The Pornography Paradox

Unlike back in the 1970s and ’80s—the heyday of XXX-rated features with multiday shoots and catering budgets, of ample profits and thriving stars—the new porn economy generates its revenues primarily from ads, accruing to site owners, not performers. The subscription site OnlyFans produces big paydays for a few stars, but elsewhere the story for workers is depressingly familiar, and porn performers are doubly screwed, so to speak. They’re kept busy, as Burke details, creating new content—one-on-one interactions with customers in “camming” sessions, for example—to supplement the content they’re barely being paid for. But even that material often finds its way to free sites.