Interview with Sam Lessin and YouTuber Marina Mogilko about a $1.7M investment in her, in exchange for 5% of her creator-related earnings for the next 30 years
which attaches a number to a human and locks them into a three-decade contract—brings up a host of potential legal, ethical, and moral issues, which Lessin didn't shy away from when I asked him about it https://twitter.com/... Jessica Lessin / @jessicalessin : .@lessin, shall we say, is surely quotable! But thought this piece was very good for talking about creator funding and hearing directly from people like @linguamarina on why doing an equity deal (versus very onerous debt deals) was appealing. https://www.vice.com/... Maxwell / @maxwellstrachan : @lessin @linguamarina The creator will also fork over 5% of money made off IP to the venture firm in perpetuity, and she didn't have an agent negotiate the deal, instead doing it herself. Like the firm, she foresees a world where you invest in your favorite humans before they become successful. https://twitter.com/... Craig Goldstein / @cdgoldstein : my “it's def not indentured servitude” email has people asking a lot of questions already answered by my email https://twitter.com/... Matt Pearce / @mattdpearce : Okay except they're literally legally not explicitly investing in those people. The entire historical point of limited liability for the money people has been so they can start companies and it doesn't ruin their lives if the LLC fails. https://www.vice.com/... https://twitter.com/... Tom Gara / @tomgara : Paying a YouTuber $2 million for a 5% stake in all their future YouTube revenue seems like a significantly different thing to....slavery? https://www.vice.com/... Dan Gillmor / @dangillmor : Not the Onion: “A Former Facebook VP Thinks Investing in Humans Is the Future of VC” https://www.vice.com/... Gita Jackson / @xoxogossipgita : this story is WILD https://www.vice.com/... Joseph Cox / @josephfcox : Former Facebook VP thinks investing in humans is the future of VC. Person gets $1.7 million. Sam Lessin's venture firm gets 5% of their creator earnings for *30* years. https://www.vice.com/... Max Burns / @themaxburns : “I've been told by people that this is slavery for literally 20 years.” Apparently that didn't stop Lessin from powering forward. https://twitter.com/... Jason Koebler / @jason_koebler : My “it's def not indentured servitude” shirt is raising a lot of questions answered by my shirt https://www.vice.com/... Sam Biddle / @samfbiddle : “it's def not indentured servitude” is an instant Hall of Fame Tech Guy Quote https://www.vice.com/... Justin Block / @jblock49 : how do we hit reset on society? https://twitter.com/... Katie Drummond / @katiedrumm : “It's def not indentured servitude,” says former Facebook VP and venture capitalist who now invests in...humans. https://www.vice.com/... Maxwell / @maxwellstrachan : I spoke to venture capitalist Sam @Lessin about his plan to start investing directly in humans. Here's how it works: - @linguamarina gets $1.7 million upfront, no strings attached - The VC firm gets 5% of her creator earnings for 30 years https://www.vice.com/... Tim Marchman / @timmarchman : Former Facebook VP Sam Lessin is now investing directly in human beings, which he thinks is the future of venture capital. He gets why people are sensitive about slavery and indentured servitude. But! https://www.vice.com/... https://twitter.com/... @alex : I don't get what here is new, given that the creators in question must have corps? so slow is buying a % of corp earnigns, effectively? https://www.vice.com/... See also Mediagazer
Context & Ripple Effects
The deal lands in a creator economy that has already been rebuilding around direct audience income — services like [[a:954054|Cameo and Substack opened new ways for prominent figures to make a living from smaller audiences]], and now Sam Lessin is applying venture-capital mechanics to a single human: $1.7M to YouTuber Marina Mogilko for 5% of her creator-related earnings for the next 30 years.
The framing matters because the alternative, per Jessica Lessin's defense of the deal, was very onerous debt — so the pitch is equity-versus-loan, not exploitation-versus-nothing. Public reaction nonetheless read the structure as indentured servitude, echoing older warnings that operators should ensure their investors are not bad actors.
First-order effects
- Marina Mogilko gets $1.7M of upfront capital with no repayment schedule, while Sam Lessin holds a three-decade claim on 5% of everything she earns from content.
- Lessin absorbs immediate reputational cost: the public reaction brands the contract as akin to indentured servitude, making him the test case for whether investing in people is socially acceptable.
Second-order effects
- Other creators weighing funding now face a visible menu — equity stakes like this one versus the onerous debt deals Lessin argues he displaced — which pressures anyone offering creator loans to soften terms or lose dealflow.
- Platform payout programs complicate the asset being bought: when Elon Musk says Twitter will share reply-thread ad revenue with paying users, 'creator-related earnings' become partly platform-determined, meaning Lessin's 30-year return depends on revenue streams outside his or Mogilko's control.
Third-order effects
- If the structure spreads, individual humans become underwritable assets — a financialization of personal career cash flows that regulators and platforms have no existing framework for, and where the ethical line between backing a creator and owning a slice of a person stays genuinely unsettled.
- Creator finance could bifurcate into equity-like and debt-like instruments, with the platform ad-revenue programs acting as the benchmark yield that private investors must beat to stay relevant.
The trend: Creator income is being financialized into investable instruments, pitting individual backers writing decade-long claims against platforms building their own direct payout programs.