From The Publisher

September 1, 1994

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SEPTEMBER 1, 1994
SMOKE SIGNALS MAGAZINE - September - October 2014

September 1, 1994.

"I'll Make Love To You" by Boyz II Men was #1 on the pop charts.

Anti-Zionist Rabbi Moshe Hirsch was appointed "Jewish Affairs Minister" by the Palestinian Governing Authority.

Robin Givens was featured on the cover of Playboy, with a nude pictorial inside.

Bill Clinton was still in his first term as President, and hadn't yet met Monica Lewinsky.

"Natural Born Killers" was a smash at the box office.

It Was Knowledge Day in the Russian Federation and Constitution Day in Slovakia.

And the very first issue of Smoke Signals arrived in the mailboxes of about 30 initial subscribers.

It's hard to believe how much everything has changed since September 1, 1994.

It's not just Smoke Signals Magazine that's no longer in print - even giants like Newsweek were slain by the internet (but unlike Newsweek, no one is trying to resurrect the print edition of Smoke Signals).

Smoking fetish producers have come - and for the most part, gone. Those who remain, are endangered.

Few people seek out smoking photos anymore; HD video is the be-all-and-end-all for most.

Smoking itself has gone from a common activity to "fringe behavior" in many areas.

But we're still here.

We can't promise we'll be here in another 20 years, or even in another 20 months. The world changes too fast for such promises.

But we can tell you it's been a joy and an honor to be in the front row as the smoking fetish went from a hidden secret to a mainstream interest.

And we have all of you to thank.

Enjoy the September-October issue!

Cleaning Out The Garage

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Cleaning Out The Garage
SMOKE SIGNALS MAGAZINE - July - August 2014

So, after years of procrastination, we finally did it.

We took several days and went through somewhere between 15 and 20 huge boxes of VHS tapes which have been sitting in our garage, mostly untouched, for more than a decade.

Yes, that's right - the Smoke Signals "library."

Some date back as far as the late 1980s, when we first discovered a few small glamour and adult producers who actually sold videos of women smoking (thanks to tips from the few other "crazies" who haunted online services searching for any trace of what we would later call the "smoking fetish").

Some are the very first attempts at smoking video production by pioneers like Tom Compo and Ed Luisser.

Some are the "complete libraries" produced by video companies or solo girls who dipped their toes into the water of the emerging smoking video market of the mid 1990s. And some are private amateur tapes, mostly of wives or girlfriends, traded among a small group of people around that same time.

There are hours and hours of short smoking scenes taped from TV shows or movies, candid videos filmed by smoking fetishists who traded them for similar material, and subfetish videos on such topics as female slaves smoking for Mistresses, and women boxing while smoking cigars.

There's old material originally shot for Smoke Signals by just about everyone you can think of.

And, of course, there are the full catalogs of almost every smoking producer, from the "long-gone" like HH Video, TLS and Cinesmoke, the "still alive" producers like Smoking Females and Bob's Videos, and the producers still active in our community like Specialized, IRL and Random Snaps.

It was quite a chore to go through them all - and to actually get rid of duplicate copies (of which there were quite a few). But we learned several things during the work - since, of course, we needed to take some breaks - and just happened to bring some of the videos into the room where we keep our VCRs.

1. VHS tapes which have been well-preserved still play just fine, even if they're as ancient as 25 years old.

2. Some of the oldest material produced in our community still holds up well today; the earliest work from Tom, Ed and Steve K., for example, is just as stunning as it was when it opened our eyes in the '90s.

3. A lot of material doesn't get better with age. We looked at a few of the tapes we'd watched a few times and grew tired of - and to put it simply, they still sucked. And some of the videos we'd marked with asterisks or other excited notations, just weren't as good as we had remembered. In those days, beggars really couldn't be choosers.

4. On the other hand, we rediscovered some old "gems" (both commercial and amateur) which had been long forgotten, but would quickly become many people's favorites if they were available today. We were thrilled we still had them.

5. Some of the productions which were staged with plot and dialogue by small or niche companies such as Customized and Stevi's Secrets, remained intriguing; but we wished they had been filmed with digital equipment and "modern" lighting techniques - they would have been extraordinary.

6. We owe a huge debt of gratitude to all of the people who went out on a very large limb to film these videos, whether they were amateur or professional, simple or complex. Without all of their efforts, we all might very well still be taping scenes from TV shows in order to get our fix.

7. Videotapes are very heavy - and a very big pain in the ass!

Of course, we couldn't bring ourselves to toss any of them (except for the duplicates) - so we didn't really end up cleaning out the garage after all. If we're all still around, we'll update you in another 10-20 years on whether they still play; and whether they're still worth watching one more time.

Enjoy the July-August issue!

One Of The Truly Good Guys Needs Our Help

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A Repeat - But An Important One
SMOKE SIGNALS MAGAZINE - May-June 2014

It may seem impossible to believe, but there are times we have very little to say. This is one of those times.

For that reason, we're going to pass on our bi-monthly opportunity to rant and rave, because we're guessing there are people who haven't seen our last column yet. We think it's important enough to leave up for this issue.

If you have already seen it, but haven't contributed yet - we hope you'll give it another read and follow your heart. If you have contributed - our deepest thanks.

And don't worry, we'll have plenty more to rant about next time around.

Enjoy the May-June issue!

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As you may have gleaned from our musings, rants and diatribes in this space over the last few years, the 2010s have not exactly been great years for smoking fetish producers.

In fact, with huge declines in sales caused by illegal file sharing, many producers have fallen on very hard times. Quite a few have been battling to save their businesses, their homes...and even in one case, his life.

We're using this space to highlight that person's situation.

The name Ed Luisser is familiar to many who have been members of the smoking fetish community for a long time. Even those who are relatively new to our world are probably familiar with the name CoherentLight - even if it's just from a mention on one of those sites which are illegally displaying the company's groundbreaking material.

Ed is the brains and vision behind CoLight, which was without question the premiere smoking video producer of the last quarter-century. Ed's use of lighting (with a big nod to Tom Compo, another pioneer in the field) and costuming, attention to detail, and above all his concern for showing exquisite smokers in all their accomplished glamour and glory, set a standard which all future producers sought to emulate. His glamour videos were, to put it simply, stunning.

Ed was also a connoisseur of "dark side" smoking, and while many of his dark side pieces may not have been appealing to everyone in our community - there was no denying that they were works of art. And, of course, the smoking and detail was still so mesmerizing that even glamour fans could be captivated despite a lack of interest in piece's specific theme.

Finally, there was no more staunch supporter of our community - generous, caring, friendly, and eager to give back (probably more than he should have, in business terms) whenever possible.

During the mid 2000s, Ed was beset with a series of major problems. Serious health challenges and a devastating break-in and equipment theft left him struggling to survive - figuratively and literally. And the huge drop in revenues that plagued all producers made his fight much, much tougher. We certainly won't invade his privacy by detailing the entire story here; it's of course been up to him to reveal as much or as little as he chose. We'll just say that we're not exaggerating the severity of the situation.

The good news that we have to pass along, however, is that Ed is doing much better than he has in years - and he's looking to rebuild CoLight into a viable smoking video producer once again.

To that end, he's appealing to the smoking fetish community which means so much to him. Ed has set up a crowdfunding account, in an effort to acquire new equipment for CoLight, and start shooting again.

We'd ask everyone reading this to take a couple of minutes to read more of Ed's story - and to help in any way you can. Our community isn't as close-knit as it used to be (we used to know most of our subscribers and/or members by name!) - but hopefully we can still show that we care, and appreciate everything he's done for us over the years.

Please visit Ed's page here and do whatever you can to help.

A Strange Discovery

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A Strange Discovery
SMOKE SIGNALS MAGAZINE - January - February 2014


While poking around stuff that we have on our hard drives, and looking around online, we made a strange discovery recently.

We're more attracted to women smoking hookahs than ever before.

Don't get us wrong, it will never be our favorite type of female smoking - cigarettes will always top the list for us. But there was definitely something that drew us to the "sheesha" videos we found.

If we were smarter, we would have just enjoyed ourselves and moved on. However, we're way too analytical for that; we spent some time trying to figure out just why we suddenly found women smoking hookahs more of interest than in the past.

We did a lot of research, meaning we watched the videos a number of times - all in the name of science, of course. Here's what we've concluded:

1. Women (well, people in general, but the women are naturally the ones we pay attention to) who smoke hookahs do it for the fun and enjoyment of it and not just to satisfy a craving. There aren't a lot of bored women in sheesha videos. They're all having fun with their smoking - and that's alluring, at least to us.

2. Hookah smoking is a sociable activity, which means there are usually two or more women participating. We always prefer watching two or three women smoke than just one (for obvious reasons).

3. There's less "down time" in the video - in a cigarette video, there's usually anywhere from ten to thirty seconds between inhales. In a hookah videos, someone is always smoking.

4. There are certainly lots of videos showing novice or non-smokers trying hookahs, which aren't of great interest to us. However, regular smokers who are having fun with their sheesha smoking tend to show off and play with their smoke; there are lots of huge cone exhales, nose exhales, snap inhales and big smoke rings - not to mention smoke exchanges. To those of us who enjoy seeing accomplished smokers perform, a good hookah video can be a treasure trove of terrific smoking.

5. There's no such thing as an ultra-light hookah. If women are deeply inhaling smoke from a sheesha, it's strong smoke and they're obviously enjoying it.

6. At times, when women are sharing a hookah, they're also smoking cigarettes during their "down time." That makes the video even smokier and more fun to watch.

7. We spend way too much time analyzing why we like what we like.

This probably was not an illuminating column to read. Everyone who visits this page already knows what they like - and we're not out to convince anyone to "give hookah videos a try." This also doesn't mean there will be an influx of sheesha material at Smoke Signals Online - we usually only have one hookah shoot per year.

We're just fortunate enough to have a soapbox from which we can rant or pontificate. And for some reason, we felt the need to share a previously "untapped" source of enjoyment that we've rediscovered.

Happy New Year!

Just A Short One

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Just A Short One
SMOKE SIGNALS MAGAZINE - November - December 2013


If you're wondering why this month's column is shorter than usual, it's because we're writing it at the last minute. We had a guest column planned for the November-December issue, but the author decided that he didn't want the piece he had written published after all.

As we were wondering what to fill this spot with, we were struck by an interesting (at least, to us) thought that was raised in an email discussion we were having with Fran from Smoking Sweeties. He mentioned the creation of "Cannibis Social Clubs" in Spain (where he lives) - which intrigued us. And after a little research (if you call searching on Wikipedia "research") we found this:

"A Cannabis Social Club is a concept of the pan-European non-government organization ENCOD conceived in 2005 as a way to enable legal production and distribution of cannabis for adults. Cannabis Social Clubs are non-commercial organizations which organize the professional, collective cultivation of very limited amounts of cannabis, just enough to cover the personal needs of their club members...Cannabis Social Clubs exist in New Zealand, Spain, Belgium, France, the Netherlands and Germany." Pot use is already legal in Cambodia and North Korea, and has been decriminalized in a number of countries.

When you couple that with the legalization of marijuana in Colorado, the growing number of states and countries which now allow the use of medical marijuana and the seemingly unstoppable move toward complete legalization, at least for personal use - the irony for our community is clear.

Before long, whether it's due to bans on smoking in public or a complete 21st century version of prohibition, it may very well be impossible for smoking fetishists to see anyone smoking in public. Our time will have passed. But the apparently smaller number of people who have a fetish for women who smoke pot will be entering their own "golden era" with opportunities for sightings abounding.

We should mention that our conclusions about the relative number of smoking fetishists and pot smoking fetishists are based on the sole fact that there are only a few websites or online resources dedicated to marijuana smoking fetishes, compared to the number of smoking fetish websites and online resources - and the pot smoking videos on YouTube and similar sites seem not to be aimed, for the most part, at a fetish audience. (And we hope you appreciate our restraint, not railing at the hypocrisy of governments banning one type of smoking while allowing another.)

But who knows? Perhaps the growing amount of exposure people will have to women toking up - will give birth to a huge new fetish in the coming years. If so, we hope those fetishists enjoy themselves as much as we have over the last hundred years or so.

Enjoy the November-December issue!

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