Victory?

In case you haven't been following the OnlyFans controversy (I have occasionally included links about it in the link round-ups), here's what it's about.  OnlyFans is a UK-based platform on which content creators can post pictures, videos, etc which are accessible to users who pay for access -- that is, it enables content creators to make money from their content, so long as they have a fan base willing to pay.  The platform has two million content creators and 130 million users (source).  In practice it's largely used by, and identified with, providers of sexually-oriented material; some sex workers, finding conventional prostitution too dangerous during the pandemic, have turned to OnlyFans as an alternate way of generating income.

On August 19 OnlyFans management announced that, as of October 1, most sexually-explicit material would be banned.  This extraordinary plan -- which would eliminate the platform's predominant and most lucrative form of content, effectively corporate suicide -- was originally widely attributed to pressure from "payment processors" (credit-card companies), which in turn were being harassed by fundies hoping to purge sexually-oriented material from the internet.  Whatever the reason, the decision provoked a huge backlash from users, content providers, and the internet generally.  It exemplified a pattern of platforms growing large and lucrative from the work of sexual-content creators, then turning against them in an effort to seem "respectable", sometimes in order to attract advertisers.

Just yesterday, OnlyFans reversed course and canceled the ban.  Its content providers remain wary (scroll down), especially since the company initially said the ban had only been "suspended".  However, it seems clear that they've backed down in the face of the backlash, as Google Blogger did in 2015 after a similar blunder and backlash, and as Tumblr notoriously failed to do in 2018, to its considerable detriment.

It's still not entirely clear who was ultimately to blame for the short-lived ban -- credit-card companies, banks, religious nuts, bluenoses in OnlyFans management itself, or whoever -- and restoring trust will take time.  Still, this serves as a reminder of the power that creators and a customer base can wield, when they choose to do so.  There will always be efforts at censorship of one kind or another, by companies or governments, pushed by right-wingers or left-wingers or fundies or Islamists or wokesters or whomever.  But we can fight back against them or work around them.  We can beat them.  We will beat them.