Yes, and what do you think those distribution sites do in exchange of distributing your content? Perhaps extracting surplus value from the profit they generate for housing sex worker's videos? It's literally the thing I'm talking about - the website is acting as a pimp in this case.

If you mean self-hosting or starting a small business selling your "sex work" on sites that you own, then that would bypass this exact point. However, that's pretty much impossible given two things:

1. How the fuck are you going to get discovered by people not aware of who you are
2. Who the hell would visit a separate site entirely just for one porn star when a gazillion centralized alternatives that already contain thousands of videos exist

It's a non-solution, and there is absolutely a reason why the biggest porn stars out there just use onlyfans or phub or whatever to host their content, even if it means getting exploited as a result.

And they're slowly chipping away at access to those means where people can freely and independently operate.

Except you’re basically guaranteed to have your content pirated, and most low level sex workers won’t have the client base to turn a profit. The vast majority of people on OF and similar make very little money.

Keep in mind too that taxes can be fucked up for independent contractors, that many payment vendors can fuck you over (very common for PayPal to freeze funds), and also again, the low barrier to access means you are competing with a ton of other people. Unless you are very skilled at marketing or can fill a specific niche, it’s not going to make you enough to pay rent.

Full service can make you a lot more and has less of the immediate competition aspect, but at least in places where it is illegal, you are going to be raped at some point. You can’t exactly call the police if they don’t pay you or if they do something worse. There will be a heavy pressure to not use condoms, and stealthing is unfortunately extremely common.

Sex work is not “easy money.” Maybe it’s empowering to some, but for many it’s extremely traumatizing and dehumanizing.