Don't Try to Crowdfund Porn on Patreon

Bad news, adult stars: Patreon is cracking down on porn.

The crowdfunding site, which is meant for recurring funding rather than a one-time campaign, recently updated its community guidelines, making its rules around porn a lot stricter.

"You can't use Patreon to raise funds in order to produce pornographic material such as maintaining a website, funding the production of movies, or providing a private webcam session," the updated policy reads. Users are also prohibited from selling "pornographic material or arranging sexual services" as a reward for their patrons.

The policy also notes that Patreon has "zero tolerance when it comes to the glorification of sexual violence which includes bestiality, rape, and child exploitation (i.e., sexualized depiction of minors)." That includes "illustrated, animated, or any other type of content." Also on the list of no-no's: "fringe sexual fetish content, such as incest, necrophilia, or fetish content that is hard to distinguish from non-consensual sex."

In a blog post, Patreon's head of legal Colin Sullivan said the site's stronger stance on porn means "a small number of creators" will need to update their pages and flag them as Adult Content. Pages flagged as Adult Content are removed from Patreon search.

"We know creators have fears about demonetization and we are sensitive to this," Sullivan wrote. "We stand behind the fact that Patreon is creator-first in everything we do."

As Engadget reports, however, the new policy "threatens to shut down many … performers who rely upon the site for revenue." Many adult content creators currently offer webcam sessions, or access to private Snapchat accounts as incentives to backers, it says.

Adult content creators who are concerned or need clarification about the new policy can contact Patreon at guidelines@patreon.com.

Meanwhile, Patreon has promised to give content creators who violate its policies a second chance "whenever possible." In these cases, a member of the site's Trust and Safety team will offer one-on-one guidance about the changes a user needs to make to get their page reinstated.

"Aside from blatant violations of Community Guidelines (such as hosting terrorist content, doxing, or very clear hate speech), removing a Patreon page completely is a last resort after we've offered a chance to update the content," Sullivan wrote.

This article originally appeared on PCMag.com.