Twitch is the biggest name in live-streaming. Launched in June 2011, Twitch quickly became the go-to home for video game streamers, growing to tens of millions of monthly viewers within just a few years. Amazon acquired the company in 2014, offering the commerce giant a powerful competitor to YouTube, with an audience the Google-owned video platform has struggled to reach. Twitch is best known for being home to Fortnite streamers like Ninja and Tfue; e-sports like Overwatch and League of Legends; and new phenomena, including Grand Theft Auto V role-playing. It’s also expanded beyond games to include activities like social eating and musical performances.
The AI-generated Seinfeld-like Twitch show (which was briefly banned for transphobic content) is, as I write this, completely silent, as spotted by a Twitter user Friday morning.
I reached out to Skyler Hartle, a co-creator of the project that I spoke to earlier this year, to ask what might be going on, but I haven’t heard back.
You can read more about the feature on a Twitch support page. Twitch said in August the feature would be arriving in September, so the company is a bit behind schedule on delivering the feature.
[help.twitch.tv]
The job cuts hit Twitch’s customer experience organization, according to GamesIndustry.biz. Amazon cut “just over” 400 jobs at Twitch earlier this year. Zach Bussey, who covers Twitch closely, says Tuesday’s cuts are “significantly smaller” than that round of layoffs.
[GamesIndustry.biz]
The phenomenal cast of Baldur’s Gate 3 is now live on Twitch playing a Dungeons and Dragons one shot as their characters. I don’t typically watch D&D actual plays, (sorry Critical Role fans) but I will be present and seated for this because I love all my murder hobo companions and I can’t get enough of them.
Twitch launched the ability to edit vertical clips in its clips editor in May, and starting this week, you’ll be able to publish those clips directly to TikTok from the editor. Seems like a handy way to save a few steps.
Twitch’s terms of service only allow “simulcasting” on “Twitch-like” services with written permission, and CEO Dan Clancy confirmed that Ninja is cleared to do so. “We don’t have any problem with what Ninja is doing right now,” Clancy said.
Ninja often streams across multiple platforms at the same time. He has the leverage to be able to do so — Ninja, one of the biggest streamers out there, will be fine whether he can stream on Twitch or not — but it’s still interesting to see that Twitch is actually giving multistreaming permission to at least one person.
Twitch will soon allow streamers to block banned users from watching their streams. Twitch streamer Lowco reported that the new feature will be showing up in creators’ settings in September. Currently, bans only remove them from chat.
Bad actors can still circumvent this by signing out of a banned account, as it’s not an IP ban. But Trevor Fisher, a senior product manager for community health at Twitch, said the company is considering IP bans or other safety measures for future updates said in a video.
Wait, sorry, my mistake: 900 is a “Scrabble-record audience,” according to Slate.
I love Scrabble, but there’s a dude asleep in bed right now who has over 1,000 concurrents.
Copyright law can’t seem to keep up with how fast YouTube and streaming trends evolve, so creators have long taken it upon themselves to set up industry norms for “react”-style videos.
Recently, Twitch and Kick star xQc caught a lot of heat for breaking those norms after posting what essentially amounted to reuploads of content by smaller creators.
He challenged YouTuber Ethan Klein to a debate over the merits of fair use, but the conversation devolved into... xQc doing the worm? I think there’s a real discussion to be had about copyright and content creation, but this definitely wasn’t it.
Popular Twitch streamer and influencer Kai Cenat is facing charges of inciting a riot at his giveaway event in New York City on Friday and hasn’t posted on social media since being released from custody on Saturday morning.
Now (via Variety), the first statement on the incident has appeared on the Instagram story for his AMP (Any Means Possible) group.
Since banning unlicensed gambling content last year, Twitch says gambling viewership on the site has dropped by around 75 percent.
Twitch posted more context in a thread on X, the platform formerly known as Twitter.
Update August 2nd, 2:53PM ET: Added a Twitch post from X.
The first post is focused on Twitch’s efforts to keep its younger users safe.
[safety.twitch.tv]
Twitch streamer Nutty has built the most incredible Twitch widget which will allow his viewers to play the Ocarina of Time. Viewers input ocarina commands in chat and a little Link avatar plays the notes. If chat can work together to input the commands for a known song (like the Song of Storms) Link will play the song in full just like he would in Ocarina of Time.
Twitch revealed a lot of new features today at TwitchCon, coming over the next few months.
Updates include a new discovery feed that will surface streamers you aren’t following; the ability to export clips to TikTok; a new shared streams update letting streamers go live on their individual channels during a Guest Star session; and a new “stories” format.
[blog.twitch.tv]
“The venue is not near the epicenter of the protests, or any of the areas that have seen protest activity, and has continued to operate business as usual,” Twitch said on Twitter. The event is scheduled for July 8th and 9th.
The protests began earlier this week after a 17-year-old was shot by police.
Lengyel’s two-year deal with Kick is for about $70 million, with incentives making up the rest.
The deal isn’t exclusive — Lengyel says he will still be streaming on Twitch, though “not nearly as often” as before he signed this deal.
Meanwhile, Twitch walked back unpopular changes this month and introduced a new 70/30 split revenue sharing program as other platforms have begun to more aggressively court streamers.
[The New York Times]
Twitch’s new rules governing how certain kinds of ads can be displayed has caused confusion, fear, and anger among streamers.
And it wasn’t the best introduction — the subscription, which removes most ads, is getting more expensive! But you might be hearing more about Turbo soon, as the company promises that new features are on the way.
Many streamers already use third-party products to show alerts for things like new subscriptions or followers, but now Twitch is introducing its own alerts system. Streamers can access it from the creator dashboard.
Hopefully, the alerts aren’t too annoying — though one example in Twitch’s blog post on the news is a bit much.
[blog.twitch.tv]
Take the time to read about Nathan Grayson’s big report about troubles at the Amazon-owned streaming platform, which just changed CEOs and is set to lay off “just over” 400 people. (I’d recommend reading Grayson’s Twitter thread about the story, too.)
[Washington Post]
With new tools like Guest Star and improvements to existing monetization programs, Twitch believes it’s the best place for creators right now.
Twitch CEO Dan Clancy, who just stepped into the role on Thursday, shared the number as part of a new blog post shortly after the announcement of Amazon’s next huge wave of layoffs.
“Like many companies, our business has been impacted by the current macroeconomic environment, and user and revenue growth has not kept pace with our expectations,” according to Clancy. “In order to run our business sustainably, we’ve made the very difficult decision to shrink the size of our workforce.”
You can read more about Amazon’s layoffs in our post from earlier today.
Larry, the Jerry Seinfeld stand-in, has seemingly been replaced by a bespectacled person named Leo. Twitch chat isn’t happy, but I’ll let you form your own opinion.
The stream is back with new guardrails after being temporarily banned due to transphobic content.
