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The anxieties are tied up with the relentless nature of their work. Tyler Blevins, AKA Ninja, makes an estimated $500,000 (£384,000) every month via live broadc

The anxieties are tied up with the relentless nature of their work. Tyler Blevins, AKA Ninja, makes an estimated $500,000 (£384,000) every month via live broadcasts of him playing the video game Fortnite on Twitch, a service for livestreaming video games that is owned by Amazon. Most of Blevins’ revenue comes from Twitch subscribers or viewers who provide one-off donations (often in the hope that he will thank them by name “on air”). Blevins recently took to Twitter to complain that he didn’t feel he could stop streaming. “Wanna know the struggles of streaming over other jobs?” he wrote, perhaps ill-advisedly for someone with such a stratospheric income. “I left for less than 48 hours and lost 40,000 subscribers on Twitch. I’ll be back today… grinding again.” This fits into the stereotype of Millennials as entitled. He makes 500k a month, but can't get off the hamster wheel? Poor soul.

da02 8y ago
Is that after or before taxes?
- mancerayder 8y ago
  Before, no doubt. After, his existential travails only take more toll on his smug fatigue level.
- EpicEng 8y ago
  Does it matter?
- runevault 8y ago
  Before for certain.
- TrainedMonkey 8y ago
  Before taxes, he has about 100k subs who contribute around $5 each. Loosing 40k subs is pretty significant, however I am not sure how that is possible in just 2 days. While there is an option to auto renew most twitch subscribers are not automatic, a person is usually watching the stream and chooses to subscribe. When subscription expires they can do so again. Assuming 140k subs are evenly distributed throughout the month the loss from not streaming for 48 hours should be 2/30 * 140k, this comes down to slightly less than 10k. Moreover most of these subs should rejoin once he starts streaming again. You can see detailed breakdown here: https://twitchstats.net/subs/ninja https://twitchstats.net/subs/ninja
  - teraflop 8y ago
    > who contribute around $5 each. Doesn't Twitch take roughly 50% of that?
    - LanceH 8y ago
      That's the most they take. Higher level partners get a better cut. If he lost 40k subscribers, that's most likely 40k renewals that didn't happen -- and they're not going to happen until he broadcasts again. It's almost a certainty he didn't lose 40k, many will have renewed once he was on again. And if 40k subscriptions lapse over 2 days that would seem to imply that he has 600k subscribers. He doesn't. The 40k loss is just sensationalist. He didn't log in the first of the month and probably had a ton of people re-sub on the 3rd when he was back on.
      - da02 8y ago
        After a while, it all starts to sound like sports & business. Are you also a star on Youtube or Twitch? Or do you work in the industry?
oh_sigh 8y ago
I wonder if he thinks people who are making 3m+ a year after taxes can just disappear randomly and not have their income affected
- drb91 8y ago
  Taking 48 hours off work is not “disappearing”, that’s a weekend. Perhaps the point is more how volatile the patronage is.
  - saagarjha 8y ago
    The article mentions that doing taking breaks causes a significant drop in their subscriber count.
  - oh_sigh 8y ago
    If he set himself up with a consistent 48 hour no stream schedule, I doubt he would keep losing 40k subscribers every break
village-idiot 8y ago
Live frugally, invest aggressively, retire in a few years. Shouldn’t be too hard with such an absurd abundance of cash.
Mirioron 8y ago
But he's at the very top. How much do you think the top software developer in the world makes? The problem with streaming is that once he gets off the hamster wheel for a bit there might be no wheel to climb back on later.
- txcwpalpha 8y ago
  >The problem with streaming is that once he gets off the hamster wheel for a bit there might be no wheel to climb back on later. Is that really a problem? He makes more in one year than most people make in their entire lifetime. Unless he's out there blowing his money on mansions and yachts (which I'm pretty sure he isn't), then he could stop at any time and retire comfortably. He doesn't need to get back on the hamster wheel.
  - Mirioron 8y ago
    But he's at the very top. Think about the tens of thousands of others that will have to deal with many of the same problems, but make a thousandth of what he makes. Nobody starts out streaming knowing they will be successful. Most people that became successful through streaming have been streaming for years for little return. The risk they took is ENORMOUS.
hwillis 8y ago
And this fits the stereotype of older generations, and indeed Americans in general, failing to read or do even superficial research. This guy streams his life to tens of thousands of people... yeah, he's gonna be a little self-obsessed. It's all but mandatory for streamers to fuel the performance. The guy streams 70 hours per week minimum[1]. That two day -more like one day- break cost him over $100,000, and cut his following (and salary, I guess? No clue how Twitch works.) by almost 20%[2]. There's no option to pick more PTO and trade off salary. He's stuck with this. Even as a "temporary" solution, that shit will take years off your life, and there are people who do this to just scrape by. It's illustrative of how shitty a "profession" it is that the top streamers have to put in such an insane amount of work with no compromise ever. [1]: https://www.twitchmetrics.net/c/19571641-ninja https://www.twitchmetrics.net/c/19571641-ninja [2]: https://kotaku.com/ninja-takes-two-day-break-loses-40-000-subscribers-1826813300 https://kotaku.com/ninja-takes-two-day-break-loses-40-000-su...
- nine_k 8y ago
  Making $500k a month would allow you to save enough in a few years to jump off the hamster wheel and live completely off passive income. Not luxuriously, but better than most, and have all his time for his own.
  - kcorbitt 8y ago
    To put some real numbers to this: $500k a month is $6M a year, or maybe $3M post-tax (assuming there's no way to shelter that income). At a very conservative 3.33% annual withdrawal rate, which all but guarantees that your capital will grow faster than you spend it in the long term, after one year of work he could live on an annual income of $100k, forever, without working another day. I guess it depends on your definition of "luxurious", but $100k free-and-clear annually buys you a much nicer lifestyle than most people have!
    - 0xFACEFEED 8y ago
      Correct me if I'm wrong, but any kind of stardom that nets you $3MM post-tax per year will also open the door to great investment opportunities AND a sort of residual income. By residual income I mean things like being paid to appear at events and sponsor brands. Very low effort work. To be fair, that'll eventually dwindle away, but if he plays his chips right then he could coast on that kind of stuff for a long time.
zdragnar 8y ago
Welcome to being self employed. When you run a business by yourself, every hour not worked is money lost. No PTO, no sick days, no breaks... you're always wondering how much money any given activity is costing you, from doing dishes and laundry to going to a bar with friends to whatever. It's certainly not a millennial thing at all. 500k a month now could turn into little to nothing if he were to take a two week holiday and his fan base lost interest (conceivably).
pvg 8y ago
It fits the stereotype of people making lousy generalizations about the generation-to-complain-about of the day.
savanaly 8y ago
I feel this way at first glance too. Then I remember that one could substitute Ninja for me, and his income for mine, and from the comparison of, say, a third-world trash-heap scavenger, I have similarly little reason to ever utter a peep of complaint about how my life is going. Yet I don't feel guilty saying negative things about my life or being depressed on occasion. And that helps me to feel sympathy for him.
- xor1 8y ago
  >Yet I don't feel guilty saying negative things about my life or being depressed on occasion. I do, especially after traveling. Holy shit do we have it good here.
itronitron 8y ago
I think you meant to say >> He makes 500k a month ... playing video games ...
ChuckMcM 8y ago
Oddly enough it is more like addicts rather than millennials. The money is a dopamine hit, I've seen day traders with the same obsession trying to make their 'nut' every day. And getting so pumped when they do and so depressed when they don't. All while constantly complaining they would rather be doing anything else. It sounded like an addict saying they hated being an addict but they needed getting high to survive. 500K a month is 6 million a year. Lets say the taxes are 50% so you take two years to bank 6 million. It is pretty straight forward to live off six million dollars pretty much anywhere in the world. Even at 2% that is a monthly check of $10K. If you've got it in t-bills that is tax free. But you don't get the dopamine hits from living off the interest.
- MisterOctober 8y ago
  Also similar to some online poker players I've known - even some of the lexicon is the same [e.g., 'grinding']
stale2002 8y ago
Would you say the same thing about the problems of famous "normal" celebrities, such as the high amount of drug overdose deaths? These real life problems of famous individuals shows that fame and success isn't always all it is cracked up to be. Related to Ninja in particular, I would also like to point out that Ninja's success is only recent. He has been doing the streamer grind for 10 whole years to get to this point of success in his life. And with a lot of luck along the way.
reaperducer 8y ago
This fits into the stereotype of Millennials as entitled. He makes 500k a month, but can't get off the hamster wheel? Poor soul. Hopefully one day he gets off that hamster wheel and has to dig ditches or clean toilets or roof a house in the desert for a living. Then he can know what work is. My office window shows me a variety of people who work a thousand times harder than I do coding. And each day I am grateful that I don’t have to do their tasks.
phamilton 8y ago
Have you ever had golden handcuffs? While I'm sure starvation, lack of shelter, unemployment etc. are certainly in a different league, I can empathize with someone who feels trapped due to their compensation. My story isn't as intense, but after an acquisition I had a really hard time. My career growth was frozen and I wanted to leave but I felt that leaving money on the table was doing a great diservice to my wife and children. It was much rougher than I had imagined. That's not to say someone deserves pity for having to choose between a massive income and "getting off the hamster wheel", but I for one don't blame him for feeling trapped.
- sooheon 8y ago
  We call that "shit you say when you're full" in Korea. It may be subjectively stressful, but don't expect much sympathy from people who objectively have it 100x worse than you do.
taneq 8y ago
> This fits into the stereotype of Millennials as entitled. He makes 500k a month, but can't get off the hamster wheel? Poor soul. That's why we have this new term, 'golden handcuffs', which has never been applied to anyone born before 1995.

da02 8y ago

Is that after or before taxes?

mancerayder 8y ago
Before, no doubt. After, his existential travails only take more toll on his smug fatigue level.
EpicEng 8y ago
Does it matter?
runevault 8y ago
Before for certain.
TrainedMonkey 8y ago
Before taxes, he has about 100k subs who contribute around $5 each. Loosing 40k subs is pretty significant, however I am not sure how that is possible in just 2 days. While there is an option to auto renew most twitch subscribers are not automatic, a person is usually watching the stream and chooses to subscribe. When subscription expires they can do so again. Assuming 140k subs are evenly distributed throughout the month the loss from not streaming for 48 hours should be 2/30 * 140k, this comes down to slightly less than 10k. Moreover most of these subs should rejoin once he starts streaming again. You can see detailed breakdown here: https://twitchstats.net/subs/ninja https://twitchstats.net/subs/ninja
- teraflop 8y ago
  > who contribute around $5 each. Doesn't Twitch take roughly 50% of that?
  - LanceH 8y ago
    That's the most they take. Higher level partners get a better cut. If he lost 40k subscribers, that's most likely 40k renewals that didn't happen -- and they're not going to happen until he broadcasts again. It's almost a certainty he didn't lose 40k, many will have renewed once he was on again. And if 40k subscriptions lapse over 2 days that would seem to imply that he has 600k subscribers. He doesn't. The 40k loss is just sensationalist. He didn't log in the first of the month and probably had a ton of people re-sub on the 3rd when he was back on.
    - da02 8y ago
      After a while, it all starts to sound like sports & business. Are you also a star on Youtube or Twitch? Or do you work in the industry?

oh_sigh 8y ago

I wonder if he thinks people who are making 3m+ a year after taxes can just disappear randomly and not have their income affected

drb91 8y ago
Taking 48 hours off work is not “disappearing”, that’s a weekend. Perhaps the point is more how volatile the patronage is.
- saagarjha 8y ago
  The article mentions that doing taking breaks causes a significant drop in their subscriber count.
- oh_sigh 8y ago
  If he set himself up with a consistent 48 hour no stream schedule, I doubt he would keep losing 40k subscribers every break

village-idiot 8y ago

Live frugally, invest aggressively, retire in a few years. Shouldn’t be too hard with such an absurd abundance of cash.

Mirioron 8y ago

But he's at the very top. How much do you think the top software developer in the world makes? The problem with streaming is that once he gets off the hamster wheel for a bit there might be no wheel to climb back on later.

txcwpalpha 8y ago
>The problem with streaming is that once he gets off the hamster wheel for a bit there might be no wheel to climb back on later. Is that really a problem? He makes more in one year than most people make in their entire lifetime. Unless he's out there blowing his money on mansions and yachts (which I'm pretty sure he isn't), then he could stop at any time and retire comfortably. He doesn't need to get back on the hamster wheel.
- Mirioron 8y ago
  But he's at the very top. Think about the tens of thousands of others that will have to deal with many of the same problems, but make a thousandth of what he makes. Nobody starts out streaming knowing they will be successful. Most people that became successful through streaming have been streaming for years for little return. The risk they took is ENORMOUS.

hwillis 8y ago

And this fits the stereotype of older generations, and indeed Americans in general, failing to read or do even superficial research. This guy streams his life to tens of thousands of people... yeah, he's gonna be a little self-obsessed. It's all but mandatory for streamers to fuel the performance. The guy streams 70 hours per week minimum[1]. That two day -more like one day- break cost him over $100,000, and cut his following (and salary, I guess? No clue how Twitch works.) by almost 20%[2]. There's no option to pick more PTO and trade off salary. He's stuck with this. Even as a "temporary" solution, that shit will take years off your life, and there are people who do this to just scrape by. It's illustrative of how shitty a "profession" it is that the top streamers have to put in such an insane amount of work with no compromise ever. [1]: https://www.twitchmetrics.net/c/19571641-ninja https://www.twitchmetrics.net/c/19571641-ninja [2]: https://kotaku.com/ninja-takes-two-day-break-loses-40-000-subscribers-1826813300 https://kotaku.com/ninja-takes-two-day-break-loses-40-000-su...

nine_k 8y ago
Making $500k a month would allow you to save enough in a few years to jump off the hamster wheel and live completely off passive income. Not luxuriously, but better than most, and have all his time for his own.
- kcorbitt 8y ago
  To put some real numbers to this: $500k a month is $6M a year, or maybe $3M post-tax (assuming there's no way to shelter that income). At a very conservative 3.33% annual withdrawal rate, which all but guarantees that your capital will grow faster than you spend it in the long term, after one year of work he could live on an annual income of $100k, forever, without working another day. I guess it depends on your definition of "luxurious", but $100k free-and-clear annually buys you a much nicer lifestyle than most people have!
  - 0xFACEFEED 8y ago
    Correct me if I'm wrong, but any kind of stardom that nets you $3MM post-tax per year will also open the door to great investment opportunities AND a sort of residual income. By residual income I mean things like being paid to appear at events and sponsor brands. Very low effort work. To be fair, that'll eventually dwindle away, but if he plays his chips right then he could coast on that kind of stuff for a long time.

zdragnar 8y ago

Welcome to being self employed. When you run a business by yourself, every hour not worked is money lost. No PTO, no sick days, no breaks... you're always wondering how much money any given activity is costing you, from doing dishes and laundry to going to a bar with friends to whatever. It's certainly not a millennial thing at all. 500k a month now could turn into little to nothing if he were to take a two week holiday and his fan base lost interest (conceivably).

pvg 8y ago

It fits the stereotype of people making lousy generalizations about the generation-to-complain-about of the day.

savanaly 8y ago

I feel this way at first glance too. Then I remember that one could substitute Ninja for me, and his income for mine, and from the comparison of, say, a third-world trash-heap scavenger, I have similarly little reason to ever utter a peep of complaint about how my life is going. Yet I don't feel guilty saying negative things about my life or being depressed on occasion. And that helps me to feel sympathy for him.

xor1 8y ago
>Yet I don't feel guilty saying negative things about my life or being depressed on occasion. I do, especially after traveling. Holy shit do we have it good here.

itronitron 8y ago

I think you meant to say >> He makes 500k a month ... playing video games ...

ChuckMcM 8y ago

Oddly enough it is more like addicts rather than millennials. The money is a dopamine hit, I've seen day traders with the same obsession trying to make their 'nut' every day. And getting so pumped when they do and so depressed when they don't. All while constantly complaining they would rather be doing anything else. It sounded like an addict saying they hated being an addict but they needed getting high to survive. 500K a month is 6 million a year. Lets say the taxes are 50% so you take two years to bank 6 million. It is pretty straight forward to live off six million dollars pretty much anywhere in the world. Even at 2% that is a monthly check of $10K. If you've got it in t-bills that is tax free. But you don't get the dopamine hits from living off the interest.

MisterOctober 8y ago
Also similar to some online poker players I've known - even some of the lexicon is the same [e.g., 'grinding']

stale2002 8y ago

Would you say the same thing about the problems of famous "normal" celebrities, such as the high amount of drug overdose deaths? These real life problems of famous individuals shows that fame and success isn't always all it is cracked up to be. Related to Ninja in particular, I would also like to point out that Ninja's success is only recent. He has been doing the streamer grind for 10 whole years to get to this point of success in his life. And with a lot of luck along the way.

reaperducer 8y ago

This fits into the stereotype of Millennials as entitled. He makes 500k a month, but can't get off the hamster wheel? Poor soul. Hopefully one day he gets off that hamster wheel and has to dig ditches or clean toilets or roof a house in the desert for a living. Then he can know what work is. My office window shows me a variety of people who work a thousand times harder than I do coding. And each day I am grateful that I don’t have to do their tasks.

phamilton 8y ago

Have you ever had golden handcuffs? While I'm sure starvation, lack of shelter, unemployment etc. are certainly in a different league, I can empathize with someone who feels trapped due to their compensation. My story isn't as intense, but after an acquisition I had a really hard time. My career growth was frozen and I wanted to leave but I felt that leaving money on the table was doing a great diservice to my wife and children. It was much rougher than I had imagined. That's not to say someone deserves pity for having to choose between a massive income and "getting off the hamster wheel", but I for one don't blame him for feeling trapped.

sooheon 8y ago
We call that "shit you say when you're full" in Korea. It may be subjectively stressful, but don't expect much sympathy from people who objectively have it 100x worse than you do.

taneq 8y ago

> This fits into the stereotype of Millennials as entitled. He makes 500k a month, but can't get off the hamster wheel? Poor soul. That's why we have this new term, 'golden handcuffs', which has never been applied to anyone born before 1995.