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My biggest shock was how much "PR" was generated on Reddit, and how many sexworkers really do use the platform. I knew it was a thing, I knew of the memes, but

My biggest shock was how much "PR" was generated on Reddit, and how many sexworkers really do use the platform. I knew it was a thing, I knew of the memes, but to see both sides in arms over a company vs branding, creating their own website and content - and vanity domain as well. People really do just want a one click solution for creating adult content, and consuming adult content. And the memes, I think they're pretty toxic, 4chan, incel, reddit, twitter memes - I never knew there was that much angst.

whymauri 5y ago
it's pretty huge COVID hit recently graduated Gen-Z incredibly hard. There's huge groups that are/were unemployed and then there's huge groups who are sexually repressed due to quarantine. Across the whole world, too*. Many can easily make more than min wage, and in certain niches you probably don't even have to be 'conventionally beautiful' (sorry to use this term, but it's important I think) to make a living or solid portion of a living on there. For $$ per hour worked, why would they field low wage, menial jobs with a risk of COVID? And if you price model right, you don't need thousands of fans, just a couple really dedicated superfans/whales. * Consider the value of dollars/euros/pounds in poorer countries!
- treesknees 5y ago
  Bhad Bhabie (cash me outside meme girl) made over $1M in 6 hours and said she could retire right now from the amount of money she has made off OF. And she's not doing "porn" or even posting fully nude photos. There's a big movement to gain a lot of followers on social media like TikTok and then redirect those followers to their $5/month OnlyFans. There are a lot of people making a living or at least significantly boosting their income from this model, and they don't have to leave the house to do it. https://www.billboard.com/articles/columns/hip-hop/9550662/bhad-bhabie-earns-1-million-dollars-onlyfans https://www.billboard.com/articles/columns/hip-hop/9550662/b...
  - ed25519FUUU 5y ago
    OF is probably similar to Etsy, where the 95th percentile make millions and the median income is $0.
    - deleted 5y ago
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    - dwater 5y ago
      I have an acquaintance who I know made ~$1500 in 2 weeks, just after work occasionally. She had been on the site already, the only reason I know the amount made during that time is she did it as a fundraiser and donated it all to a non-profit. I'm sure it's a distribution with a long tail, but I think it's probably easier to have a side gig on OF provide you with a little supplemental income rather than Etsy.
    - Sohcahtoa82 5y ago
      Twitch is certainly that way as well. The median viewer count is likely single digits. Though I can say with considerable certainty that a lot of wannabe Twitch streamers think that being a streamer just means having people watch you play a game, which may be true for story-driven games that don't get a lot of viewers, since it creates a more movie-like experience, and may be true for highly-competitive games where you can watch someone make amazing plays. But for the rest, you need to have the charisma and creativity to create entertaining commentary and audience interaction. Nobody wants to watch an average Joe play World of Warcraft.
      - kd5bjo 5y ago
        In the Justin.tv days, the median viewer count was zero: At any given time, 2/3 of the live channels had literally nobody watching.
        Anther 5y ago
        I was proud of my JTV channel. I actually used to vlog and chat to people. They regularly featured me too. I wonder how much I could have made in today’s market..
- acituan 5y ago
  > COVID hit recently graduated Gen-Z incredibly hard Aren’t women over-represented on the supply side while men on the demand side though? I don’t think gen-z as a wholesale cohort makes sense.
  - watwut 5y ago
    Women are also overrepresented on the side of loosing job. Mostly artly because women work in segments that were hit harder - services and the like. And partly because childcare is more on them, mothers were even more likely to loose jobs.
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- throwaway0a5e 5y ago
  >For $$ per hour worked, why would they field low wage, menial jobs with a risk of COVID? Because after shit pay being the desk girl at Walmart Tire Center for 2yr you can easily convert that into a service writer job <fast forward 40yr> and then retire from your job as regional support manager for <company that makes industrial doodad> Compare with thotting around on the internet where you can make a ton of money up front but you're basically racing the clock because your body won't be nearly as lucrative of an income at 30 and you'll be starting from square one-ish. Can you potentially take the cash and pivot into a career that will carry you to retirement? Sure, but it takes a work ethic and level of discipline that is uncommon. It's like the female equivalent of being a marine rifleman for several enlistments. You get out at ~30 with few marketable skills, hopefully a good work ethic and a high liklihood of f-ed up knees.
  - pope_meat 5y ago
    That's too many regional managers, I don't think the economy will support that.
    - throwaway0a5e 5y ago
      The economy won't support that many Walmart Tire Centers either. That was just an example. My point was that there are paths from these "crap jobs" to "real career" and traveling said paths require about the same level of "how do I tee up my next move for more money" long term thinking as being a successful camgirl.
    - engineer_22 5y ago
      A growing economy can support more managers in the future. A stagnant economy will not.
      - pope_meat 5y ago
        Ah, the old forever growth strategy. You float the idea of perpetual growth in any other context, and you'd be called a fool, but apparently the economy doesn't obey the same rules of common sense. Well, I hope you're right.
- notyourday 5y ago
  > For $$ per hour worked, why would they field low wage, menial jobs with a risk of COVID? Median OF revenue per creator is $180/mo for equivalent of a full time job. https://sea.mashable.com/culture/17130/top-onlyfans-creators-can-earn-nearly-27000-more-than-doctors-survey-finds#:~:text=On%20average%2C%20the%20typical%20OnlyFans,by%20creators%20such%20as%20gem101 https://sea.mashable.com/culture/17130/top-onlyfans-creators....
  - enedil 5y ago
    Which is around the minimal wage in places such as Ukraine (which isn't the ultimate low either).
  - dijit 5y ago
    > Median OF revenue per creator is $180/mo Many factors can lead to this, but that's not surprising, the law of distributions when it comes to things like this is that there are incredible earners and then a massive drop off and long tail. > for equivalent of a full time job. You added this, I don't doubt that some people put in a lot more effort than the monetary amount they get back- but the inverse is also true and no source claims that "you get $180 for a full time workload", because that's impossible to measure at scale.
  - mzs 5y ago
    FWIW that's an average not median income with a ton of caveats ^ from the source. I'm confident though that only the first two screens of OF content creators make the bulk of the income though. ^ https://mrq.com/blog/only-fans https://mrq.com/blog/only-fans > https://ranking-fans.com/ https://ranking-fans.com/ - Seedlist and Fans Sorted by total fans; accounts where fans are not available have been excluded. Many accounts listed as having the most fans are free accounts used by OnlyFans models who also possess paid accounts. However, as fan numbers were only available for the free accounts, these have been disregarded for the purposes of this story. Likewise, "free" accounts where subscription is free but photos provided required payment have been disregarded. Accordingly, the only data shown is for paid accounts with high subscriber numbers. In some cases, models possessed multiple paid accounts. In these cases, only the one with the highest subscriber numbers has been tracked. Monthly earnings are based exclusively on the individual account assuming no media requires additional payment and disregarding tips and similar voluntary costs. Similarly, free trials and discounts have been excluded. Accordingly, all monthly earnings are estimates reflecting the monthly payments of subscribers over the long term.
- pelasaco 5y ago
  In Germany, all Craftsmen are just laughing. Tiler, Carpenter, electrician, etc.. all of them have enough to do, can choose their clients and their wages. I understand that HN always will tend to talk about CS, but Craftsmen are doing their 40k/year, easily. The Salary potential is just increasing.
  - lugged 5y ago
    You know Devs can relatively easily get around 250k in NY / SF right? Trades are solid career choices but it's hard work and you expire at about the same rate as a software dev.
    - laputan_machine 5y ago
      So sick of seeing these wildly inflated numbers, they increase after every post I'm sure. Most of us here who are software devs are not earning close to 150k, stop using a few SF salaries as the baseline for the rest of us. It is really annoying.
      - Ancapistani 5y ago
        I don’t know the breakdown, but I’m a (remote) dev in Arkansas making right at $150k with ~10 years experience. The numbers aren’t inflated, they’re just not equally distributed.
      - raztogt21 5y ago
        Is easily doable have 2 100k jobs without burnout. Do you really spend 8 hours coding each day?
      - dlp211 5y ago
        Ok, so let's not use inflated Numbers for the trades either. According to the BLS, the median Software Developer makes $110k. The median carpenter makes $34k. There are also nearly 5x the number of Developer jobs then carpenters. It's a similar story for other trades, machinist is $47k, welder is $44k, plumber is $56k, HVAC is $50k. Then when we look at other technology jobs, PM, IT, etc, the story is similar to developers, high median salary with a multiple of jobs available over the trades.
- ronnier 5y ago
  > huge groups who are sexually repressed Men I assume given the amounts of money they’ll spend on OF and the m/f ratios on dating apps?
- bobthechef 5y ago
  > COVID hit recently graduated Gen-Z incredibly hard. Gen-Z is less sexually active than previous generations. Significantly so. They've been exposed to porn at an earlier age (owing to earlier access to the internet and the ubiquity of pornography online). Porn use was already common among them. The lockdown made things worse, but the status quo was already in place. > There's huge groups that are/were unemployed and then there's huge groups who are sexually repressed due to quarantine. This false anthropology must die. Pornography is incredibly harmful to those that consume it. It enslaves a person to his passions. It feeds his lusts and deranges his desires. It makes him or her incapable of relating to the opposite sex in a healthy way, whether in the strictly sexual sphere or not. Lust blunts the mind and renders one incapable of thinking clearly. The consumption of pornography only feeds the sexual passions, further entrenching lust and often generating paraphilias and fetishes as the titillating novelty wears off. Emotions become disordered. Someone who has a porn habit becomes locked in him or herself. The stereotype of a lonely and smarmy 40 year old locked in his parents' basement masturbating to porn is a pithy illustration in many ways. It is the image of an emasculated, impotent wretch deranged by his vices and disorders. This has nothing to do with his lack of a sexual relationship and everything to do with how he views sexuality. He is not master of himself. Frankly, we'd be better off permitting (regulated) prostitution. There seem to be plenty of women willing to provide these services and plenty of men who are slaves to their lusts (men tend to be more vulnerable to porn addiction and lust than women, but yes, it is true that it is not a problem exclusive to men). At least with prostitution, you're having sex with a human being instead of abusing yourself alone in your room. But ultimately, our view of sexuality must be restored to a healthy one and not the depraved one proposed by liberalism. I suspect the "asexual movement" is a subconscious reaction against the obsession with sex in our society. Excess in one direction tends to produce excess in the other. But maybe it will at least legitimize celibacy again. You don't need sex to have a happy life, contrary to the propaganda of the last few decades or so. I will add that porn use is an industry fueled both by a corrupt society and people in power who recognize that those who are slaves to their passions (and lust is but one of them) are easy to control. Oligarchies are prone to let such vices flourish because it keeps the populace impotent and consumed with themselves instead of threatening the usurpers who have managed to gain tyrannical control. Porn appeals to prurient interest which is why it is so useful in psychological warfare (a rather stark example is the broadcasting of porn on captured Palestinian television by the Israelis; you think they were trying to liberate them?). Sexual liberation has made people easier to control. It has truncated their humanity, warped them, and turned them into sex robots.
- polote 5y ago
  The success of OF is more a question of demand than offer honestly. During the lockdowns they were a lot of guys with money to spend but could not spend it on social activities, so a lot of it went on internet websites. But there is also a more long term trend of people having less and less sex and more and more porno consumption. But that can't go forever, at one point if all girls in the world are on sex workers then they will be much more offer than demand. A girl on OF, to make a living, let's say 3k per month, needs to have 300 guys paying for her. But a guy is not paying for 300 girls, maybe 10 max, so the platform needs to have 30 times more guys than girls. Which is unsustainable in a world with 50% girls/50% guys. Which is a good news imho. The day that having sex for girls is a normal thing (No this is not normal thing today). Then a lot of things will be much simpler for everyone
  - handmodel 5y ago
    I would love to see their metrics. I would imagine, like most things, they have a ton of whales so that even if a minority of guys subscribe to 50 girls there probably are plenty of people with addictions shelling out $500 or $1000 a month on this stuff. And this people could represent the majority of all payments on the site. It also seems (from actual published data) that the distribution is super weighted towards the top performers. That being said, even an extra 1k a month is pretty sick for posting topless photos if your regular income is less than 40k or you are in school.
    - _dark_matter_ 5y ago
      everthing is a pareto distribution, across both buyers and sellers. Would be neat to see a better breakdown though.
  - caractacus 5y ago
    A long-term trend of less sex and more porno? Could you show some stats on this? I only question that line because I can't even deal with the rest of your post.
    - polote 5y ago
- vncecartersknee 5y ago
  I don't think just any old person can make money off OF though, like presumably you need a reasonable camera and maybe lights or something, you need to be able to edit photos, the time and energy and motivation to learn how to use those things etc. It's not like some random struggling single mother can take a few pics of her feet on her 5 year old iphone and be expecting to make decent money.
okprod 5y ago
I think OF has also become a one-click outlet for nontraditional sex workers, e.g., those who wouldn't otherwise have done this type of stuff. From what I've read OF has even more "amateurs" than platforms like MyFreeCams.
- southeastern 5y ago
  Part of the reason they've gotten so much heat is because of cases of underage girls selling photos on that site for some time before they're caught. I don't know if they've found a solution to that problem or just come to some agreement with their payment processors
immmmmm 5y ago
a good friend of mine is a sex worker, a cam girl to be precise, and uses OF as it is safer than other platforms. it should be noted that she is a brilliant individual and do this job due to severe psychiatric problems that prevent her doing more "normal" jobs. she feeds one child with this money, as a lot of sex workers that are also loving moms. it is important that such platforms do exist (if they implement proper safeguards) and that these content creators are not stigmatized.
- dna_polymerase 5y ago
  > it should be noted that she is a brilliant individual it should NOT be noted. Too many good people died in the wars of past centuries to get us to the freedom and liberty we enjoy today to let any fundamentalists dictate what a normal job is and who works it. Sex work is work and if you dislike it you'd might enjoy Afghanistan these days.
  - immmmmm 5y ago
    i know, unfortunately sex work is still highly stigmatized, including in western present cultures. you don't need to go as far as afghanistan, i'm back from eastern europe where my friends from the LGBTQ community are literally being beaten by neo nazi funded by putin.
    - fenderbluesjr 5y ago
      It is stigmatized because it plays a part in facilitating people's addictions and mental problems. Just like gambling, drug-dealing, snake-oil salesmen, etc. It's not all roses, that's for sure..
  - mumblemumble 5y ago
    We should try to read each others' comments in the most charitable light possible. In this case, I think the friendly way to interpret that comment is as an attempt to anticipate and pre-empt a very common and harmful misconception about sex workers.
lotsofpulp 5y ago
There is a good chance that any given reddit post in the widely viewed subreddits is posted in order to get people to look at the user’s profile or other posts and follow it back to their only fans page.
- finalfire 5y ago
  That's pretty right. In particular, there is a (huge) subreddit devoted to selfies where a high number of users that post in there have a OF link present in their biography.
wly_cdgr 5y ago
Of course there was a big outcry. It's like if Etsy announced they were gonna ban candles, or Kickstarter said they were gonna ban dice and cards. You think all those people would want to go create their own sites? You think it would make any sense for them to do that? Come on
- marc_io 5y ago
  It could be better for some of them in the long run, who knows. The fact is that there's no absolute security in either choice, but with a personal website at least you are in control, you have your “domain”.
Crontab 5y ago
I've noticed that a large portion of women submitting in the /r/Gonewild subreddit have an OF these days.
- Grakel 5y ago
  OF has ruined amateur porn. What used to be genuine and casual is now mostly bored-eyed pros with bad lighting.
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  - jldl805 5y ago
    You've summarized all my most important thoughts into two succinct sentences, thank you.
  - hackinthebochs 5y ago
    It's the opposite for me. The value for amateur porn is that they don't look or act like traditional porn stars. I don't find much value in abstract notions like "genuine interest".
- kraftman 5y ago
  That's simply not true, because /r/gonewild are extremely strict about not allowing OF creators. They can post under a seperate account but any mention of they're main account or OF results in a swift permanent ban.
- Seattle3503 5y ago
  /r/gonewild is actually one of the few subreddits that prohibits posts from sellers. But every subreddit that doesn't outright prohibit sellers is flooded with them. The OF girls all got kicked off of Facebook, Instagram, Snapshot, etc... Reddit is comparatively more friendly to sex workers as far as site wide policy goes.
dr-detroit 5y ago
Wow youre so naive I wish I was you
lovegoblin 5y ago
> People really do just want a one click solution for creating adult content They want a solution for distributing adult content and getting paid for it. By far, the single biggest hurdle here is payment processing - as evidenced by this whole OnlyFans fiasco. It's Visa and Mastercard who are pressuring OF - they've been doing this to sex workers for decades, but finally picked a fight big enough that it's getting real media backlash.
da_chicken 5y ago
> People really do just want a one click solution for creating adult content, and consuming adult content. Once they know it's possible, people want a one click solution for anything. The subject being taboo has nothing to do with it. This is one reason why Youtube, Spotify, Steam and Netflix did such a good job combatting piracy for music, video games, and movies, while ROM sites are still a ubiquitous problem for 20 year old consoles. Youtube, Spotify, Steam and Netflix made content easy to get. There's no equivalent for most ROMs, so they're still widely pirated.
- fnord77 5y ago
  there'd probably be a netflix for ROMs if there were enough demand (I imagine the copyright holders would get onboard if the demand and $$ was there)
  - kbenson 5y ago
    I can see it now. Most ROMs would be available, but Nintendo would be notably absent from any of the platforms and only allow their ROMs to be streamed from their own service.
    - entropicdrifter 5y ago
      >Nintendo would be notably absent from any of the platforms and only allow their ROMs to be streamed from their own service. They already do this, you need a Switch online subscription to access the NES/SNES ROMs they have available
      - kbenson 5y ago
        Oh, I know, but in the theoretical world where there's a Netflix like subscription, I would assume that means a lot of different IP was also gathered there, like Sega, Atari, older Playstation and Xbox titles, etc. There's not a lot of incentive for some of those groups to come together, but I imagine even if most could be assembled, Nintendo would be particularly resistant.
belorn 5y ago
Wondering what the memes were and this article (https://www.newsweek.com/onlyfans-memes-flood-internet-after-site-announces-ban-some-sexual-content-1621270 https://www.newsweek.com/onlyfans-memes-flood-internet-after...) displayed some. There is also https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/events/onlyfans-adult-content-ban https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/events/onlyfans-adult-content.... Are those that an correct representation of the memes?
drakythe 5y ago
I don't think it is just the One Click Solution they want (though I don't deny that is probably very attractive). I'm pretty sure we would see more vanity URLs and one-off sites if payment processors weren't so strict when it comes to selling adult content/services. Spinning up a CMS website of your own, even with commerce/membership functionality, isn't difficult. But the payment processors are the unspoken guardians of internet commerce, and without VC level backing good luck getting them to touch something like adult content. I think this is a missing piece of OFs popularity and usefulness to creators. Not only is it a centralized and (by now) well known site for this kind of content. OF deals with the payment processors, the charge backs, and the disputes. It is relatively seamless for the content creators in that regard.
- lovegoblin 5y ago
  > But the payment processors are the unspoken guardians of internet commerce, and without VC level backing good luck getting them to touch something like adult content. You're completely correct here. The only other real option in this space is CCBill - and they: a) only do payments - not hosting and everything that OF does b) still take a ~18-20% cut, in addition to annual flat fees c) are really fucking unbelievably terrible
- matheusmoreira 5y ago
  This is exactly the sort of problem cryptocurrencies were created to solve. Nobody should need some payment processor's permission for anything. People should be able to get paid in cryptocurrencies as if it was cash. Monero is ideal for this sort of thing.
  - neaanopri 5y ago
    Sex Workers are well aware of crypto bros saying "you should be using crypto for this" It clearly doesn't meet the needs of these customers, regardless of whether or not it's "supposed to"
cblconfederate 5y ago
Why do we call pornstars sex workers and not artists?
- immmmmm 5y ago
  they are both. but the former is less controversial.
- psyc 5y ago
  There's a lot going on in the porn world, especially now that it's, er, democratized. Sex workers is very broad. Porn stars is a little fuzzy. Some porn stars are big names, and/or can actually act pretty well. Or excel at creating fantasies. A surprising number of cam girls just sit at their desk fully clothed, chin in hand, and the only action is their eyes darting around their monitor while bad background music gets mangled through their microphone.
  - cblconfederate 5y ago
    "Sex workers" is synonymous with prostitution. Pornography is a form of art. "Sex artists" would make more sense. "Sex worker" sounds very pedestrian, we don't call actors or singers "theater workers". As for the girls just sitting in their desks that doesnt sound like sex-related work at all, they might as well be called cam-artists. This is a not a tiny niche anymore, there is space for more than one terms.
    - spidersouris 5y ago
      > Pornography is a form of art. Pornography is as much art as streaming video games or uploading card opening videos to YouTube are a form of art. Pornography is entertainment, and not all entertainments are art. In spite of all the more or less recent porn videos labeled "Art Porn," which, in fact, rather depicts passionate sexual intercourse, pornography cannot reasonably be considered art in the traditional sense. Pornography does not elevate your spirit, it does not make you feel a broad range of emotions, and there is no real creativity, or it is utterly limited to a mediocre plot and a few different environments. What definition of art do you have in mind that makes you think that pornography is art?
howaboutnope 5y ago
> My biggest shock was how much "PR" was generated on Reddit And the winner ist: viggity https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28237827 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28237827
samstave 5y ago
The RES addon has been a godsend for reddit for YEARS. I love to browse by /r/all -- but I have spent a long while +Filtering out so many subreddit - and running it with Res and adblock etc... I have a super sleek and fun experience on Reddit with my 15-year-old account... Some memes are cool - most are lame. I have never been interested in 4chan nor twitter (I think twitter is the new "National Inquirer type" -- I think of tweets as those horrific multi colored snippet boxes on the front of tabloids.
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newbamboo 5y ago
It is in keeping with the general theme of things.
app4soft 5y ago
> My biggest shock was how much "PR" was generated on Reddit Here is Twitter event by Tech Insider.[0,1] [0] https://twitter.com/TechInsider/status/1430654887327682565 https://twitter.com/TechInsider/status/1430654887327682565 [1] https://twitter.com/TechInsider/events/1430648239171198984 https://twitter.com/TechInsider/events/1430648239171198984
ManBlanket 5y ago
I guess that's on you for attempting to conceptually limit the the wellspring of internet angst 4chan, incel, reddit, and twitter have become.
dbbk 5y ago
> People really do just want a one click solution for creating adult content, and consuming adult content. I was the under the impression that Pornhub offers this? I have no idea how self-service it is though.

whymauri 5y ago

it's pretty huge COVID hit recently graduated Gen-Z incredibly hard. There's huge groups that are/were unemployed and then there's huge groups who are sexually repressed due to quarantine. Across the whole world, too*. Many can easily make more than min wage, and in certain niches you probably don't even have to be 'conventionally beautiful' (sorry to use this term, but it's important I think) to make a living or solid portion of a living on there. For $$ per hour worked, why would they field low wage, menial jobs with a risk of COVID? And if you price model right, you don't need thousands of fans, just a couple really dedicated superfans/whales. * Consider the value of dollars/euros/pounds in poorer countries!

treesknees 5y ago
Bhad Bhabie (cash me outside meme girl) made over $1M in 6 hours and said she could retire right now from the amount of money she has made off OF. And she's not doing "porn" or even posting fully nude photos. There's a big movement to gain a lot of followers on social media like TikTok and then redirect those followers to their $5/month OnlyFans. There are a lot of people making a living or at least significantly boosting their income from this model, and they don't have to leave the house to do it. https://www.billboard.com/articles/columns/hip-hop/9550662/bhad-bhabie-earns-1-million-dollars-onlyfans https://www.billboard.com/articles/columns/hip-hop/9550662/b...
- ed25519FUUU 5y ago
  OF is probably similar to Etsy, where the 95th percentile make millions and the median income is $0.
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  - dwater 5y ago
    I have an acquaintance who I know made ~$1500 in 2 weeks, just after work occasionally. She had been on the site already, the only reason I know the amount made during that time is she did it as a fundraiser and donated it all to a non-profit. I'm sure it's a distribution with a long tail, but I think it's probably easier to have a side gig on OF provide you with a little supplemental income rather than Etsy.
  - Sohcahtoa82 5y ago
    Twitch is certainly that way as well. The median viewer count is likely single digits. Though I can say with considerable certainty that a lot of wannabe Twitch streamers think that being a streamer just means having people watch you play a game, which may be true for story-driven games that don't get a lot of viewers, since it creates a more movie-like experience, and may be true for highly-competitive games where you can watch someone make amazing plays. But for the rest, you need to have the charisma and creativity to create entertaining commentary and audience interaction. Nobody wants to watch an average Joe play World of Warcraft.
    - kd5bjo 5y ago
      In the Justin.tv days, the median viewer count was zero: At any given time, 2/3 of the live channels had literally nobody watching.
      - Anther 5y ago
        I was proud of my JTV channel. I actually used to vlog and chat to people. They regularly featured me too. I wonder how much I could have made in today’s market..
acituan 5y ago
> COVID hit recently graduated Gen-Z incredibly hard Aren’t women over-represented on the supply side while men on the demand side though? I don’t think gen-z as a wholesale cohort makes sense.
- watwut 5y ago
  Women are also overrepresented on the side of loosing job. Mostly artly because women work in segments that were hit harder - services and the like. And partly because childcare is more on them, mothers were even more likely to loose jobs.
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throwaway0a5e 5y ago
>For $$ per hour worked, why would they field low wage, menial jobs with a risk of COVID? Because after shit pay being the desk girl at Walmart Tire Center for 2yr you can easily convert that into a service writer job <fast forward 40yr> and then retire from your job as regional support manager for <company that makes industrial doodad> Compare with thotting around on the internet where you can make a ton of money up front but you're basically racing the clock because your body won't be nearly as lucrative of an income at 30 and you'll be starting from square one-ish. Can you potentially take the cash and pivot into a career that will carry you to retirement? Sure, but it takes a work ethic and level of discipline that is uncommon. It's like the female equivalent of being a marine rifleman for several enlistments. You get out at ~30 with few marketable skills, hopefully a good work ethic and a high liklihood of f-ed up knees.
- pope_meat 5y ago
  That's too many regional managers, I don't think the economy will support that.
  - throwaway0a5e 5y ago
    The economy won't support that many Walmart Tire Centers either. That was just an example. My point was that there are paths from these "crap jobs" to "real career" and traveling said paths require about the same level of "how do I tee up my next move for more money" long term thinking as being a successful camgirl.
  - engineer_22 5y ago
    A growing economy can support more managers in the future. A stagnant economy will not.
    - pope_meat 5y ago
      Ah, the old forever growth strategy. You float the idea of perpetual growth in any other context, and you'd be called a fool, but apparently the economy doesn't obey the same rules of common sense. Well, I hope you're right.
notyourday 5y ago
> For $$ per hour worked, why would they field low wage, menial jobs with a risk of COVID? Median OF revenue per creator is $180/mo for equivalent of a full time job. https://sea.mashable.com/culture/17130/top-onlyfans-creators-can-earn-nearly-27000-more-than-doctors-survey-finds#:~:text=On%20average%2C%20the%20typical%20OnlyFans,by%20creators%20such%20as%20gem101 https://sea.mashable.com/culture/17130/top-onlyfans-creators....
- enedil 5y ago
  Which is around the minimal wage in places such as Ukraine (which isn't the ultimate low either).
- dijit 5y ago
  > Median OF revenue per creator is $180/mo Many factors can lead to this, but that's not surprising, the law of distributions when it comes to things like this is that there are incredible earners and then a massive drop off and long tail. > for equivalent of a full time job. You added this, I don't doubt that some people put in a lot more effort than the monetary amount they get back- but the inverse is also true and no source claims that "you get $180 for a full time workload", because that's impossible to measure at scale.
- mzs 5y ago
  FWIW that's an average not median income with a ton of caveats ^ from the source. I'm confident though that only the first two screens of OF content creators make the bulk of the income though. ^ https://mrq.com/blog/only-fans https://mrq.com/blog/only-fans > https://ranking-fans.com/ https://ranking-fans.com/ - Seedlist and Fans Sorted by total fans; accounts where fans are not available have been excluded. Many accounts listed as having the most fans are free accounts used by OnlyFans models who also possess paid accounts. However, as fan numbers were only available for the free accounts, these have been disregarded for the purposes of this story. Likewise, "free" accounts where subscription is free but photos provided required payment have been disregarded. Accordingly, the only data shown is for paid accounts with high subscriber numbers. In some cases, models possessed multiple paid accounts. In these cases, only the one with the highest subscriber numbers has been tracked. Monthly earnings are based exclusively on the individual account assuming no media requires additional payment and disregarding tips and similar voluntary costs. Similarly, free trials and discounts have been excluded. Accordingly, all monthly earnings are estimates reflecting the monthly payments of subscribers over the long term.
pelasaco 5y ago
In Germany, all Craftsmen are just laughing. Tiler, Carpenter, electrician, etc.. all of them have enough to do, can choose their clients and their wages. I understand that HN always will tend to talk about CS, but Craftsmen are doing their 40k/year, easily. The Salary potential is just increasing.
- lugged 5y ago
  You know Devs can relatively easily get around 250k in NY / SF right? Trades are solid career choices but it's hard work and you expire at about the same rate as a software dev.
  - laputan_machine 5y ago
    So sick of seeing these wildly inflated numbers, they increase after every post I'm sure. Most of us here who are software devs are not earning close to 150k, stop using a few SF salaries as the baseline for the rest of us. It is really annoying.
    - Ancapistani 5y ago
      I don’t know the breakdown, but I’m a (remote) dev in Arkansas making right at $150k with ~10 years experience. The numbers aren’t inflated, they’re just not equally distributed.
    - raztogt21 5y ago
      Is easily doable have 2 100k jobs without burnout. Do you really spend 8 hours coding each day?
    - dlp211 5y ago
      Ok, so let's not use inflated Numbers for the trades either. According to the BLS, the median Software Developer makes $110k. The median carpenter makes $34k. There are also nearly 5x the number of Developer jobs then carpenters. It's a similar story for other trades, machinist is $47k, welder is $44k, plumber is $56k, HVAC is $50k. Then when we look at other technology jobs, PM, IT, etc, the story is similar to developers, high median salary with a multiple of jobs available over the trades.
ronnier 5y ago
> huge groups who are sexually repressed Men I assume given the amounts of money they’ll spend on OF and the m/f ratios on dating apps?
bobthechef 5y ago
> COVID hit recently graduated Gen-Z incredibly hard. Gen-Z is less sexually active than previous generations. Significantly so. They've been exposed to porn at an earlier age (owing to earlier access to the internet and the ubiquity of pornography online). Porn use was already common among them. The lockdown made things worse, but the status quo was already in place. > There's huge groups that are/were unemployed and then there's huge groups who are sexually repressed due to quarantine. This false anthropology must die. Pornography is incredibly harmful to those that consume it. It enslaves a person to his passions. It feeds his lusts and deranges his desires. It makes him or her incapable of relating to the opposite sex in a healthy way, whether in the strictly sexual sphere or not. Lust blunts the mind and renders one incapable of thinking clearly. The consumption of pornography only feeds the sexual passions, further entrenching lust and often generating paraphilias and fetishes as the titillating novelty wears off. Emotions become disordered. Someone who has a porn habit becomes locked in him or herself. The stereotype of a lonely and smarmy 40 year old locked in his parents' basement masturbating to porn is a pithy illustration in many ways. It is the image of an emasculated, impotent wretch deranged by his vices and disorders. This has nothing to do with his lack of a sexual relationship and everything to do with how he views sexuality. He is not master of himself. Frankly, we'd be better off permitting (regulated) prostitution. There seem to be plenty of women willing to provide these services and plenty of men who are slaves to their lusts (men tend to be more vulnerable to porn addiction and lust than women, but yes, it is true that it is not a problem exclusive to men). At least with prostitution, you're having sex with a human being instead of abusing yourself alone in your room. But ultimately, our view of sexuality must be restored to a healthy one and not the depraved one proposed by liberalism. I suspect the "asexual movement" is a subconscious reaction against the obsession with sex in our society. Excess in one direction tends to produce excess in the other. But maybe it will at least legitimize celibacy again. You don't need sex to have a happy life, contrary to the propaganda of the last few decades or so. I will add that porn use is an industry fueled both by a corrupt society and people in power who recognize that those who are slaves to their passions (and lust is but one of them) are easy to control. Oligarchies are prone to let such vices flourish because it keeps the populace impotent and consumed with themselves instead of threatening the usurpers who have managed to gain tyrannical control. Porn appeals to prurient interest which is why it is so useful in psychological warfare (a rather stark example is the broadcasting of porn on captured Palestinian television by the Israelis; you think they were trying to liberate them?). Sexual liberation has made people easier to control. It has truncated their humanity, warped them, and turned them into sex robots.
polote 5y ago
The success of OF is more a question of demand than offer honestly. During the lockdowns they were a lot of guys with money to spend but could not spend it on social activities, so a lot of it went on internet websites. But there is also a more long term trend of people having less and less sex and more and more porno consumption. But that can't go forever, at one point if all girls in the world are on sex workers then they will be much more offer than demand. A girl on OF, to make a living, let's say 3k per month, needs to have 300 guys paying for her. But a guy is not paying for 300 girls, maybe 10 max, so the platform needs to have 30 times more guys than girls. Which is unsustainable in a world with 50% girls/50% guys. Which is a good news imho. The day that having sex for girls is a normal thing (No this is not normal thing today). Then a lot of things will be much simpler for everyone
- handmodel 5y ago
  I would love to see their metrics. I would imagine, like most things, they have a ton of whales so that even if a minority of guys subscribe to 50 girls there probably are plenty of people with addictions shelling out $500 or $1000 a month on this stuff. And this people could represent the majority of all payments on the site. It also seems (from actual published data) that the distribution is super weighted towards the top performers. That being said, even an extra 1k a month is pretty sick for posting topless photos if your regular income is less than 40k or you are in school.
  - _dark_matter_ 5y ago
    everthing is a pareto distribution, across both buyers and sellers. Would be neat to see a better breakdown though.
- caractacus 5y ago
  A long-term trend of less sex and more porno? Could you show some stats on this? I only question that line because I can't even deal with the rest of your post.
  - polote 5y ago
vncecartersknee 5y ago
I don't think just any old person can make money off OF though, like presumably you need a reasonable camera and maybe lights or something, you need to be able to edit photos, the time and energy and motivation to learn how to use those things etc. It's not like some random struggling single mother can take a few pics of her feet on her 5 year old iphone and be expecting to make decent money.

okprod 5y ago

I think OF has also become a one-click outlet for nontraditional sex workers, e.g., those who wouldn't otherwise have done this type of stuff. From what I've read OF has even more "amateurs" than platforms like MyFreeCams.

southeastern 5y ago
Part of the reason they've gotten so much heat is because of cases of underage girls selling photos on that site for some time before they're caught. I don't know if they've found a solution to that problem or just come to some agreement with their payment processors

immmmmm 5y ago

a good friend of mine is a sex worker, a cam girl to be precise, and uses OF as it is safer than other platforms. it should be noted that she is a brilliant individual and do this job due to severe psychiatric problems that prevent her doing more "normal" jobs. she feeds one child with this money, as a lot of sex workers that are also loving moms. it is important that such platforms do exist (if they implement proper safeguards) and that these content creators are not stigmatized.

dna_polymerase 5y ago
> it should be noted that she is a brilliant individual it should NOT be noted. Too many good people died in the wars of past centuries to get us to the freedom and liberty we enjoy today to let any fundamentalists dictate what a normal job is and who works it. Sex work is work and if you dislike it you'd might enjoy Afghanistan these days.
- immmmmm 5y ago
  i know, unfortunately sex work is still highly stigmatized, including in western present cultures. you don't need to go as far as afghanistan, i'm back from eastern europe where my friends from the LGBTQ community are literally being beaten by neo nazi funded by putin.
  - fenderbluesjr 5y ago
    It is stigmatized because it plays a part in facilitating people's addictions and mental problems. Just like gambling, drug-dealing, snake-oil salesmen, etc. It's not all roses, that's for sure..
- mumblemumble 5y ago
  We should try to read each others' comments in the most charitable light possible. In this case, I think the friendly way to interpret that comment is as an attempt to anticipate and pre-empt a very common and harmful misconception about sex workers.

lotsofpulp 5y ago

There is a good chance that any given reddit post in the widely viewed subreddits is posted in order to get people to look at the user’s profile or other posts and follow it back to their only fans page.

finalfire 5y ago
That's pretty right. In particular, there is a (huge) subreddit devoted to selfies where a high number of users that post in there have a OF link present in their biography.

wly_cdgr 5y ago

Of course there was a big outcry. It's like if Etsy announced they were gonna ban candles, or Kickstarter said they were gonna ban dice and cards. You think all those people would want to go create their own sites? You think it would make any sense for them to do that? Come on

marc_io 5y ago
It could be better for some of them in the long run, who knows. The fact is that there's no absolute security in either choice, but with a personal website at least you are in control, you have your “domain”.

Crontab 5y ago

I've noticed that a large portion of women submitting in the /r/Gonewild subreddit have an OF these days.

Grakel 5y ago
OF has ruined amateur porn. What used to be genuine and casual is now mostly bored-eyed pros with bad lighting.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- jldl805 5y ago
  You've summarized all my most important thoughts into two succinct sentences, thank you.
- hackinthebochs 5y ago
  It's the opposite for me. The value for amateur porn is that they don't look or act like traditional porn stars. I don't find much value in abstract notions like "genuine interest".
kraftman 5y ago
That's simply not true, because /r/gonewild are extremely strict about not allowing OF creators. They can post under a seperate account but any mention of they're main account or OF results in a swift permanent ban.
Seattle3503 5y ago
/r/gonewild is actually one of the few subreddits that prohibits posts from sellers. But every subreddit that doesn't outright prohibit sellers is flooded with them. The OF girls all got kicked off of Facebook, Instagram, Snapshot, etc... Reddit is comparatively more friendly to sex workers as far as site wide policy goes.

dr-detroit 5y ago

Wow youre so naive I wish I was you

lovegoblin 5y ago

> People really do just want a one click solution for creating adult content They want a solution for distributing adult content and getting paid for it. By far, the single biggest hurdle here is payment processing - as evidenced by this whole OnlyFans fiasco. It's Visa and Mastercard who are pressuring OF - they've been doing this to sex workers for decades, but finally picked a fight big enough that it's getting real media backlash.

da_chicken 5y ago

> People really do just want a one click solution for creating adult content, and consuming adult content. Once they know it's possible, people want a one click solution for anything. The subject being taboo has nothing to do with it. This is one reason why Youtube, Spotify, Steam and Netflix did such a good job combatting piracy for music, video games, and movies, while ROM sites are still a ubiquitous problem for 20 year old consoles. Youtube, Spotify, Steam and Netflix made content easy to get. There's no equivalent for most ROMs, so they're still widely pirated.

fnord77 5y ago
there'd probably be a netflix for ROMs if there were enough demand (I imagine the copyright holders would get onboard if the demand and $$ was there)
- kbenson 5y ago
  I can see it now. Most ROMs would be available, but Nintendo would be notably absent from any of the platforms and only allow their ROMs to be streamed from their own service.
  - entropicdrifter 5y ago
    >Nintendo would be notably absent from any of the platforms and only allow their ROMs to be streamed from their own service. They already do this, you need a Switch online subscription to access the NES/SNES ROMs they have available
    - kbenson 5y ago
      Oh, I know, but in the theoretical world where there's a Netflix like subscription, I would assume that means a lot of different IP was also gathered there, like Sega, Atari, older Playstation and Xbox titles, etc. There's not a lot of incentive for some of those groups to come together, but I imagine even if most could be assembled, Nintendo would be particularly resistant.

belorn 5y ago

Wondering what the memes were and this article (https://www.newsweek.com/onlyfans-memes-flood-internet-after-site-announces-ban-some-sexual-content-1621270 https://www.newsweek.com/onlyfans-memes-flood-internet-after...) displayed some. There is also https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/events/onlyfans-adult-content-ban https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/events/onlyfans-adult-content.... Are those that an correct representation of the memes?

drakythe 5y ago

I don't think it is just the One Click Solution they want (though I don't deny that is probably very attractive). I'm pretty sure we would see more vanity URLs and one-off sites if payment processors weren't so strict when it comes to selling adult content/services. Spinning up a CMS website of your own, even with commerce/membership functionality, isn't difficult. But the payment processors are the unspoken guardians of internet commerce, and without VC level backing good luck getting them to touch something like adult content. I think this is a missing piece of OFs popularity and usefulness to creators. Not only is it a centralized and (by now) well known site for this kind of content. OF deals with the payment processors, the charge backs, and the disputes. It is relatively seamless for the content creators in that regard.

lovegoblin 5y ago
> But the payment processors are the unspoken guardians of internet commerce, and without VC level backing good luck getting them to touch something like adult content. You're completely correct here. The only other real option in this space is CCBill - and they: a) only do payments - not hosting and everything that OF does b) still take a ~18-20% cut, in addition to annual flat fees c) are really fucking unbelievably terrible
matheusmoreira 5y ago
This is exactly the sort of problem cryptocurrencies were created to solve. Nobody should need some payment processor's permission for anything. People should be able to get paid in cryptocurrencies as if it was cash. Monero is ideal for this sort of thing.
- neaanopri 5y ago
  Sex Workers are well aware of crypto bros saying "you should be using crypto for this" It clearly doesn't meet the needs of these customers, regardless of whether or not it's "supposed to"

cblconfederate 5y ago

Why do we call pornstars sex workers and not artists?

immmmmm 5y ago
they are both. but the former is less controversial.
psyc 5y ago
There's a lot going on in the porn world, especially now that it's, er, democratized. Sex workers is very broad. Porn stars is a little fuzzy. Some porn stars are big names, and/or can actually act pretty well. Or excel at creating fantasies. A surprising number of cam girls just sit at their desk fully clothed, chin in hand, and the only action is their eyes darting around their monitor while bad background music gets mangled through their microphone.
- cblconfederate 5y ago
  "Sex workers" is synonymous with prostitution. Pornography is a form of art. "Sex artists" would make more sense. "Sex worker" sounds very pedestrian, we don't call actors or singers "theater workers". As for the girls just sitting in their desks that doesnt sound like sex-related work at all, they might as well be called cam-artists. This is a not a tiny niche anymore, there is space for more than one terms.
  - spidersouris 5y ago
    > Pornography is a form of art. Pornography is as much art as streaming video games or uploading card opening videos to YouTube are a form of art. Pornography is entertainment, and not all entertainments are art. In spite of all the more or less recent porn videos labeled "Art Porn," which, in fact, rather depicts passionate sexual intercourse, pornography cannot reasonably be considered art in the traditional sense. Pornography does not elevate your spirit, it does not make you feel a broad range of emotions, and there is no real creativity, or it is utterly limited to a mediocre plot and a few different environments. What definition of art do you have in mind that makes you think that pornography is art?

howaboutnope 5y ago

> My biggest shock was how much "PR" was generated on Reddit And the winner ist: viggity https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28237827 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28237827

samstave 5y ago

The RES addon has been a godsend for reddit for YEARS. I love to browse by /r/all -- but I have spent a long while +Filtering out so many subreddit - and running it with Res and adblock etc... I have a super sleek and fun experience on Reddit with my 15-year-old account... Some memes are cool - most are lame. I have never been interested in 4chan nor twitter (I think twitter is the new "National Inquirer type" -- I think of tweets as those horrific multi colored snippet boxes on the front of tabloids.

deleted 5y ago

[deleted]

newbamboo 5y ago

It is in keeping with the general theme of things.

app4soft 5y ago

> My biggest shock was how much "PR" was generated on Reddit Here is Twitter event by Tech Insider.[0,1] [0] https://twitter.com/TechInsider/status/1430654887327682565 https://twitter.com/TechInsider/status/1430654887327682565 [1] https://twitter.com/TechInsider/events/1430648239171198984 https://twitter.com/TechInsider/events/1430648239171198984

ManBlanket 5y ago

I guess that's on you for attempting to conceptually limit the the wellspring of internet angst 4chan, incel, reddit, and twitter have become.

dbbk 5y ago

> People really do just want a one click solution for creating adult content, and consuming adult content. I was the under the impression that Pornhub offers this? I have no idea how self-service it is though.