OnlyFans CEO says creators are key to AI integration

OnlyFans CEO Keily Blair said the company is careful in its approach to AI adoption, not wanting avatars to compete with content creators nor wanting to jump in while AI copyright issues are still playing out.

Keily claims the company is “trying to figure out what’s the opportunity and what’s the threat” associated with integrating AI into the platform, but is ruling out avatars that might compete with human content creators for attention or engagement.

“When we think about AI integration into our platform, we want to be very sensitive to build AI that enhances our creators’ experience and doesn’t cannibalise them,” said Keily.

The CEO went on to say that if the company was to, for example, create AI avatars for the platform, it would be “competing with creators for that attention, for those eyeballs, and we don’t want to do that.”

Ideally, AI integration for OnlyFans would enhance the user experience, but also be transparent, so users are aware that artificial intelligence is being used. But this is something further down the line.

“We haven’t cracked that nut yet, so I don’t want to pretend that we have all the answers to the questions here, but [AI integration is] something that we’re actively working on, and we’re listening to our creator community,” added Keily.

Don’t use AI for the sake of using AI

The CEO warned that it is vital to understand what the company’s user base needs and respond to that “rather than just plowing ahead as a business and doing what we think is the right thing to do”.

Keily’s comments were made in relation to the growing rise of AI integration into social media and content creation platforms.

Speaking more about the pros and cons of introducing AI-generated content creators or avatars to the platform, the CEO said: “If you have a wholly AI-generated content creator, the question is then about who owns that content? Who is the primary financial beneficiary of that content? How do you create a connection with the fan base of an AI personality?”

“And then there’s the nerdy lawyer in me who gets worried about copyright and consent and all of those other things that are still playing out in the AI world,” added Keily.

Redefining the OnlyFans brand

Keily also addressed the company’s efforts to change people’s understanding of the OnlyFans brand, saying: “I want the company to be a company [that] any single content creator who’s over 18 thinks: ‘I should have an OnlyFans page’.”

“My mission is to go beyond the preconceptions,” added the CEO. “It’s super easy to just tell the same story about what OnlyFans is. But actually, we’re an incredibly inclusive, incredibly diverse platform that is open to everybody who is creator-focused and creator-friendly.”

Keily, however, also acknowledged the adult content creators that make up a sizeable portion of the platform’s user base: “The other thing that is really dear to my heart is financial inclusion for our adult content creators. So a lot of our adult content creators face an incredible amount of stigmatisation and discrimination on a societal basis, but also in financial services institutions.”

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Main image: Piaras Ó Mídheach/Web Summit (CC BY 2.0)