$100,000: Researchers launch "OnlyFans" for marmots to fund critical study
Government budget cuts in the USA almost led to the closure of a critical environmental study, until the researchers decided to use unconventional methods and received unexpected support from the online community.
What happens when a serious scientific study loses all its funding one fine day? It turns to a platform primarily associated with the adult industry. Researchers leading a legendary 60-year-old project to study marmots in the USA found themselves without funding following budget cuts by the Donald Trump administration. In a desperate move, they opened an "OnlyFans" account called "OnlyMarms," but instead of provocative content, they uploaded innocent videos of the chubby rodents in the wild.
While the "OnlyFans" account generated only about $6,000, the buzz online did its job. Anonymous supporters on the web were enthusiastic about the initiative and issued a cryptocurrency "memecoin" called $OnlyMarms, with all its fees dedicated to the research. Within just two weeks, the viral coin raised over $88,000, which, together with other donations, crossed the $100,000 mark — a sum that ensures the continuation of the research for another year.
"It is simply fascinating and shocking to me at the same time that this internet culture, which I barely know, raised so much money," shared researcher Julian Martin, one of the project leaders.
Martin noted the bitter irony that the scientists had to use crypto — a field that brought Donald Trump himself hundreds of millions of dollars through network coins — to bypass the cuts of his administration, which disqualified studies dealing with the "climate crisis."
Beyond the entertaining web story, the research itself is critical: the researchers are documenting how marmots are becoming fatter due to long summers, but at the same time are freezing to death in winter due to the lack of snow, which serves as insulation for their burrows. "It worked for us because we were the first," Martin concluded the financial adventure, "but it is just fun to see that crypto can also be used for good causes."
