In spring 2020, as social distancing became the norm and almost the whole world, it seemed, retreated online, one industry particularly struggled to rework its business model: pornography studios. For their product, six feet apart might as well be six miles.
It didn’t take long, though, before the free market worked its magic and hit upon a solution. A UK-based site, OnlyFans, had developed a subscription-based service for content creators, many of whom were already specializing in pornographic content. With adult models unable to shoot in the studio, many set up direct-to-consumer services on the platform; meanwhile, with bars and clubs shut down, sex-starved singles quickly provided a surge in demand to match the surging supply. Between March and April 2020, the user and creator bases both jumped by 75%. By the end of the year, the site had 85 million users and 1 million creators, the vast majority paid to perform virtual sex acts—making it the largest prostitution ring in history. After numerous stories revealed that many of the performers were minors, a public outcry led the site to ban pornography—for all of six days. The market revolted, OnlyFans backpedaled, and its meteoric rise continues to this day.
[OnlyFans] is Exhibit A in the moral limits of markets, and the tendency of modern technology to hack the human person in the pursuit of profit.
From one perspective, OnlyFans is a textbook example of how the market, leveraging technological innovation in a digital age, can respond almost immediately to tackle disruptions, match supply to demand, and maximize consumer utility. From another, it is Exhibit A in the moral limits of markets, and the tendency of modern technology to hack the human person in the pursuit of profit.
