> MindGeek should buy Tumblr and allow adult content again.
MindGeek isn't interested in new investments allowing independent content creation.
MindGeek has been the target of active - and successful - campaigns from anti-pornography groups with explicit religious motivation (Exodus Cry, Morality in Media, etc., mostly funded by right-wing evangelicals). Those groups are the reason that Xtube shut down in 2021, and that Pornhub removed all independent content a couple of months later.
Those same groups are also behind the new "age verification" laws in a number of states, which are the reason that accessing many big-name tube websites (both from MindGeek and other properties) now requires uploading your drivers' license along with biometric face scans, even when viewed from states which don't have such laws on the books.
There's been a war on pornography on the Internet for the last several years, and the anti-pornography groups have won nearly every battle, in part because the only opposition has come from sex workers, who have very little lobbying influence. For some reason, most digital rights or general First Amendment advocacy groups have paid very little attention.
If you wrote on HN in 2017 suggesting the possibility of a total ban on pornography on the Internet within a few years, you'd have been dismissed outright. But we're actually pretty close to a de facto ban on pornography on the Internet. Very few websites still allow independent creators to upload pornography. Most of the ones that were around in 2017 either are dead, no longer allow pornography (Tumblr, Imgur), heavily restrict its visibility (Reddit), or only allow it from "verified creators", which limits it to commercial production (Pornhub).
Even self-hosting is going to become harder, as these groups are shifting their focus towards pressuring payment platforms and hosting providers to drop customers who produce sexual content.
Will pornography be literally banned on the Internet in a few years? Probably not. But will it be extremely difficult to either find or post sexual imagery or nudity within that timeframe? Probably - and so far, the anti-porn activists have actually been operating ahead of their own schedule.