5 ms·

I know of a friend who spends a lot of money on this platform. I was baffled by the amounts he ends up spending, ~5% of his monthly income. He doesn't have that

I know of a friend who spends a lot of money on this platform. I was baffled by the amounts he ends up spending, ~5% of his monthly income. He doesn't have that high a disposable income, so it made no sense to me, considering I can't even imagine me spending a single dollar on such stuff. When I asked him about it, he said "the messages are personalised and it doesn't feel artificial. They kind of lead you on to pay more as the interaction goes on". I would be really surprised if it is not bots interacting at this point. The kind of messages he was talking about being "personalised", felt very generic, at least the initial ones and they could reuse the same content over and over again with others.

scarmig 6y ago
It gets me to wondering: how hard would it be to create computer generated OnlyFans models (actors? performers?) and set up some chat bots to interact with fans? Even if the chat bot would lack verisimilitude, I can imagine outsourcing the messages to developing countries and adding some tools to let them make quick, cash-generating responses more efficiently.
- mrguyorama 6y ago
  You've reinvented half of the scams that are run out of business buildings in nigeria
- actuator 6y ago
  Unethical but I won't be surprised if that is exactly what's happening. Once you have the media, you just need a person to chat up and insert that media. For all we know, that can be a dude. For content as well, you can scrape other platforms and create a new identity.
  - HenryBemis 6y ago
    Wasn't it disclosed through the Ashley Madison hack that they were employing bots (and real people) to keep the clients busy and lure them into buying more "chatting privileges" (number of messages etc.? So this has already happened to some degree. As AI (aka humans teaching computers) to make for better "hungrier" chatboxes, with the escalation (buy more messages, send client to next tier), sell a "more personalized package" (to use the parent comment of his friend). This could do a nice Black Mirror episode. Like the one where she lost her husband, her friend registered for the Tier1 service and it went on from that..
- TeamTurtle 6y ago
  Pretty sure the term you're looking for is e-whoring and it's a thing.
- xwdv 6y ago
  I actually had been thinking alone these lines myself. Disclaimer though: I have very unethical ideas around technology and if that offends you don't bother reading and don't downvote the hell out of me, just move on, this is only a thought, but consider this: Imagine you come across an instagram profile of a woman with a lot of followers who you think would make some damn good money on OnlyFans, but for whatever reason she will never do that. If you could find a woman with her similar body shape, you could create deep fake videos using that women performing various sexual acts, but use the face of the woman using her instagram selfies, which inevitably she will have tons of on her profile. You could then create a marketing funnel, privately following and DMing male followers from some "Instagram business account" cloned from some of the girls pics and perhaps some deep faked pics, and invite them to your OnlyFans page that you create for her. Setup some low cost individuals who can reply to chat messages competently 24/7, and you now have a full working product setup and ready to produce profits. You can then continue doing this with more instagram girls, each time you do you must be careful who you market to to avoid detection, you don't want to end up having to "burn" a girl that could make some good money, but it's no big deal because your central operation won't be threatened unless someone can tie all the accounts together and ban you. This could probably make about $5k a month per girl. Should scale well.
  - elliekelly 6y ago
    In addition to being a total scumbag move, using the face of a real identifiable person would be criminal in many jurisdictions even if the photos/videos were computer generated.
    - xwdv 6y ago
      Just don’t conduct operations in those jurisdictions then.
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
- CapricornNoble 6y ago
  >>>It gets me to wondering: how hard would it be to create computer generated OnlyFans models (actors? performers?) and set up some chat bots to interact with fans? Arguably, this has been attempted already with Projekt Melody. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Projekt_Melody https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Projekt_Melody Twitch suspended the account, and a bunch of biological female streamers were pissed that a computer-generated female was cutting into their market.
  - an_opabinia 6y ago
    It's an open question if Twitch gets anything out of non-pro-gaming streamers. Ultimately those dollars come at the expense of others, there is limited attention and money, it really isn't something that would just exist elsewhere. For example people also spend a lot of money on virtual slot machine games, so much so they were usually one out of every 11 apps in Apple's top grossing, back when they reported this list. It couldn't possibly be healthy for the app ecosystem, it sucks the air out of the room for other developers making creative or useful stuff. Sure it makes money, but a lot of things make money, it's stupid to reduce the effect of virtual slot machine games down to, "Well its users wouldn't spend the dollars elsewhere, and the more money to Apple the better, so it helps everyone." The success of virtual slot machines has hurt video game developers, because financiers expect you to reproduce their mechanics, even though their expectation that it's all about mechanics is wrong. Hence many games with pointless slot machine mechanics. Nobody needs OnlyFans. OnlyFans harms earnest creators, it ghettoizes earnest female creators especially because your agent, your manager, your friends, your family, your viewers - they will now expect that the surest way to make money is selling your body, and not by having any real talent or skills. OnlyFans and its porn stars have completely co-opted well-meaning people with this talk about sex work, COVID, it sucks to live in Bulgaria and whatever. Bella Thorne is of course a huge hack, it is preposterous she is repeatedly being given a platform by the media where the net result will be, more people will stop trying hard and gamble on being nude online. They're not the only platform. TikTok is full of talentless hacks too, who simply win a random Internet lottery and are completely and utterly distorting earnest creativity and opportunities for hard working people. Facebook, Twitter and YouTube also reward SEO / ripping off other people's stuff much more than creating something original. This "well it makes money" bullshit has to end.
- qtplatypus 6y ago
  So basically what Kizuna Ai pretends to be but for real?
sergiotapia 6y ago
Should simps be protected from themselves? This is borderline abusing men with profound psychological issues.
- nonbirithm 6y ago
  But then it's like, should we protect people from anti-vaccine messages or other misinformation? Is the only way to prevent societal collapse to have a higher authority step in and protect people who cannot resist temptation from themselves? I don't know who I would trust to enforce that kind of thing. A lot of times I do end up wishing there was someone who would set me straight every time I attempted to eat unhealthy or not exercise. But it seems like the imperative in modern society is that you're just going to have to learn to resist temptation on your own, or you're done for - good luck. I don't really understand this, because I can say that I want to improve myself all the time and be fully aware of my mild desire to do so, and be willing to have someone put me on the right path, and simply never get around to it all until it's too late. And then there's climate change, where I have accepted that trying to convince people to change is hopeless on a large scale. Who is going to be trusted to make the decisions "for our own good," without another yellow vests movement springing out in opposition?
  - rumanator 6y ago
    > But then it's like, should we protect people from anti-vaccine messages or other misinformation? Is the only way to prevent societal collapse to have a higher authority step in and protect people who cannot resist temptation from themselves? Society is comprised of people, and some members of society are indeed vulnerable and susceptible to abuse. Society is expected to step up to stop and punish abuse directed at vulnerable members of society, like how the police intervenes in domestic violence cases, and how social services intervenes in at-risk families. I don't see the point of arguing against protecting the most vulnerable members of society. There is zero to be gained with Spartan approaches to it's weakest and most vulnerable members.
- Cthulhu_ 6y ago
  What's the alternative? I mean loneliness is a huge problem in a lot of societies, and the 'rona has only made it worse.
nonbirithm 6y ago
Reminds me of the virtual YouTubers. They are sort of like streamers with webcams, but they do not expose their real image. Instead they make up a fictional backstory and have an artist create a visual representation of them that gets motion/face tracked. It feels like an offshoot of traditional Japanese idols, with the same merchandising and live events, but with a totally different distribution method. Personally, as someone that doesn't understand the appeal of real-life idols, I end up watching a lot of the virtual people because even though I understand there is a system behind it, it does fill in the desires that stem from being lonely. Yes, it is not a substitute for human contact, and I am fully cognizant of this every time I watch, but the most interesting parts for me come from the interaction between the different streamers instead of the streamers with the audience anyways. They frequently do collaborations, and eventually there comes a weird sort of mythology that emerges where you and the other streamers gradually understand the most memorable qualities of each (one is perverted, one is the most "idol-like", one is a fluent speaker of English and has knowledge of American meme culture, and so on). Sometimes they also exude a form of the "heel and face" aspects of professional wrestling. Thus when you come back for more you see the same group of characters in new situations, and the backstory you have previously built up in your mind increases your interest in what happens. It feels kind of like a long running soap opera, or indeed professional wrestling, except with much more emphasis on personalized interaction and a lot of people yelping at each other in a foreign language. That's another thing. The fact that most of the members do not speak English and there are no official translations of most of the content gives the experience an odd foreign quality where the streamers will desperately try to translate things or greet people in broken English, which they promptly forget, in order to "summon the foreigner people". That in itself becomes a meme that the group capitalizes on heavily. I think the fact that you do not see a real person sets your expectations that you are watching someone with a fictional backstory better, and even so you can still enjoy the things they talk about. Unlike actors, they frequently talk about things like going to the convenience store to buy snacks or cook things or discuss that one time that one member paid for the bill for another and then forgot to leave enough for the subway home, in the context of the actual people going incognito and doing things off-stream. Even supposing it was scripted, it does not feel like it at all, more like they were given a general list of topics and free reign to more or less day what they want. It gives it a very human quality that static television or movies or idol concerts do not usually provide, and I think that is the key thing that people (me included) keep coming back for. The virtualness also implies that you do not necessarily have to "sell your body" to make it big as an entertainer, which I think is a relatively recent innovation. Then there are things that happen like a steamer sneezing triggering a flood of donations, some over $100. The donators are very concious of the image of their kind that gets posted on the Internet. In fact some of the streamers themselves go to great length to satirize the donation culture, the CEO of the talent company that manages them, and "real" idol groups that existed before, also categorizing each character by different dimensions (most to least pure, etc.). It is a very integrated system, and I can easily underand how it can suck people in, having been sucked in myself for a while. That does not change the fact that a system still exists however. Recently there was a very high profile "graduation" of a member who hadn't even been streaming for two weeks over a doxing scandal, which was really a cover for "firing to save face." It really does remind you that it's just the entertainment business in a different manifestation. 7 out of the 10 steamers with the highest donation amount on YouTube are virtual YouTubers. There is clearly a market being tapped here. Whether or not people should or ought to, if they are "slaves to loneliness," is a different question I don't really want to pursue.
Cthulhu_ 6y ago
I'm pretty sure they're still personalized, but they're "stock" messages because these people deal with dozens of requests a day. Very lucrative, I'm sure.

scarmig 6y ago

It gets me to wondering: how hard would it be to create computer generated OnlyFans models (actors? performers?) and set up some chat bots to interact with fans? Even if the chat bot would lack verisimilitude, I can imagine outsourcing the messages to developing countries and adding some tools to let them make quick, cash-generating responses more efficiently.

mrguyorama 6y ago
You've reinvented half of the scams that are run out of business buildings in nigeria
actuator 6y ago
Unethical but I won't be surprised if that is exactly what's happening. Once you have the media, you just need a person to chat up and insert that media. For all we know, that can be a dude. For content as well, you can scrape other platforms and create a new identity.
- HenryBemis 6y ago
  Wasn't it disclosed through the Ashley Madison hack that they were employing bots (and real people) to keep the clients busy and lure them into buying more "chatting privileges" (number of messages etc.? So this has already happened to some degree. As AI (aka humans teaching computers) to make for better "hungrier" chatboxes, with the escalation (buy more messages, send client to next tier), sell a "more personalized package" (to use the parent comment of his friend). This could do a nice Black Mirror episode. Like the one where she lost her husband, her friend registered for the Tier1 service and it went on from that..
TeamTurtle 6y ago
Pretty sure the term you're looking for is e-whoring and it's a thing.
xwdv 6y ago
I actually had been thinking alone these lines myself. Disclaimer though: I have very unethical ideas around technology and if that offends you don't bother reading and don't downvote the hell out of me, just move on, this is only a thought, but consider this: Imagine you come across an instagram profile of a woman with a lot of followers who you think would make some damn good money on OnlyFans, but for whatever reason she will never do that. If you could find a woman with her similar body shape, you could create deep fake videos using that women performing various sexual acts, but use the face of the woman using her instagram selfies, which inevitably she will have tons of on her profile. You could then create a marketing funnel, privately following and DMing male followers from some "Instagram business account" cloned from some of the girls pics and perhaps some deep faked pics, and invite them to your OnlyFans page that you create for her. Setup some low cost individuals who can reply to chat messages competently 24/7, and you now have a full working product setup and ready to produce profits. You can then continue doing this with more instagram girls, each time you do you must be careful who you market to to avoid detection, you don't want to end up having to "burn" a girl that could make some good money, but it's no big deal because your central operation won't be threatened unless someone can tie all the accounts together and ban you. This could probably make about $5k a month per girl. Should scale well.
- elliekelly 6y ago
  In addition to being a total scumbag move, using the face of a real identifiable person would be criminal in many jurisdictions even if the photos/videos were computer generated.
  - xwdv 6y ago
    Just don’t conduct operations in those jurisdictions then.
deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
CapricornNoble 6y ago
>>>It gets me to wondering: how hard would it be to create computer generated OnlyFans models (actors? performers?) and set up some chat bots to interact with fans? Arguably, this has been attempted already with Projekt Melody. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Projekt_Melody https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Projekt_Melody Twitch suspended the account, and a bunch of biological female streamers were pissed that a computer-generated female was cutting into their market.
- an_opabinia 6y ago
  It's an open question if Twitch gets anything out of non-pro-gaming streamers. Ultimately those dollars come at the expense of others, there is limited attention and money, it really isn't something that would just exist elsewhere. For example people also spend a lot of money on virtual slot machine games, so much so they were usually one out of every 11 apps in Apple's top grossing, back when they reported this list. It couldn't possibly be healthy for the app ecosystem, it sucks the air out of the room for other developers making creative or useful stuff. Sure it makes money, but a lot of things make money, it's stupid to reduce the effect of virtual slot machine games down to, "Well its users wouldn't spend the dollars elsewhere, and the more money to Apple the better, so it helps everyone." The success of virtual slot machines has hurt video game developers, because financiers expect you to reproduce their mechanics, even though their expectation that it's all about mechanics is wrong. Hence many games with pointless slot machine mechanics. Nobody needs OnlyFans. OnlyFans harms earnest creators, it ghettoizes earnest female creators especially because your agent, your manager, your friends, your family, your viewers - they will now expect that the surest way to make money is selling your body, and not by having any real talent or skills. OnlyFans and its porn stars have completely co-opted well-meaning people with this talk about sex work, COVID, it sucks to live in Bulgaria and whatever. Bella Thorne is of course a huge hack, it is preposterous she is repeatedly being given a platform by the media where the net result will be, more people will stop trying hard and gamble on being nude online. They're not the only platform. TikTok is full of talentless hacks too, who simply win a random Internet lottery and are completely and utterly distorting earnest creativity and opportunities for hard working people. Facebook, Twitter and YouTube also reward SEO / ripping off other people's stuff much more than creating something original. This "well it makes money" bullshit has to end.
qtplatypus 6y ago
So basically what Kizuna Ai pretends to be but for real?

sergiotapia 6y ago

Should simps be protected from themselves? This is borderline abusing men with profound psychological issues.

nonbirithm 6y ago
But then it's like, should we protect people from anti-vaccine messages or other misinformation? Is the only way to prevent societal collapse to have a higher authority step in and protect people who cannot resist temptation from themselves? I don't know who I would trust to enforce that kind of thing. A lot of times I do end up wishing there was someone who would set me straight every time I attempted to eat unhealthy or not exercise. But it seems like the imperative in modern society is that you're just going to have to learn to resist temptation on your own, or you're done for - good luck. I don't really understand this, because I can say that I want to improve myself all the time and be fully aware of my mild desire to do so, and be willing to have someone put me on the right path, and simply never get around to it all until it's too late. And then there's climate change, where I have accepted that trying to convince people to change is hopeless on a large scale. Who is going to be trusted to make the decisions "for our own good," without another yellow vests movement springing out in opposition?
- rumanator 6y ago
  > But then it's like, should we protect people from anti-vaccine messages or other misinformation? Is the only way to prevent societal collapse to have a higher authority step in and protect people who cannot resist temptation from themselves? Society is comprised of people, and some members of society are indeed vulnerable and susceptible to abuse. Society is expected to step up to stop and punish abuse directed at vulnerable members of society, like how the police intervenes in domestic violence cases, and how social services intervenes in at-risk families. I don't see the point of arguing against protecting the most vulnerable members of society. There is zero to be gained with Spartan approaches to it's weakest and most vulnerable members.
Cthulhu_ 6y ago
What's the alternative? I mean loneliness is a huge problem in a lot of societies, and the 'rona has only made it worse.

nonbirithm 6y ago

Reminds me of the virtual YouTubers. They are sort of like streamers with webcams, but they do not expose their real image. Instead they make up a fictional backstory and have an artist create a visual representation of them that gets motion/face tracked. It feels like an offshoot of traditional Japanese idols, with the same merchandising and live events, but with a totally different distribution method. Personally, as someone that doesn't understand the appeal of real-life idols, I end up watching a lot of the virtual people because even though I understand there is a system behind it, it does fill in the desires that stem from being lonely. Yes, it is not a substitute for human contact, and I am fully cognizant of this every time I watch, but the most interesting parts for me come from the interaction between the different streamers instead of the streamers with the audience anyways. They frequently do collaborations, and eventually there comes a weird sort of mythology that emerges where you and the other streamers gradually understand the most memorable qualities of each (one is perverted, one is the most "idol-like", one is a fluent speaker of English and has knowledge of American meme culture, and so on). Sometimes they also exude a form of the "heel and face" aspects of professional wrestling. Thus when you come back for more you see the same group of characters in new situations, and the backstory you have previously built up in your mind increases your interest in what happens. It feels kind of like a long running soap opera, or indeed professional wrestling, except with much more emphasis on personalized interaction and a lot of people yelping at each other in a foreign language. That's another thing. The fact that most of the members do not speak English and there are no official translations of most of the content gives the experience an odd foreign quality where the streamers will desperately try to translate things or greet people in broken English, which they promptly forget, in order to "summon the foreigner people". That in itself becomes a meme that the group capitalizes on heavily. I think the fact that you do not see a real person sets your expectations that you are watching someone with a fictional backstory better, and even so you can still enjoy the things they talk about. Unlike actors, they frequently talk about things like going to the convenience store to buy snacks or cook things or discuss that one time that one member paid for the bill for another and then forgot to leave enough for the subway home, in the context of the actual people going incognito and doing things off-stream. Even supposing it was scripted, it does not feel like it at all, more like they were given a general list of topics and free reign to more or less day what they want. It gives it a very human quality that static television or movies or idol concerts do not usually provide, and I think that is the key thing that people (me included) keep coming back for. The virtualness also implies that you do not necessarily have to "sell your body" to make it big as an entertainer, which I think is a relatively recent innovation. Then there are things that happen like a steamer sneezing triggering a flood of donations, some over $100. The donators are very concious of the image of their kind that gets posted on the Internet. In fact some of the streamers themselves go to great length to satirize the donation culture, the CEO of the talent company that manages them, and "real" idol groups that existed before, also categorizing each character by different dimensions (most to least pure, etc.). It is a very integrated system, and I can easily underand how it can suck people in, having been sucked in myself for a while. That does not change the fact that a system still exists however. Recently there was a very high profile "graduation" of a member who hadn't even been streaming for two weeks over a doxing scandal, which was really a cover for "firing to save face." It really does remind you that it's just the entertainment business in a different manifestation. 7 out of the 10 steamers with the highest donation amount on YouTube are virtual YouTubers. There is clearly a market being tapped here. Whether or not people should or ought to, if they are "slaves to loneliness," is a different question I don't really want to pursue.

Cthulhu_ 6y ago

I'm pretty sure they're still personalized, but they're "stock" messages because these people deal with dozens of requests a day. Very lucrative, I'm sure.