OnlyFans: How self-creators have disrupted the adult industry while porn enthusiasts ruin our planet.  Well, sort of…

What is OnlyFans?  Well, if you don’t know what OnlyFans is, you’re probably Amish or live in a cave somewhere without the internet.   If you’ve heard of OnlyFans, it’s probably because it’s one of the biggest content-creator driven platforms in the world.  It’s corporate parent, Fenix International Limited, was formed in September, 2016 in the UK and launched OnlyFans in November 2016.  The concept offers digital creators a turn-key platform to upload clips and photos to subscribers for a monthly fee.  

Founder Tim Stokely started the platform using a small loan from his father Guy Stokley who helped establish the company.  Tim and his older brother, Thomas Stokely worked with their father, who ran the financial operations of the company.  Within a couple years the concept attracted other investors who began to see the real potential in the platform.  Enter, Leonid Radvinsky.  

Radvinsky is a Ukrainian-American businessman who was the owner of MyFreeCams, a widely popularized streaming webcam service for the porn industry.  Radvinsky purchased 75% of Fenix International Limited in 2018 and by 2019, under the ownership of Radvinsky, the company began to attract more not safe-for-work (NSFW) content and gradually earned a reputation for being a hub of pornography.  Ironically, this was the key to their success and the basis for significant disruption in the porn industry. 
Historically, adult entertainment companies had ownership over access to video distribution where traditional compact discs were sold in adult novelty stores and on pay-per-view television channels in hotels and other venues.  When internet pornography began to transform distribution for industry production companies, they redistributed content in “hubs and tubes” known for serving porn clips, generally for free.  These sites became hugely profitable by monetizing their traffic into ad revenue.  Even today, according to website popularity ranker SimilarWeb, porn sites generate more traffic than media giants such as Wikipedia, eBay, Netflix and Craigslist.

In order of ranking, today the top 5 most visited websites in the world are:
1. Google.com
2. Youtube.com
3. Facebook.com
4. Twitter.com
5. Instagram.com

However, Xvideo.com, Pornhub.com, and Xnxx.com are the eighth, ninth, and tenth most visited websites in America when it comes U.S. internet traffic.  OnlyFans ranks as the 53rd most visited website in the United States and 101st in the world, while it’s ranking in the porn industry comes in at #12.    It’s no wonder estimates rate pornography as generating 12% of all internet traffic.  

While we’re on the subject, this brings up a very interesting point of view in terms of climate change!  What the F#CK, you say?  What do climate change and pornography have in common you ask?  Well, if you’re doing your part to help save the planet from being destroyed from climate change, you may want to limit the amount of porn you watch!  Since we know pornography viewership is a multiple of Netflix binging, let’s look at this from the point of view of climate change:

A recent Shift Project figure shows that watching an hour of Netflix consumes 6.9 kilowatt hours (kWh) of electricity. Apparently, this is enough electricity to power a Tesla Model S for over 18 miles. The Shift Project figures further allege that Netflix streaming consumes approximately 94 terawatt hours (TWh) per year, with 167,000,000 Netflix subscribers viewing an average of two hours per days. However, because the efficiency of data centers and networks rapid technological improvements roughly doubling every couple of years, energy use and emissions from streaming today continues to become substantially lower.  So, the good news is that you can keep binge watching porn without feeling guilty for the polar bears who are in desperate need of the receding artic icecaps for their survival.  For that matter, Onlyfans might be at the top of your list.  

Today, the binge viewers of OnlyFans contribute as much as several million dollars a month to the bottom line of the top creators. The platform takes a percentage, typically 20% of gross receipts, and the creator pockets the balance.  Although the platform remains popular among provocateur type creators, or as we like to say, “people who want to have fun with their clothes off”, the site now features content from all walks of life.  With the success of OnlyFans, creators have been able to channel their own creative outlets and access an easy-to-use console for uploading content and monetization.  For many creators, the idea of getting a job at Starbucks as a barista is no longer an option – now with an iPhone and an internet connection, you have all the tools to be a technopreneur.  In fact, you can be your own porn-star! 

It’s fairly clear that the pandemic lockdowns contributed to the success of many online businesses, such as Netflix, Zoom, and obviously OnlyFans.  

OnlyFans creators have the opportunity to make money using one of these methods:
• Monthly subscriptions
• Pay-per-view Content
• Private messages
• Tips

Most OnlyFans creators choose to pay a monthly subscription. Prices range from $4.99 up to $49.99. You should know that some celebrity accounts can be accessed for free, but there are upcharges for higher quality content. Cardi B, one of OnlyFans’ highest-earning celebrities, is known to not give away anything unless she is paid.  A 2020 Substack article states that the top 1% creators account for 33% of all money generated on the platform while 73% of all money is made by the top 10% accounts… and, such is life.  It’s like the 80/20 rule. 

Variety published a list of OnlyFans’ data for the year 2021, revealing, “net sales climbed 160%, to $932 million, and the firm achieved pre-tax profits of $433 million (up from $61 million in 2020), its largest yearly profit gain.”   According to the publication, Blac Chyna earned $20 million month, from her nearly 17 million OnlyFans fan base, while Bella Thorne closed the second position with $11 million, Cardi B comes in third place, allegedly earning $9.34 million each month.   The numbers are staggering and dumbfounding at the same time.  

Creators have profited mostly from adult oriented content, which arguably has taken away profits from the traditional pornography companies.  Generally speaking, the top porn actresses rarely perform anymore.  Instead, they can take an iPhone and together with a friend (or not), make video content that pays them multiples of what they would make on a porn shoot, which may often take 10 or more hours to produce.  Instead, porn actresses perform on-camera with production companies to generate notoriety from the adult company which promotes the film, and the net result is a traffic spill-off to the creators OnlyFans account.  This seems to be the new eco-system of the adult industry. 

We compiled a separate list of OnlyFans creators who are producing some of the top-rated content on the platform as follows below: