Daily, thousands of people indulge in their sexual fantasies by following and interacting with OnlyFans models. OnlyFans is a platform that allows creators to monetize their posts as a way of freelance modeling.
In 2020, it became big news in the mainstream media that content creators were earning anxiously large sums of money from girls who were selling nudes, private and custom videos, private interactions, and personalized pictures.
For some people, OnlyFans accounts make up to 30% of their monthly income. Considering the perks of not having an agent who will represent you to the public and take a fee from your earnings, or spending hours of modeling to make an extra buck, OnlyFans has allowed models to have flexible and remote schedules.
The Explosive Growth
The platform’s explosive growth brought a lot of influencers and celebrities to the table. Even porn stars decided to try it to pay their way through school and cover their bills.
One porn actress, Ashley, says that her opinion of porn was of a “very rigid stereotype”. She wanted to take her porn skills to another level, and, for her, that’s when OnlyFans came into the picture. It was a medium for her to find an appropriate audience, upload her art, and profit from it.
After her experimental videos on Tumblr went unnoticed, Ashley migrated to OnlyFans, where she could earn monthly subscriptions from her followers. All types of creators become part of the community, fastly rising in fame as the best OnlyFans accounts and becoming a “nexus for adult entertainment”.
How the Covid-19 Pandemic Affected the Adult Industry?
What really drove the essence of the platform was the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic. As people were limited on venturing into the outside world, with no way out for entertainment, people flocked to OnlyFans as a means of entertainment and to make connections – albeit online.
Creators took on the chance to earn an extra income source, and the OnlyFans platform accelerated its momentum by hitting 75% of newly registered users in 2020.
OnlyFans accounts were rising continuously, reaching 120 million users two years ago. Nowadays, the number is more than 170 million registered subscribers and 1.5 million content creators. And the numbers don’t seem to go down any time soon.
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Celebrities Hopped on the Platform
Celebrities like Rebecca Minkoff, Cardi B, and Tyler Posey added the hype of joining the OnlyFans platform, thus increasing the number of content creators drastically. Before OnlyFans, such celebrities were not part of a paid subscription service. Most of them relied on social media posts and stories to share their content.
The OnlyFans Sexual Content Ban
OnlyFans models recognized the potential of earning money from selling videos, photos, and direct messages to users and started selling exclusive content. While the platform was not originally developed for adult entertainment, the subscription model and the user-friendly interface allowed sex workers to find their place in the sky right on OnlyFans.
So, why did OnlyFans decide to ban adult content? Well, the main reason was with banking. The CEO of OnlyFans, Tim Stokely, claimed that the banks refused to process any type of payment that has been associated with adult content. Tim Stokely added that JPMorgan Chase, Metro Bank, and BNY Mellon banned the intermediary payments, which crippled the sex workers financially.
OnlyFans suffered an outrage in August 2020 due to the announced ban of sexually explicit content in October 2020. Millions of OnlyFans models expressed their discontent with the decision of the ban, thus protesting against the policy of prohibiting adult content. Within a couple of days, OnlyFans announced that the adult content would not be suspended.
The ban was reversed after OnlyFans followed a strict and thorough verification process and ensured sustainability on the platform. They even published the first “transparency report” in 2021 and announced that the payment process is now regulated, so that sex workers can continue using the OnlyFans services.
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Adding Value to Subscribers and Creators
While the porn industry became destabilized with the adult content being available for free to viewers, many pornography platforms decided to make the movies available for free while earning money from commercials and ads. OnlyFans follows the trends in the porn industry. It has capitalized on the trends where content creators benefit from the subscription fees.
For the fans, the main reason for contributing to the profits is the value creators provide. Having access to exclusive consent means a sense of appreciation, friendliness, intimacy, and visibility.
Content creators receive their share via direct payments of 80% of the OnlyFans subscription fees. OnlyFans lives on the rule of showcasing celebrities and influencers for marketing growth purposes.
Will This Change in the Future?
While we can’t tell for sure, in terms of scalability, OnlyFans is available for new creators and demographics. It’s hard to predict its growth since the platform has seen enormous traffic in a short period of time. What we can do is wait and see!
