Passes bought rival Fanhouse in 36 hours, and a Fanhouse co-founder quit over it

Creator monetization platforms where fans pay subscriptions for content from creators

Buying Fanhouse's creators and fans outright is quicker than winning them one by one, and a 95% take rate can keep them on a new platform

Terms undisclosed; Passes had raised a $9M seed led by Multicoin Capital, while Fanhouse raised a $20M Series A in 2022

Passes launched in beta in December 2022; its founder Lucy Guo said they were taking creators from every platform and at least doubling their income. Fanhouse, founded in 2020, was far more established.

Guo said she and Fanhouse had a call about 36 hours before closing the deal 24 hours prior. Fanhouse co-founder Rosie Nguyen resigned hours before the news broke, saying she made no money on the deal and received no severance. Creators raised concerns about Passes' looser content rules, its plan for optional AI likenesses of creators and missing content guidelines on its site; Guo said it uses high-risk credit card processing and later said guidelines existed.

Within weeks, opted-in Fanhouse creator and fan accounts would transfer to Passes using the same logins. Passes offered a 95% take rate for six months, then 90%, matching Fanhouse's.

Passes saw acquisition as the fastest way to bring creators over without competing platform by platform

Fanhouse, though better funded, was acquired in a fast deal with little notice for its creators

A co-founder's resignation and creators' concerns showed that incentives of VC-backed platforms and creators can diverge

In creator-economy deals the acquirer inherits creators who run small businesses; a deal closed in days and moved over in weeks left creators apprehensive.

As of July 14, 2023 Fanhouse creators had to choose whether to move to Passes within weeks, and the deal's terms had not been disclosed.