On quest to redefine business, Cindy Gallop addresses attitudes on sex

As the founder of If We Ran the World and Make Love Not Porn, Cindy Gallop is taking steps to tackle the absence of honest conversation in society about sex. At Big Omaha this afternoon, she described the business model of Make Love Not Porn as shared values combined with shared action to create shared…

Cindy Gallop is the founder and CEO of If We Ran The World, a marketing platform that turns human and corporate good intentions into collective action, and Make Love Not Porn, a site that aims to bring about open, healthy conversations about sex and pornography.


As the founder of If We Ran the World and Make Love Not Porn, Cindy Gallop is taking steps to tackle the absence of honest conversation in society about sex. At Big Omaha this afternoon, she described the business model of Make Love Not Porn as shared values combined with shared action to create shared profit.

The difference from mainstream porn? All of the site’s content is user-generated and depicts “real-world sex.” 

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“This is not about performing for the camera,” Gallop said. “It’s about recording the silliness, realness, messiness of real-world sex.”

Users can rent the videos for three weeks for $5, and 50 percent of all revenue goes back to Make Love Not Porn contributors. Gallop says the model benefits not only consumers but also society along with the brand itself. 

Because of the adult content published on the site, other companies like Amazon, PayPal or mainstream credit cards have refused to work with Make Love Not Porn.

“My single biggest challenge is putting payment structures in place,” Gallop said. “I want to find people as frustrated with the old-world financial system as we are.”

And in the Silicon Prairie she has. Des Moines-based startup Dwolla currently has a partnership with Gallop’s company.

She urged entrepreneurs to not believe in a finite number of business models. “You cannot do new world-order business from an old world-order place,” she said. “Everything’s changed, but the systems and processes haven’t.”

Gallop also suggested that any company or individual hoping to change the older business model has to be willing to get uncomfortable.

“It’s very comfortable hanging out, hiring, and working with men,” she said. “But you have to get uncomfortable. Work with women. We are ‘other.’ We ask different questions. We ask the tough questions, in business and life. Women challenge the status quo because we are never it.”

In fact, Gallop believes that one change will drive new creativity.

“There is huge money in taking women seriously,” she said. 

The next big thing, Gallop said, is changing the world through sex. “Make that activity socially acceptable. That’s where the money really is. The area of sexuality needs us in the tech world, in the entrepreneur world.” 

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Big Omaha is a two-and-a-half-day event that aims to inspire, educate and celebrate the entrepreneurial ecosystem in the heart of the Midwest. Produced by Silicon Prairie News, it’s part of the Big Series, the nation’s most ambitious events on innovation and entrepreneurship.

The Big Omaha Video Series is presented by the Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation

Based in Kansas City, Mo., the Kauffman Foundation is among the largest foundations in the U.S. with a mission to foster a society of economically independent individuals who are engaged citizens, continuing the improvement of their communities.



Credits: Video by Quadrant5. Snippet photo by Malone & Company.

This story is part of the AIM Archive

This story is part of the AIM Institute Archive on Silicon Prairie News. AIM gifted SPN to the Nebraska Journalism Trust in January 2023. Learn more about SPN’s origin »

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