Some of the most prominent alternative weeklies in the United States publish, in addition to their editorial content, search engine optimized lists of porn actresses that appear to be generated by AI.
For example, if you open the Village Voice homepage on your phone, you’ll see reporting by freelancers (longtime columnist Michael Musto still occasionally files a report) and archival work by notable former writers like Greg Tate, the Pulitzer Prize-winning music critic. You’ll also see a tab in the dropdown menu labeled “OnlyFans.” Click on it to reveal a catalog of lists that group different types of pornographic artists by demographic, from “Turkish” to “incest” to “granny.” These blog posts link to hundreds of different OnlyFans accounts and are presented as editorial, with no labels indicating that they’re ads or sponsored.
Similar content appears on the websites of LA Weekly, which is owned by Street Media, the same parent company as the Village Voice, and the alternative weekly Riverfront Times in St. Louis. While there’s a chance some of these posts are written by human freelancers, the writing shows signs of AI sloppiness.
According to AI detection startup Reality Defender, which scanned a sample of these posts, the content of the articles registers as having a “high probability” of containing AI-generated text. One scanned example, a Riverfront Times story titled “19 Best Free Asian OnlyFans with OnlyFans Asian Free in 2024,” ends with the following sentence, exemplary in its generic horny platitudes: “You explore, taste and discover your next favorite addiction, and we’ll be back with more insane talent in the future!”
“We’re seeing more and more of the old media being reborn as AI-generated new media,” said Ali Shahriyari, co-founder and CTO of Reality Defender. “Unfortunately, this means a lot less informative and newsworthy content and more SEO-focused ‘clutter’ that actually just wastes people’s time and attention. Keeping up with these types of publications isn’t even part of our day-to-day operations, but we’re seeing them pop up more and more.”
In March 2024, LA Weekly laid off or offered severance pay to most of its staff, while the Riverfront Times laid off its entire staff in May 2024 after parent company Big Lou Media sold the company to an anonymous buyer.
The Village Voice’s sole remaining editor, RC Baker, says he has no involvement with the OnlyFans posts, though they appear on the site as editorial content. “I just do news and culture reporting out of New York City. I have nothing to do with OnlyFans. That content is handled by a separate team that’s based in, I believe, LA,” he told WIRED.
Former LA Weekly editor-in-chief Darrick Rainey also says he had nothing to do with the OnlyFans listicles when he worked there. Neither did his editorial colleagues. “We were not happy about it at all and we had absolutely no involvement in posting it,” he says.
Former employees are shocked to see their archival work mixed in with SEO porn junk. “It’s heartbreaking on so many levels,” says former Riverfront Times writer Danny Wicentowski. “It’s like watching a beloved home get eaten up by vines or left to rot.”
