OnlyFans moved to ban the explicit content that built it, to appease its banks

OnlyFans is a subscription platform where creators sell content directly to paying fans.

Cleaning the platform for banks and investors keeps the business sustainable - without losing the creators who made it.

Founded in London in 2016, OnlyFans grew into a major moneymaker on adult creators' direct subscriptions, paying out over $3 billion in creator earnings since founding.

On August 19, 2021 it announced that from October 1 it would 'prohibit the posting of any content containing sexually explicit conduct,' citing 'the requests of our banking partners and payout providers'; nudity would remain allowed but the line was undefined. It came as OnlyFans tried to attract investors at a $1 billion valuation: a merchant bank was hired that spring, but 'several deep-pocketed firms quickly passed,' and investors called a pitch deck that never mentioned porn 'disingenuous.' The same week it launched OFTV, a safe-for-work curated platform.

Payments access, not user demand, drove the pivot: the company cited banking partners and payout providers.

A $1 billion valuation fundraise stalled as investors passed over the adult content the business ran on.

The ban threatened the income of the sex workers whose labor had built the platform, with no definition of what remained allowed.

Tumblr's post-porn-ban collapse - sold reportedly for well under $20 million after a $1.1 billion purchase - was the cautionary tale in everyone's feed.

When your distribution depends on banks your product offends, the dependency - not the product roadmap - decides strategy.

As of August 19, 2021 the ban was set for October 1 and OnlyFans promised details 'in the coming days' along with support for creators through the change. Commenters asked whether anyone at OnlyFans had asked Verizon how Tumblr worked out.