Twitch

New Twitch Rules Ban The Confederate Flag, ‘Unwelcome’ Comments About Streamers’ Appearances

Today, Twitch announced a “significant” update to its harassment and hateful conduct policies. The update takes aim at multiple blind spots in Twitch’s previous rules, adding clearer language about membership in hate groups, symbols like the Confederate flag, and sexual harassment. In a blog post, Twitch outlined the impending changes, which will go into effect…

Streamer Finds Extremely Rare Pokémon, Freaks Out

Sometimes, with everything on fire and no end in sight, it’s nice to have a wholesome moment to remind us there are still beacons of light in this cruel world. I think this clip of Twitch streamer AjentVee getting super mega ultra excited over finding a rare Pokémon fits the bill. Let’s watch. Nice! Right?…

Twitch Removes ‘Blind Playthrough’ Tag After Disability Criticism

Since 2018, Twitch has had a tag system that allows streamers to categorize their broadcasts according to their content’s contents and give viewers an at-a-glance idea of what they’re about. Tags also tie into Twitch’s still-rudimentary (but increasingly prominent) recommendation system. Until very recently, “blind playthrough” was one of these official Twitch tags. Now, however,…

Twitch Stopped Working Right After Fortnite‘s Big Marvel Event

Today, Fortnite players battled Galactus, devourer of worlds, in the culmination of the game’s Marvel-flavored fourth season. With the event ending on a cliffhanger, the biggest boy in a fictional universe of very big boys did not end up going down. But Twitch sure did. In the immediate wake of the event, which millions of…

WWE Crackdown On Wrestlers’ Twitch Accounts Is Causing A Lot Of Drama

Over the last few decades, numerous events have sparked talk that pro wrestlers in the United States might finally unionize. In 1986, Jesse “The Body” Ventura tried and failed to start a wrestlers’ union before WrestleMania 2. More recently, the financial hit wrestlers took from the 2014 launch of the WWE Network streaming service got…

Twitch Streamers Are Opening ’90s Pokémon Card Boxes Worth Thousands Of Dollars

When many of us were kids, popping open a pack of Pokémon cards and flipping to a holographic Charizard meant bragging rights or a hypothetical hundred dollars if we chose to sell it on eBay (or, in my case, if an eBay-addicted aunt could pry the card from my cold, dead hands). But now those…

New Cyberpunk 2077 Mode Will Help Streamers Avoid DMCA Takedowns

It’s been a long month for Twitch streamers, who’ve spent the past 30 days weathering an ongoing DMCA storm with few signs of reprieve. Today, CD Projekt Red announced that it’s added a new mode to Cyberpunk 2077 with this show-stopping dilemma in mind. During the latest installment of long-form Cyberpunk commercial series “Night City…

Streamers Baffled By New Twitch Option To Buy Affiliate Status

The latter portion of Twitch’s 2020 has been characterized by two seismic shifts: a big push to make money off ads and deals, and creator-unfriendly capitulation to the music industry. The company’s latest announcement, a deal with music label Monstercat that allows streamers to purchase affiliate status instead of earning it, combines both. Monstercat outlined…

Twitch’s Digital Convention Was A Day-Long Commercial That Left Streamers Feeling Frustrated

Its location, size, and Pokimane pizza lines have varied, but since 2015, Twitch has hosted some form of convention every year. 2020 is not like other years, to put it mildly. Of all activities people could choose to perform in our pandemic-stricken nation right now, conventions might actually be the most out of the question.…

Twitch Apologizes, But DMCA Fiasco Continues With Punishments For In-Game Sounds, Deleted Clips

Twitch’s past three weeks have been bleak, to say the least. Late last month, the company abruptly purged thousands of streamers’ videos and advised them to delete all remaining clips in advance of a massive music industry DMCA crackdown—one it had known about for months, but failed to adequately warn streamers about until it developed…

Pokimane’s New $5 Donation Cap Sends Ripples Through The Twitch Community

Giving money to streamers can be weird. It makes sense when a streamer is a scrappy up-and-comer for whom even a few coins in the cup can make a difference, but we live in an era in which big streamers are millionaires with exclusive contracts and brand deals. While popular streamers have expressed awareness of…

When Even Mourning Is Live: What Happens To A Famous Twitch Streamer’s Channel After Death

Tuning into Byron “Reckful” Bernstein’s recent daily Twitch streams, you wouldn’t immediately suspect something’s amiss. He’s front and center, playing World of Warcraft, Hearthstone, League of Legends, or any number of other games. Fans frequently make playful remarks, use emotes, and laugh at or with him. But the illusion doesn’t last long, nor is it…

Botched Twitch Promotion Just Pisses Off Streamers Dealing With DMCA Issues

For perhaps as long as Twitch has existed, there has been a myth: On exceedingly rare occasions, if the stars align perfectly, the ever-popular “Kappa” chat emote will turn gold. Some have suggested that a single Twitch user receives golden Kappa abilities every 24 hours. Others believe you have to fulfill highly specific prerequisites in…

Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez Streams On Twitch With Hasan Piker And Pokimane, Draws Over 430,000 Viewers

It began on Monday with a simple question: “Anyone want to play Among Us with me on Twitch to get out the vote?” Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez asked on Twitter, and nearly every even vaguely left-leaning streamer on Twitch answered. Mere hours later, AOC had a verified Twitch channel with hundreds of thousands of followers. Tuesday…

Twitch DMCA Purge Deletes Thousands Of Streamers’ Videos

It’s finally happening: Twitch is taking action against copyrighted music—long a norm among streamers—in response to music industry pressure. Today, hundreds of streamers received emails from the company stating that videos or clips in their back catalogues had run afoul of copyright rules, resulting in deletion. This, it seems, is just the beginning. Something similar…

Twitch’s Latest Horror Sensation, Phasmophobia, Has Streamers Screaming (At Each Other)

It’s not uncommon for horror games to take off on Twitch. Usually they’re flashes in the pan: The janky P.T.-alike du jour grabs eyeballs for a few days and then quickly descends back into the poorly-lit pits of obscurity. Phasmophobia is different. Sure, it’s inspired by P.T., and yes, it’s janky as all get out,…

Report: Employees Accuse Twitch Of Indifference To Sexual Assault, Harassment, And Racism

In a new report by GamesIndustry.biz, current and former Twitch employees recount issues of racism, sexism, and assault at the company that they say were never properly dealt with and often even enabled by a white bro tech startup culture. GamesIndustry.biz spoke to 16 employees that span the streaming platform’s history, and their stories paint…

Streamers Concerned Twitch’s New Unban Request Feature Will Just Lead To More Harassment

Fact: No chat user in the history of Twitch has ever believed they were justly banned. But generally speaking, a streamer or moderator did, in fact, ban them for a reason. Despite this, Twitch has introduced a new feature that allows viewers to appeal their bans and get a new lease on their life of…

Twitch is introducing a new feature that gives streamers access to rights-cleared music. “Soundtrack by Twitch” will circumvent the DMCA takedown issues that have plagued streamers for years (and especially recently) by giving them access to Twitch-curated songs that the company actually has the rights to include in broadcasts. The feature also separates music into…

Twitch Is Winning The Battle Against QAnon, Despite Only Suspending A Few Far-Right Channels

Earlier this month, Twitch temporarily suspended a channel called Patriots’ Soapbox. The channel is not enormous, generally pulling 20-50 concurrent viewers over the course of its 24/7 talk show-style streams, sometimes spiking into the 100 range. But Patriots’ Soapbox is notorious: Some credit the organization behind it, which has bases of operation on many different…