Check out the Touch project at Fleshmap. The creators asked survey participants where on their own bodies they most like to be caressed and where they most like to touch their lovers’ bodies. Using this data (33,871 individual ratings!), the creators came up with two interactive maps of male and female bodies: Skin to Skin, a “heatmap,” and Sorting Out Desire, a collage of images of body parts whose relative size indicates their erotic allure.

Also check out the Look project, which graphically represents female breasts and male nipple hair.

Finally, check out the Listen project. One part of the project visually demonstrates how often various body parts are referenced in different musical genres, while the second deletes all of the text that doesn’t refer to body parts from various famous poems and songs, leaving only images of body parts separated by dots.

Zarb Champagne has bottles that will make your tongue (and maybe some other things) tingle. The website is pretty and interactive, but since it’s flash-based I can’t link you to the sexy Skin series of bottles. To reach the gallery, select the “Zarb” menu at the top of the main page, click on “Bottles” from the drop-down menu, and navigate to “Skin” on the sidebar.

Finally, educate yourself with this article about how scent influences sexual attraction.

I’ve found enough links that a backlog has begun to form. What that means to you is that this and future WSO posts will have fewer pictures, perhaps a bit less text, and significantly more links. Sounds good for everyone, am I right?

Take a moment with Kieran Vollard from Dinner for Schmucks and learn how to turn your lovemaking into artmaking.

Check out artist Olga Zavershinskaya‘s sexy photo work [above] at the Zeemp blog.

Esquire presents wisdom from Dr. Ruth Westheimer, a well-loved 82-year-old sex therapist who helped Americans open up about sex and sexuality (and who once  served as a sniper in the Israeli military). Here’s one of her tips:

The biggest concern among men is still penis size. I tell them the vagina accommodates penises of all sizes. Then I tell them to go home, and, in the privacy of their own room, stand in front of a full-length mirror, bring themselves to full erection, and admire. You will never worry about penis size again because you won’t be looking down upon it. You’ll be looking at it from straight ahead.

This article from Al-Jazeera discusses the disturbing prevalence of rape in the US military, including the surprising fact that more men than women have experienced sexual trauma while serving.

This article from the Huffington Post claims that Target has continued to donate funds to anti-gay politicians they had previously apologized for supporting.

Ever feel like something is missing from your vaginal-care regimen? Maybe a vaginal steam bath will help.

This article claims that a new contraceptive method called RISUG (reversible inhibition of sperm under guidance) is moving forward in development. RISUG is a one-time procedure that supposedly lasts for 10 years, is fully reversible, has few side effects, and takes fewer than five minutes to perform. Fingers crossed.

Finally, and most importantly, a new study indicates that heterosexual and homosexual love are identical in the brain. Awesome.

What’s Sexy Online is back to make your holidays a little bit sexier.

First up is an article that might help you with some of the familial issues you might run across this holiday season. It’s called Incest is Cancer and it argues that we should condemn incest and that the argument against incest doesn’t apply to  homosexual relationships. Here’s a quote:

Homosexuality is an orientation. Incest isn’t. If the law bans gay sex, a lesbian can’t have a sex life. But if you’re hot for your sister, and the law says you can’t sleep with her, you have billions of other options. Get out of your house, for God’s sake. You’ll find somebody to love without incinerating your family. And don’t tell me you’re just adding a second kind of love to your relationship. That’s like adding a second kind of life to your body. When a second kind of life grows in your body, we call it cancer. That’s what incest is: cancer of the family.

[Tip: Do not search for “incest” in Google Images while your family is in the room, particularly if you have safesearch off.]

Next is an anonymous article from imeveryone.com entitled  “This is a Story About What People Don’t Tell You About Anal Sex…”. You know you’re interested. If you’re short on time skip to the bottom (ha) for a one-sentence summary.

In this article from the Cleveland Open Relationships Examiner, the author discusses how sex became sin. It’s a short piece that follows changing views of sexuality from the ancient Greeks to Aquinas.

I found this article on the Yes Means Yes! blog. The author, a straight female college student, asks “…why is that my sexuality had to become this all-consuming entity linking me inextricably to my “duties to men”? Why can’t I be a sexual creature, but also a human being?”

The blog itself is a counterpart to the book Yes Means Yes!, an anthology dedicated finding a way to respect female sexuality without rape, violence, or shame. You can buy it here.

Ever wish there was somewhere you could learn about every influential sexual scene in cinema? There is. This database includes over 75 pages of entries that painstaking catalog every important nipple, thrust, and moan in movies from the 1800s to 2009. There are lots of (sadly, quite small) pictures, too.

[Tip: Look up movies here before watching them with your parents.]

Finally, here’s a color-coded pocket guide to vaginal euphemisms. Might come in handy. [Click to enlarge].

[Note: I tried very hard to make those last two sentences into a sexual pun, but failed. Maybe you can give it a try.]

What’s Sexy Online will be on hiatus for the next few weeks. Expect a special holiday post soon after!

We apologize for the delay — one of your Editors-in-Chief was in Austin for the weekend. Now for What’s Sexy Online II: Fun Fun Fun Edition!

Everyone is Gay offers love, sex, and sexuality advice from two “girls who like girls.” They both answer each question separately and both have unique writing styles (“exuberant” comes to mind, but “spastic” might work if you’re feeling uncharitable). Fun and illuminating to read if you aren’t LGBT, fun and helpful if you are. A few questions from “gay bois,” parents of LGBT people, and straight folks sneak in occasionally too.

Thought-provoking slideshow on Slate with some commentary about the differing views toward teenage sex in the US and Europe with particular focus on condom advertisements. An interesting statistic: “The majority of U.S. teens—63 percent of boys and 69 percent of girls—wish they had waited longer to have sex, compared with only 5 percent of boys and 12 percent of girls in the Netherlands.”

Sexy illustrations from a Brazilian artist who goes by the name “Derbyblue.” Mildly NSFW.

smoking is not sexy. from Brandon Aviram on Vimeo.

Remember, smoking kills. Eye candy for boys and girls and everyone else with a sex drive.

Straight male stereotypes edition!

Greta Christina writes about 5 Stupid, Unfair and Sexist Things Expected of Men on Alternet. (She means straight men.)

Esquire answers 12 Mysterious Sex Questions you (straight men) may have had. This article was also written by a woman. One of the questions begins with “Not that I have a huge penis…”

Taking a break from the explicitly manly manly stuff, Sex at Dawn is a book about sexuality that argues that monogamy is not the natural way of things and that many of our romantic and sexual problems come from a lack of understanding of this. I haven’t read it, but the premise is interesting.

Oh, and at-least-a-little-straight guys (and not-so-straight girls) — if I have my stereotypes right, you should enjoy this.

Starting this week, we will begin producing some regular features. One of these will be a place for us, your editors and staff, to share a handful of interesting links to web content that we think is relevant, sexy, or just fascinating. We’ve tentatively planned for this feature to be published on Fridays, but we’re generous. Here’s an early taste of the kinds of things we have in store.

Speaking of taste, Gastronomista shared Mangez Moi (“Eat Me”), a collection of chocolates by the French culinary design group Bouchees Doubles. Each chocolate is modeled after a body part, and each body part has its own flavor. The nipples, for instance, are dark chocolate with “the fragrance of flowers”.

Fast Company‘s Co.Design shared this unique chess set designed by Aruliden for the luxury sex shop Kiki de Montparnasse which carries some sophisticated-looking accessories and sleek sex toys (mostly) for women. Yes, those are vibrators. Yes, that is gold trim. It costs $7,000.

Finally, we’d like to invite you to check out Savage Love, Dan Savage’s advice column about sex, love, and relationships. We’re fans because of Savage’s sex-positive and brutally honest tone, but, if nothing else, you’ll probably learn about some new fetishes. You can read the column at the AV Club or on The Stranger’s website. Also check out Savage’s podcast on iTunes.

We hope you like the direction this feature is taking, but if you don’t — or just want to send a few sexy links our way — you can contact us, as always, at riceopen@gmail.com.