TThe witch is having a hard time. Owned by Amazon since 2014, the live streaming site is synonymous with video games for many. TechScape’s audience is large, so forgive me: some of you will wonder why I should explain why Twitch’s viewers play video games, interact with these influencers, and have the kind of tight parasocial relationships other communities have with podcasters. , YouTubers or newsletter writers. (I love you too). Others will wonder why anyone would want to watch someone playing video games.
Whether you understand it or not, there’s no doubt that Twitch streamers are real celebrities. We’re just a few years after 31-year-old Richard Blevins, better known as Ninja, made headlines in 2018 by playing Fortnite against Drake and earning an easy million-dollar salary in the process.
Since then, Ninja’s trajectory speaks to how challenged Twitch’s leadership in space has been. In 2019, Microsoft’s local Twitch rival Mixer was awarded an exclusive contract for an undisclosed sum. Blevins said it wasn’t just about the money: The “toxic” community that had grown on Twitch played its part. But in 2020, Mixer was shutting down and Ninja was released from his contract. Now, he splits his time across multiple platforms, still streaming to Twitch, but also streaming to YouTube, TikTok, Instagram, and Facebook.
Ninja isn’t alone in looking beyond the market leader for a platform. And Twitch isn’t helping anything. The company recognizes the importance of its stars, and in a move that’s quietly commonplace in the social media world, it’s started offering sweetheart deals to its biggest celebrities and splitting the earnings of a Twitch subscription. an individual host – 70/30 in favor of the publisher for the biggest and best. For smaller publishers, the deal is split 50/50, but with a supportive audience and a community culture that encourages parting with cash rather than relying solely on advertising, even that can generate a meaningful amount of money.
But in September, Twitch ended the 70/30 revenue split and slashed payouts to its biggest stars. “We don’t believe it’s okay for those with standard contracts to have revenue shares that vary by publisher size,” Twitch said in a blog post. “In an ideal world, all publishers, regardless of size, would be on the same set of terms.” No sweet deal sounds fair enough – but why not standardize it at 70/30 and revive smaller creators?
“We need to talk about the cost of our service,” said Twitch president Dan Clancy. “Providing high-definition, low-latency, always-available live video to virtually any corner of the world is expensive. Live video costs for 100, using broadcast rates from Amazon Web Services’ Interactive Video Service (IVS) (mainly Twitch video) [viewer] Streamers that stream 200 hours a month for more than $1,000 a month.”
It pours as it flows
It went badly to tell streamers that were cut off because Amazon’s subsidiary Twitch couldn’t pay their Amazon Web Services bills until it was necessary. However, the company took the opportunity to make changes at its annual meeting, TwitchCon, in October.
Instead, things just got worse. Attendees said that from the start, the convention was clinical and institutional, an opportunity to celebrate the company rather than a moment when the company honors the publishers who made it this way.
And then there was the foam pit. A booth set up by PC maker Lenovo featured gladiator-style battles between top broadcasters atop a pile of foam blocks. But unlike the TV show, the blocks are just a thin layer scattered on the concrete floor of the convention center. It has been reported that some people who jumped from the platform were injured, the most serious of which was Adriana Chechik. who said he broke his back in two places. Twitch has remained silent about the events. (A Lenovo representative told the Polygon website at the time: “Safety remains our priority and we are working with event organizers to review incidents.”)
The lightweights create the impression that Twitch doesn’t care about people who dedicate themselves to producing content for its platform. And this is becoming more and more problematic, because “dedicated” is the right word. To participate in the Twitch “affiliate” program and access monetization features, you must have streamed for at least eight hours spread out over at least seven days in a 30-day period (for an average of three viewers in total). period). Free by definition, it’s a tedious program for the job, and yet it doesn’t guarantee that Twitch will actually accept you.
The shackles of the flow
When Twitch pays you, work doesn’t get any less intense. As Likewise MacDonald of the Guardian wrote last year:
Talking to the people around that table, I was surprised and frankly worried at how hard they were working. The woman sitting next to me told me that she streams for eight to 10 hours every day and curates her social media when she’s not live, responding to fans, researching brand partnerships or collaborations with other streamers; Throughout our conversation, she was visibly resisting the urge to check her phone, where new stats, fan reviews, and potential opportunities were likely piling up. I asked her what she was doing for fun and she looked really confused by the question.
It’s a hard life if you get the rewards for it. It’s even harder if someone else is using you. Last week, a top Twitch streamer claimed that his partner spent years manipulating him and forcing him to stream on the platform after checking his finances and bank account. He described the world he lived in as a “fancy prison” and claimed that his 12 to 15 hour streams were not his choice and the rewards for doing them were not his. In a follow-up video, she said she’s safe and happy to be outside: “I don’t have to wear a cleavage every day.”
In a recent interview, Twitch CEO Emmett Shear acknowledged that the company’s relationship with its streamers needed to change – but urged the US government to take the first step. “This isn’t exactly a W-2 business and it’s not exactly a contracting business,” he told Bloomberg (£). “I think we can really use laws that create a third option that is suitable for the gig economy and the creative economy.
“One of the key dynamics of the creative economy is that tech companies are not accustomed to the level that creators rely on them for their work,” he added. “A quick change in how a product works is not just a question of ‘This person didn’t get many views on their video’, it’s more of a ‘This person can’t pay rent this month’ issue.”
As an acknowledgment that the relationship needs to change, it’s a start. But Twitch can do more for its creators than just waiting for the government to make them fake employees. The question is whether it will be before turning to someone else who can.
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