The Twitch-Files (Episode 1)

This as nothing to do directly with mental illness/disorder/healt.. just have to say it.

I am surfing on Twitch since the last year or so. I am watching variety of streams: gambling, chess, fishing, music, painting (yes I watched Bob Ross) bounty hunting, party, cooking, special events, gaming, cartoons marathons, scammer investigation, Ai development, tea tasting, thelethon, ... NAME iT! I probably watched it.

Twitch was created to build communities around streamers and give them a chance to built something around a passion.

A community, usually, works this way: give to the community, it gives back to you. Bank are working: give me your money.

Believe me, it took a while before I sarted to find good streams to watch. the Twitch recommendations are not the best I have seen in my life. It recommends you a channel, you check, then yes you give it a follow for a while, then unfollow for x, y, z reasons: channel goes back in recommendations. There is also this very popular stream, but you never opened it because the category does not fit in your interests. Still both there since I created my account.

The thing I have remarked and really makes me angry is: the money.

« Do it for fun, money will come » - Streaming philosophy.

« Donations are never expected, but always appreciated. » - Mentionned in writing in most of the streams I have watched.

This last one is an unwritten rule of Twitch. You do not request donations to your viewers, but you are very happy when someone decides to send you a tip for your work, whatever the amount is.

Sure, it can happen that in a very special stream, you will force on them for a good reason, but I was not joking, saying I have watched telethons on Twitch. Some streamers are focussing what they are doing, on getting money out of it.

I recently saw a stream in which, now, once per seventy-five or ninty seconds, an animation appears in the corner, asking to "Help to keep the stream online, donate now!!!". Top donator, last tips, bits, buy my merch: NAME iT!! All is showed on the screen. In the middle of all this: the streamer's face!

I watched the stats of this stream: not streaming for 6 months yet, not reached one thousand followers, I saw an average of twenty something viewers per stream, some raids but not really from people doing the same thing so people do not stay long, for two weeks the streams never started at the scheduled time and some of them never happened at all.. and above all, that person paid hundreds of dollars for someone else to build the stream. Clap! Clap! Clap!

On others, nope they do not talk about donations or money live, but 75% of the informations provided on their screen layout are: last donation (tip), top donation (tip), last subscriber, .. all these informations related to money, trying also to influence the amount you will donate. After all, what will you look like with your five dollars, when the last tip is seventy-five dollars and the top donator gave one hundred and fifty dollars? Not knowing at the previsou stream, a sort of donation war started between two or three 'players' and they wanted to get the attention of that very popular cute girl, having hundreds of viewers.

Oh, these are funny! I saw this few times, but more then once: « Song Request 20$ - MAY NOT PLAY! ». I saw also thrity, fifty a hundred dollars. COMMON, SERiOUSLY? FOR REAL? AM i DREAMiNG? FiRST, that goes against all copyrights laws and SECOND, people doing it anyway? What the fuck is wrong with you!!

Not talking live about donations, whatch-out anyway. Try to find informations about the streamer your are watching like: the name, age, social media and other informations. There is a big chance they will be the last things mentionned at the bottom of the page. The first informations you will see when scrolling down the page are: how to support the stream: donate (in evidence) often coming with a list of top donators who gave (ten of)thousands of dollars/euros, a list of possible happening depending the amount you donate, subscribers privileges, ... following the stream is mostly the last thing mentionned and no word about watching it?

Unfortunately something that kills a bit hope in passionate streaming is that some people charges douzens, hundreds of dollars to setup a stream, ready to go.

Now, who do I blame here? Everybody and Nobody. Everybody for doing what they do, nobody for doing the best they do. If you can not figure out where/when to stop, that is YOUR FUCKiNG problem. Wake up trouts!

Where is the sex in all this? Well.. that's another Twitch-Files.

-FBF