 million in ride and game revenue on the Midway.
  

• 346 vendors in total, 59% of them Ohio-based, with roughly 120 food vendors ready to sell you everything from a corn dog to a pickle lemonade.
  

• 42,000 lemonades or lemon shake-ups sold. 21,992 corn dogs. 18,515 ears of roasted corn. 16,480 funnel cakes. Nearly 1,000 pickle lemonades (which raises questions we may not want answered).
  

• 45,151 concert tickets sold in the WCOL Celeste Center, proving that fairgoers still appreciate live music sandwiched between pig races and a butter sculpture.
  

• 33,943 free admission tickets distributed to community and charitable organizations.
  

• Visitors came from all 88 Ohio counties, plus all 48 contiguous states, Hawaii, and countries including Canada, Mexico, Brazil, the UK, Japan, and South Korea.
  

• $25,500 awarded in scholarships to Ohio youth, along with $260,000 raised at the Sale of Champions,  more than half going to the Virgil L. Strickler Youth Reserve Program to support future exhibitors.

And while these stats are impressive, they don’t capture the intangibles: the nostalgia of multi-generational visits, the butter cow selfie tradition, or the annual parental debate over whether the kids’ lemonade really needed that $5 souvenir cup. Ohio may have plenty of attractions, but nothing else combines deep-fried food, livestock, and economic impact quite like this.

Baby Thaws Out After 30 Years, Decides Ohio Looks Nice.

Ohio has officially welcomed the “world’s oldest baby,” and no, that’s not a comment on the average age of a Columbus suburb. On July 26, Lindsey and Tim Pierce of London, Ohio, became the proud parents of Thaddeus Daniel Pierce, a perfectly healthy baby boy who spent the last three decades chilling as a frozen embryo. Literally, he was conceived in 1994, when Blockbuster was king, dial-up internet was the height of technology, and the most advanced home entertainment system was a really nice VCR.

Thaddeus’s journey started with Linda Archerd in the early ‘90s, when she and her then-husband turned to IVF after struggling to conceive. Four embryos were created. One became her daughter (now 30, with a 10-year-old of her own), and the others went into cryogenic storage, where they sat for 30 years like a very sentimental bag of peas.

After her divorce, Archerd gained custody of the embryos and later decided on “embryo adoption,” a process where the original parents choose who gets to give the embryos a shot at life. She preferred a white, Christian married couple, and that’s how the Pierces entered the picture.

Fast forward to 2025, and those microscopic cells from 1994 are now a 7-pound, 10-ounce baby boy who looks eerily like his biological sister did as a newborn. Archerd said she compared baby pictures side by side and immediately saw the resemblance, cementing the idea that genetics are wild, even when they’ve been on ice for three decades.

For the Pierces, who had spent seven years trying to have a child, it wasn’t about setting a record, though it certainly did. “We didn’t go into this thinking about records, we just wanted to have a baby,” Lindsey told the Associated Press. Their doctor, a Reformed Presbyterian who runs the clinic where the embryo was transferred, called it part of a larger mission to reduce the number of embryos in storage, saying, “Every embryo deserves a chance at life.”

Medical experts say the age of a frozen embryo doesn’t affect the odds of a healthy birth, so long as it was frozen and thawed correctly. In other words, Thaddeus didn’t age a day between 1994 and 2025, a trick that, unfortunately, still isn’t available to the rest of us.

Now the Pierces are adjusting to life with their long-awaited newborn, and Thaddeus will grow up with the ultimate icebreaker for awkward social events: I was born in 2025, but technically I’m older than Google.

Ohio has officially proven it, in the Buckeye State, anything can be preserved indefinitely: cheese, buildings, political careers, and apparently, people.

On a Roll

 If 2020 taught us anything, it’s that society crumbles faster than a stale biscuit when toilet paper runs out. While most of us were panic-hoarding Charmin like it was gold bullion, Marvin Green, D’Andre Martin, and Charles Peaks decided to do something slightly more productive: create their own eco-friendly toilet paper brand.

Enter Leafy,  Columbus’s own Black-owned bamboo TP empire. Yes, bamboo. It’s fast-growing, requires less water, no pesticides, and doesn’t require killing a single Midwestern tree. It’s unbleached, septic-safe, biodegradable, and comes in compostable packaging, which means you can feel smug about saving the planet every time you hit the bathroom.

But Leafy isn’t just wiping away waste, it’s building community. The founders donate rolls to homeless shelters, supply local businesses, and have even landed a deal with Hyatt hotels. Their mission is part environmental, part economic, and all about proving you can be sustainable without being sanctimonious.

Sure, switching to bamboo toilet paper won’t save the polar bears single-handedly, but Leafy is proof that a small, daily change can make a big impact. And honestly, if you’re going to spend money on something you literally flush, why not make it something good?

LeafyProducts, because saving the planet one wipe at a time is still better than doing nothing at all.

This fall, DubBot gets a friend: Bridge Walker, another robot assigned to patrol the Dublin Link Bridge and Riverside Crossing Park. Because if there’s one place where you really need robotic surveillance, it’s near a playground.

So while Columbus wrestles with potholes and ransomware, Dublin’s dropping nearly a quarter-million dollars on droids to monitor garages. And somehow, that feels extremely on brand.

Welcome to the future, Central Ohio. It’s got four wheels, a strobe light, and it’s watching your every move.

Trivia Answer

A. 82,405