How we think about creator economics.
The revenue model isn't a feature — it's a first-principles decision. Here's why we're building the Creator Fund the way we are, and what we're still figuring out.
Revenue model as a first-principles decision
Most platforms treat their creator monetization model as a product feature — something you add after the core experience is built, when you need to keep creators from leaving. Subscription tools, tipping buttons, virtual gifts: features bolted on to platforms whose underlying business model was always advertising. That sequencing matters more than it looks.
When the platform’s revenue comes from advertising, every product decision ultimately gets weighted against that: does this keep users on the app longer? Does this generate more impressions? Creator earnings become a secondary consideration, optimized around what keeps the advertising flywheel turning. We started Circus by asking a different question: if we want creators to earn meaningfully from communities they build, what does the platform need to look like from day one?
The Creator Fund approach
The Circus Creator Fund is our answer to that question, and it’s coming — not available yet, because we’re pre-launch, but it’s a core part of how we’re designing the platform, not an add-on. The idea is straightforward: when Circus generates revenue, creators share in it based on the communities they’ve built and the engagement those communities drive. Creators earn from the health and activity of their communities, not just from individual post reach.
We’re not going to commit to a specific percentage split here. That’s not evasiveness — it’s that we’re still designing the model, and we’d rather be honest about that than announce a number that we later have to change. What we can say is that the guiding principle is that creators should keep more than they do on existing platforms. We think the current industry norm, where creators receive a small fraction of the value their work generates, is wrong. The Creator Fund is our attempt to do better.
What “creators keep more” actually means
The way most platforms talk about creator economics focuses on the percentage split on individual transactions — tips, subscriptions, ticket sales. That number matters, but it’s not the full picture. A creator earning 70% of a subscription fee on a platform that takes 30% is still losing money to a platform whose incentives don’t align with theirs. The real question is: is the platform invested in helping you build a sustainable community, or is it just hosting your content?
Circus communities are designed to make the answer obvious. Every community is a named space. Members join it intentionally. The creator is the one who builds it, sets its culture, and keeps it worth belonging to. When that community generates value, the creator should capture a significant share of it — not just as a policy statement, but as a structural reality of how the platform earns revenue.
Advertising and the community-aligned approach
We’re also developing an advertising model for Circus, and we’re being equally deliberate about it. The advertising market for creator platforms has historically worked against creators — platforms sell access to audiences that creators built, often without meaningful transparency or creator input. We think there’s a better way, where advertising on Circus is aligned with the interests of communities rather than extracting from them. The exact shape of this is still being designed, and we’ll share more when we’re ready to be specific.
The short version of where we stand: creators should earn more, advertisers should reach genuinely engaged communities, and the platform should benefit only when both of those things are true. That’s the model we’re building toward.