For San Jose State student sex workers, OnlyFans is not just a side job, it's their main source of income.
But with the news that 22-year-old actor Bella Thorne joined the site,OnlyFans content creators claim she allegedly caused a change in payment policies including caps and holds on payments. Now, many of these students might have to look for other ways to make money, according to a Sept. 3 Cosmopolitan article.
"The worst part about the Bella Thorne scandal is it's going to really affect content creators,” said an SJSU nursing major and OnlyFans content creator who asked to remain anonymous because she doesn’t want family finding out she’s a content creator. For the rest of the article, she’ll be referred to as “Sophia”.
Sophia said over Zoom that for many content creators including herself, the app has been a main source of income, especially since the coronavirus pandemic started.
OnlyFans, founded in 2016 by British tech entrepreneur and investor Timothy Stokely, is a subscription service app where sex workers, influencers and other content creators can sell original content to users. This content can range from food, eating and fitness videos, to semi-nude and nude photos and even explicit soft-porn videos.
The recent controversy with Thorne started on Aug. 19 when she announced on Instagram that she created an OnlyFans account.
According to an Aug. 25 Los Angeles Times article, she made $2 million within a week by charging $20 a month for access to her feed and $200 for a pay-to-view nude photo.
However, OnlyFans subscribers tweeted at Thorne and OnlyFans saying that the photo was a scam because it wasn’t a nude photo and they demanded refunds.
In regards to OnlyFans payment policy changes, monthly payouts replaced weekly payments for content creators. The other payment change OnlyFans instituted put a cap on the amount creators can charge on their pay-to-view content and the amount a creator can make in tips, which is now capped at $100 for tips and $50 for videos and photos, according to an Aug. 31 Vulture magazine article.
“For sex workers, especially those who are career sex workers and don’t have other sources of income, this directly impacts their livelihood and access to their economic resources and stability,” said Jack Caraves, SJSU women, gender and sexuality studies professor, over Zoom. “This again places limitations of what they are able to do on a platform that once was just for adult content and was a lot more ‘free’ in the sense of exchanges that were made.”
Sophia said she made $4,000 in her first payout from OnlyFans and it helped her during a financially difficult time, including paying for tuition.
"I wasn't able to work due to the whole quarantine thing, so I thought it would be a good way to make money,” she said.
She added that the effects of Thorne’s scandal will impact her income now.
"A lot of my [pay-to-view] content is a lot more money than the cap OnlyFans has put so that's going to definitely affect me,” Sophia said. "Now I'll just be selling myself short because I know my content is worth a lot more.”
Content creators tweeted at Thorne after OnlyFans changed its policies and said Thorne jeopardized the intergrity of sex work.
"[Thorne] doing that just stigmatized sex workers even more because we aren't going to be able to put our prices at what we think it's worth,” Sophia said. “Now a lot of people are going to be looking at that sitution and think of sex workers as people who are just scammers and feed into negative stereotypes people have of us.”
Thorne posted a series of tweets on Aug. 29 apologizing for hurting the livelihoods of sex workers and content creators and said she will meet with OnlyFans directors to ask about the payment policy changes.
“I wanted to bring attention to the site, the more people on the site the more likely of a chance to normalize the stigmas, And in trying to do this I hurt you,” Thorne said in one of the Aug. 29 tweets. “I have risked my career a few times to remove the stigma behind sex work, porn, and the natural hatred people spew.”
An SJSU psychology major and content creator who asked to go by her stage name, “Nicole,” because she doesn’t want family finding out about her OnlyFans account, also said the sites’ updated policies are detrimental to her.
"When I was really active, I was making about $2,000 a week,” she said over Zoom. "That was a big game changer because it helped me pay for school, books and other things I needed.”
She added that she is less active on OnlyFans now because she’s disappointed in the way it’s treating its creators and that it’s just not worth it anymore.
“To make these type of changes without thinking about the sex workers who have in a sense built OnlyFans to be what it is today, is not only unfortunate, but irresponsible . . . but it’s not surprising,” Caraves, SJSU women, gender and sexuality studies professor said.
