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It's strange to see a company that once prided itself on active engagement with its users to find product-market fit antagonize its content creators so much. An

It's strange to see a company that once prided itself on active engagement with its users to find product-market fit antagonize its content creators so much. And as a user, it gives me the perception that the platform is just plainly unfair. (Plus the platform is unusable without Adblock). Top streamers have been banned or lost partnerships for playing their own music[0], stating controversial political opinions[1][2], getting trolled by users who "snipe" streamers and shout vulgarities, or just accidentally showing movie clips with nudity [3]. From what I gather, the ban appeal process is byzantine and is heavily biased towards inaction. Oftentimes appeals are never even considered, or partnership staff plainly doesn't respond. The upsetting part is Twitch is such a great platform technology wise, and its competitors can't seem to recreate the same magic. I guess we're stuck with lousy moderation until the streaming fad dies down. [0] https://www.sportskeeda.com/esports/twitch-reportedly-suspends-guitarist-playing-music-the-hypocrisy-dmca https://www.sportskeeda.com/esports/twitch-reportedly-suspen... [1] https://dotesports.com/streaming/news/hasanabi-banned-from-twitch-after-saying-america-deserved-9-11 https://dotesports.com/streaming/news/hasanabi-banned-from-t... [2] https://win.gg/news/5496/destiny-loses-twitch-partnership-for-encouraging-violence https://win.gg/news/5496/destiny-loses-twitch-partnership-fo... [3] https://www.ginx.tv/en/twitch/vinesauce-banned-on-twitch-over-naked-hologram-girl-from-blade-runner https://www.ginx.tv/en/twitch/vinesauce-banned-on-twitch-ove...

analognoise 6y ago
It's because those "creators" are absolutely replaceable - there's no reason not to simply jettison them if there's any issue. There's an army of people willing to try their hand at being a similar "creator", and the vacuum caused by the loss of one of these "creators" is so miniscule people will just watch the next available stream. The replacement cost is so low and with such low impact, you can save even more money by not spending someone's time to review the appeal.
neaden 6y ago
First link: DMCA problems, this is super common but Twitch is reacting to a very poorly written law. Second link: Someone got in trouble for saying "America Deserved 9/11" which is a bit beyond a controversial political opinion. Third link: Person advocated that people start shooting protestors, a literal call for violence once again beyond a controversial political opinion. Fourth Link: Played a game (not a movie) that included nudity. Twitch has pretty clear policy on that and while it wasn't intentional on the streamers part, not allowing nudity is a pretty standard thing. None of your links back up the idea that Twitch is cracking down on free speech.
- Areibman 6y ago
  I never said this is a free speech issue; Twitch is a private platform so they can do whatever they please. My concern is that the quality of the platform is going downhill because Twitch's response to everything is the ban button. For repeat offenders, I understand banning, but as far as I know, they don't even have a warning system in place. (Their ban policies are also wildly inconsistent when it comes to ban lengths). In my view, this just leads to overall lower quality content on the platform. Creators can't risk or innovate because their entire livelihoods at are at the whim of a temperamental moderator.
  - willk 6y ago
    Why would they need a warning system other than their TOU?
  - ashtonkem 6y ago
    I dunno, if someone is calling for their political enemies to be shot, I don’t think they deserve a warning. That is so clearly beyond the acceptable pale that one shouldn’t need a warning that such behavior is unacceptable. To pretend otherwise is to infantilise streamers and pretend that they’re utterly incapable of telling right from wrong.
- Rebelgecko 6y ago
  I think part of the problem is how inconsistent twitch is. eg some people have been banned for accidentally showing nudity in movies/games/websites. Whereas other people who stripped naked on twitch to advertise their OnlyFans account just get 72 hour suspensions
- thaumasiotes 6y ago
  > Fourth Link: Played a game (not a movie) that included nudity. Twitch has pretty clear policy on that and while it wasn't intentional on the streamers part, not allowing nudity is a pretty standard thing. From the link: >> According to Twitch rules, nudity and sexual content are allowed if they are originally part of the game, but not if the game is modded to include sexually explicit material. >> In this case, the original Blade Runner game has been modified to add some elements from Blade Runner 2049, including the famous hologram girl scene. You could call that a "clear" policy, but it's also self-evidently insane. The problem isn't that there was nudity. The problem is that someone modified the game. Of course, that's also allowed.
ApolloFortyNine 6y ago
Your 2nd source links to Hasan saying "America deserved 9/11". Since not everyone will click on your sources, I just want to point out what you consider "political speech" for others to see.
- alacombe 6y ago
  > Your 2nd source links to Hasan saying "America deserved 9/11". Maybe it did.
  - paxys 6y ago
    It's hilarious that in a thread full of people hating on companies for deplatforming people for their opinions, you are getting massively downvoted for voicing your own opinion. Goes to show that no one really wants "free speech".
    - alacombe 6y ago
      > Goes to show that no one really wants "free speech". Especially not on HN, where the SV/SJW group think prevail. Argument I often get is "you are free to voice your opinions and we are free to massively downvote you", well, same happened with 9/11, the US elites have been cunts to the whole world (including to "The People" and still are), they are totally free to be, by then 9/11 came as a big slap in Wall Street America face, maybe they deserved it...
      - dang 6y ago
        We've asked you many times to stop using HN for ideological battle. Since you've ignored those requests and done even more of it, I've banned this account. If you don't want to be banned, you're welcome to email hn@ycombinator.com and give us reason to believe that you'll follow the rules in the future. They're here: https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html. As for "SJW group think", that sort of generalization is entirely determined by your own priors. The opposite side has different priors and sees HN in exactly the opposite way. Both views are not only imaginary, they're actually the same phenomenon with just one bit flipped. Lots of examples here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26148870 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26148870. Countless other explanations at https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&query=by%3Adang%20notice%20dislike&sort=byDate&type=comment https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&qu....
Pfhreak 6y ago
To be clear, the controversial political opinions you believe should be platformed by Twitch are: "If that means white redneck militia dudes mowing down dipshit protesters that think they can torch buildings at 10 PM, at this point they have my fucking blessing." and "America Deserved 9/11"? Because those are the literal quotes from things that got people pulled from Twitch and you've labelled "controversial political opinions." I'm sorry, but suggesting that we unilaterally kill innocent people or that innocent people deserved to be killed by terrorists is absolutely beyond the pale and should result in consequences like losing partnerships or facing suspensions.
- handoflixue 6y ago
  I'm old enough to remember when "gay people are all pedophiles" was the mainstream position given by the New York Times. It was utterly unacceptable to endorse such perverts. I'm not so old to remember the arguments about how women are too emotional to be allowed to vote, or the ones about black people, but it was pretty unacceptable to come out in defense of either of those groups either. Why in the world would I believe censorship is only going to squash the sort of stuff you list, when there's such a long history of it being used to oppress anyone who thinks they deserve the same rights as the rest of us? Are we going to ban any pro-abortion discussions, because "suggesting we kill innocent people" is absolutely beyond the pale? Do you really think there aren't millions of people in the US drooling at that sort of censorship opportunity?
  - Pfhreak 6y ago
    I think you are correct in that these tools will undoubtedly be used against progressive folks and minorities, as that's historically where they've been used. I believe that Twitch has too much power/authority, but also I believe that it's reasonable to moderate speech in communities and platforms. That said, I believe there's a material difference between examples and what was shared in the parent comment. I don't think one can generalize from "speech calling for violence should be removed from Twitch" to "all unpopular opinions will be suppressed". Yes, it was unpopular (and career limiting) to stand up for LGTBQ+ folks, and those voices rarely got mainstream airtime. Suppressing those voices was wrong, but totally different than prohibiting endorsements of mass violence. I believe we, culturally, can evaluate the difference between "I think gay folks should have equal rights" and "America deserved 9/11" and understand why we should be open to the former and cautious about the latter.
saurik 6y ago
To verify, the aforementioned "magic" includes a strong network effect / community aspect? Or is the issue that the tech and UI is particularly well-optimized for this use case and if someone else could only get it write it would be easy for streamers to use it instead?
deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
techrat 6y ago
>It's strange to see a company that once prided itself ... Twitch is an Amazon property now. All prior impressions are now moot.
GuB-42 6y ago
And there is that recent one: Twitch banned the Revision demoparty mid-stream. We suppose it is related to nudity (there was a few artistic nudes) but we are not even sure. Thankfully, the orga team was awesome and the CCC came to the rescue. 30 minutes later the stream was back on on a new (and better!) server. Announcement: https://twitter.com/revision_party/status/1378427185518764034 https://twitter.com/revision_party/status/137842718551876403... HN discussion: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26684247 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26684247
deanCommie 6y ago
I love how 99% of this thread is HackerNews comments about how free speech must be maintained and blah blah blah cancel culture. Then those same people are clutching their pearls about "America Deserved 9/11"

analognoise 6y ago

It's because those "creators" are absolutely replaceable - there's no reason not to simply jettison them if there's any issue. There's an army of people willing to try their hand at being a similar "creator", and the vacuum caused by the loss of one of these "creators" is so miniscule people will just watch the next available stream. The replacement cost is so low and with such low impact, you can save even more money by not spending someone's time to review the appeal.

neaden 6y ago

First link: DMCA problems, this is super common but Twitch is reacting to a very poorly written law. Second link: Someone got in trouble for saying "America Deserved 9/11" which is a bit beyond a controversial political opinion. Third link: Person advocated that people start shooting protestors, a literal call for violence once again beyond a controversial political opinion. Fourth Link: Played a game (not a movie) that included nudity. Twitch has pretty clear policy on that and while it wasn't intentional on the streamers part, not allowing nudity is a pretty standard thing. None of your links back up the idea that Twitch is cracking down on free speech.

Areibman 6y ago
I never said this is a free speech issue; Twitch is a private platform so they can do whatever they please. My concern is that the quality of the platform is going downhill because Twitch's response to everything is the ban button. For repeat offenders, I understand banning, but as far as I know, they don't even have a warning system in place. (Their ban policies are also wildly inconsistent when it comes to ban lengths). In my view, this just leads to overall lower quality content on the platform. Creators can't risk or innovate because their entire livelihoods at are at the whim of a temperamental moderator.
- willk 6y ago
  Why would they need a warning system other than their TOU?
- ashtonkem 6y ago
  I dunno, if someone is calling for their political enemies to be shot, I don’t think they deserve a warning. That is so clearly beyond the acceptable pale that one shouldn’t need a warning that such behavior is unacceptable. To pretend otherwise is to infantilise streamers and pretend that they’re utterly incapable of telling right from wrong.
Rebelgecko 6y ago
I think part of the problem is how inconsistent twitch is. eg some people have been banned for accidentally showing nudity in movies/games/websites. Whereas other people who stripped naked on twitch to advertise their OnlyFans account just get 72 hour suspensions
thaumasiotes 6y ago
> Fourth Link: Played a game (not a movie) that included nudity. Twitch has pretty clear policy on that and while it wasn't intentional on the streamers part, not allowing nudity is a pretty standard thing. From the link: >> According to Twitch rules, nudity and sexual content are allowed if they are originally part of the game, but not if the game is modded to include sexually explicit material. >> In this case, the original Blade Runner game has been modified to add some elements from Blade Runner 2049, including the famous hologram girl scene. You could call that a "clear" policy, but it's also self-evidently insane. The problem isn't that there was nudity. The problem is that someone modified the game. Of course, that's also allowed.

ApolloFortyNine 6y ago

Your 2nd source links to Hasan saying "America deserved 9/11". Since not everyone will click on your sources, I just want to point out what you consider "political speech" for others to see.

alacombe 6y ago
> Your 2nd source links to Hasan saying "America deserved 9/11". Maybe it did.
- paxys 6y ago
  It's hilarious that in a thread full of people hating on companies for deplatforming people for their opinions, you are getting massively downvoted for voicing your own opinion. Goes to show that no one really wants "free speech".
  - alacombe 6y ago
    > Goes to show that no one really wants "free speech". Especially not on HN, where the SV/SJW group think prevail. Argument I often get is "you are free to voice your opinions and we are free to massively downvote you", well, same happened with 9/11, the US elites have been cunts to the whole world (including to "The People" and still are), they are totally free to be, by then 9/11 came as a big slap in Wall Street America face, maybe they deserved it...
    - dang 6y ago
      We've asked you many times to stop using HN for ideological battle. Since you've ignored those requests and done even more of it, I've banned this account. If you don't want to be banned, you're welcome to email hn@ycombinator.com and give us reason to believe that you'll follow the rules in the future. They're here: https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html. As for "SJW group think", that sort of generalization is entirely determined by your own priors. The opposite side has different priors and sees HN in exactly the opposite way. Both views are not only imaginary, they're actually the same phenomenon with just one bit flipped. Lots of examples here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26148870 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26148870. Countless other explanations at https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&query=by%3Adang%20notice%20dislike&sort=byDate&type=comment https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&qu....

Pfhreak 6y ago

To be clear, the controversial political opinions you believe should be platformed by Twitch are: "If that means white redneck militia dudes mowing down dipshit protesters that think they can torch buildings at 10 PM, at this point they have my fucking blessing." and "America Deserved 9/11"? Because those are the literal quotes from things that got people pulled from Twitch and you've labelled "controversial political opinions." I'm sorry, but suggesting that we unilaterally kill innocent people or that innocent people deserved to be killed by terrorists is absolutely beyond the pale and should result in consequences like losing partnerships or facing suspensions.

handoflixue 6y ago
I'm old enough to remember when "gay people are all pedophiles" was the mainstream position given by the New York Times. It was utterly unacceptable to endorse such perverts. I'm not so old to remember the arguments about how women are too emotional to be allowed to vote, or the ones about black people, but it was pretty unacceptable to come out in defense of either of those groups either. Why in the world would I believe censorship is only going to squash the sort of stuff you list, when there's such a long history of it being used to oppress anyone who thinks they deserve the same rights as the rest of us? Are we going to ban any pro-abortion discussions, because "suggesting we kill innocent people" is absolutely beyond the pale? Do you really think there aren't millions of people in the US drooling at that sort of censorship opportunity?
- Pfhreak 6y ago
  I think you are correct in that these tools will undoubtedly be used against progressive folks and minorities, as that's historically where they've been used. I believe that Twitch has too much power/authority, but also I believe that it's reasonable to moderate speech in communities and platforms. That said, I believe there's a material difference between examples and what was shared in the parent comment. I don't think one can generalize from "speech calling for violence should be removed from Twitch" to "all unpopular opinions will be suppressed". Yes, it was unpopular (and career limiting) to stand up for LGTBQ+ folks, and those voices rarely got mainstream airtime. Suppressing those voices was wrong, but totally different than prohibiting endorsements of mass violence. I believe we, culturally, can evaluate the difference between "I think gay folks should have equal rights" and "America deserved 9/11" and understand why we should be open to the former and cautious about the latter.

saurik 6y ago

To verify, the aforementioned "magic" includes a strong network effect / community aspect? Or is the issue that the tech and UI is particularly well-optimized for this use case and if someone else could only get it write it would be easy for streamers to use it instead?

deleted 6y ago

[deleted]

techrat 6y ago

>It's strange to see a company that once prided itself ... Twitch is an Amazon property now. All prior impressions are now moot.

GuB-42 6y ago

And there is that recent one: Twitch banned the Revision demoparty mid-stream. We suppose it is related to nudity (there was a few artistic nudes) but we are not even sure. Thankfully, the orga team was awesome and the CCC came to the rescue. 30 minutes later the stream was back on on a new (and better!) server. Announcement: https://twitter.com/revision_party/status/1378427185518764034 https://twitter.com/revision_party/status/137842718551876403... HN discussion: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26684247 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26684247

deanCommie 6y ago

I love how 99% of this thread is HackerNews comments about how free speech must be maintained and blah blah blah cancel culture. Then those same people are clutching their pearls about "America Deserved 9/11"