We cover all sorts of things for the voyeur to the player to the sex worker. We're not sensationalist – we're a community, a home for different ways of thinking that we allow to flourish."

The events of the last week have left a gap in the print market for intelligent sex literature. When the new Foreplay magazine launches it also has plans to go online only, indicating that for those readers keen to give the theme of sex some cerebral effort, the web is their only option. Yet porn, soft-core lads mags and the less engaging erotic chic lit continue to chug along. Yet there is something prognostic in the notion that all three have been forced to rethink their business models. Do sex and thinking really pair off that badly? Is it really the case that titillation can not be high-brow? Can a British readership only engage in sexual subject matter in the form of a cheap snigger from a porno? Then there was confusion surrounding Forum magazine after its publisher, Trojan, went into administration. Once the storm calmed, Forum – another magazine that runs sizeable sex features – revealed to its readers that it was not withdrawing from print but rebranding as Foreplay. What all these magazines have in common – apart from carrying adverts for vibrators – is that they explore sex intellectually for an educated, open-minded readership. Their longest word is not 36DD and none of them go anywhere near the top shelf.

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The Erotic Review does an laudable job of mixing humour with sex and over the years has attracted great writers such as Auberon Waugh and Sarah Waters. Forum seeks out originality and covers in-depth features about sex in different cultures. Scarlet captured the modern, educated, forward thinking woman, brave enough to celebrate her sex. It is unlikely that this gap will be filled though, because whoever tries will likely have their attempts hampered by a culture of embarrassment and assumptions. Despite the sharp wit of the Erotic Review, the daring of Forum and the dynamism of Scarlet, most consumers – and distributors it seems – assume that these titles are full of dirty pictures and gags about whips and chains. Sarah Berry, editor of Forum – which is to become Foreplay – also alludes to indirect censorship: "I think the problem is partly because we're seen as seedy; but also because people don't necessarily know we're there. A lot of newsagents won't allow top shelf magazines and distribution is down.

What a week it's been for sex in print. I don't mean framed masterpieces of erotica, I mean sex in the written form, and the few publications that present this complicated genre with words and not pictures. Next, news leaked out that Scarlet magazine, a glossy for the sexually liberated woman, is closing.

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