Death of reclusive OnlyFans owner marks end of era

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Leonid Radvinsky, the owner of OnlyFans, has died of cancer at 43. The platform was founded in 2016 by a British father and son who initially tried to keep porn off the site. Radvinsky, who rarely gave interviews, bought the company two years later and turned it into an online juggernaut centred on adult content. By allowing creators to charge directly for their material, he transformed porn. OnlyFans takes a 20% cut from these transactions, generating £1bn in revenue last year. Radvinsky was born in Ukraine and grew up in Chicago, but kept the company headquartered in Britain. This makes it one of the country’s most successful tech start-ups. At the time of his death, he was in talks to sell a majority stake for roughly $3.3bn.