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I think viewership peaked in 2021 and has been flat or down since then. [1][2][3] I know some of my friends watch Twitch less because the ad policy became toxi

by Brybry 3y ago

I think viewership peaked in 2021 and has been flat or down since then. [1][2][3] I know some of my friends watch Twitch less because the ad policy became toxic. [1] https://twitchtracker.com/statistics https://twitchtracker.com/statistics [2] https://sullygnome.com/longtermstats https://sullygnome.com/longtermstats [3] https://streamscharts.com/overview#:~:text=Twitch%20growth%20by%20week https://streamscharts.com/overview#:~:text=Twitch%20growth%2...

joegibbs 3y ago
What happened to the ad policy?
- echelon 3y ago
  You can't show female-presenting cleavage, for one. They change their "attire policy" on a near-weekly basis. Is it exploitative? Empowering? Toxic? Who knows! Everyone argues about everything. Twitch is ban happy with anything even remotely controversial. Things that can be suggestive or comments that can be interpreted as offensive will garner a ban. And they hate anything even remotely sex-related. Honestly, this stuff needs to move P2P. Platforms are indecisive and fickle. Just a month ago, they flip-flopped on their policy in just two days [1]. And it happens time and time again. I don't blame the ad networks (after all Twitter had all of the world government and news orgs plus sex and nudity). I blame the Twitch leadership. If you follow Twitch, the entire leadership is embroiled in the kind of drama you'd expect in a middle or high school. The community is moving to mostly Kick [2] and somewhat to YouTube Gaming. [1] https://decrypt.co/209998/twitch-walks-back-changes-after-surge-nudity-went-too-far https://decrypt.co/209998/twitch-walks-back-changes-after-su... [2] https://kick.com/ https://kick.com/
  - philwelch 3y ago
    > You can't show female-presenting cleavage, for one. They change their "attire policy" on a near-weekly basis…. And they hate anything even remotely sex-related. It seems incomplete to complain about this without also noting that Twitch (along with almost every other social media platform) has increasingly turned into a lead generation platform for OnlyFans. The rules keep changing because the OnlyFans streamers will find whatever line is drawn and absolutely spam the platform with whatever drives traffic to OF.
    - ta8645 3y ago
      Which suggests that a less prudish content policy at Twitch might have kept OnlyFans from ever being created in the first place. They literally drove those consumers away to other platforms, squandering their early and dominant position in the market.
      - hacketthfk 3y ago
        There is a reason porn sites are a separate category and not a section of mainstream sites. I don't want to see porn when I watch news or video games. If I want to see porn, I know where to find it.
        Washuu 3y ago
        During this past Christmas Twitch "meta" I could not even link clips to friends because it would bring up "related" popular clips of what was basically soft core porn. It goes beyond what we want to watch. It affects how I can use and interact with the service to other people.
        echelon 3y ago
        Twitch should de-boost such content. That's the easiest method. Super easy to implement and moderate, no waffling on the rules, users are kept happy.
        philwelch 3y ago
        Much easier said than done. A million camgirls all trying to boost their engagement are going to find ways to game your algorithm faster than you are going to find ways to de-boost them. It’s the same fundamental reason Google is overrun with SEO spam and content farms that they can’t simply “de-boost”.
        corobo 3y ago
        > There is a reason porn sites are a separate category and not a section of mainstream sites. Aye. Payment providers. Porn is "high risk" and the fees for processing payments for it are way higher.
  - Spivak 3y ago
    I think this kind of thing is far far overblown, for the vast majority of streamers these kinds of "internet discourse" dramas don't affect them in any meaningful way. Internet drama is just fuel for the blogspam. It's all money anything else is rage baiting, kick's pull is the revenue split they'll never be able to maintain if they reach critical mass and the policies that get streamers to leave are the ad/revenue split changes.
  - pclmulqdq 3y ago
    Kick allows sexual content and gambling content. Both of those are worth quite a bit for the content creators, the first of which is monetized by driving people to OnlyFans, and the second of which is monetized through incentives and partnerships with gambling sites.
    - boneitis 3y ago
      (I misread parent a bit.) Not to say that you are off, but what people here seem to be glossing over if not wholly overlooking is that Kick is entirely backed by founders of an online casino (quick searching will turn up very quickly who). "partnerships" and "intertwined" that I'm seeing on this submission feel like they are understating it: Kick is owned by a casino. A Harris Heller clip of a pretty thoughtful take, IMO: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QKMnBZ0LlP4&t=423s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QKMnBZ0LlP4&t=423s
  - octacat 3y ago
    It is more tricky to do p2p because not all viewers use stationary PCs nowadays. There are mobiles or wifi users, who cannot be the rebroadcaster nodes. Bittorenty style delivery maybe will work, just with higher delays. Youtube is probably good enough for steamers.
  - bart_spoon 3y ago
    Hate anything remotely sex-related? Are we talking about Twitch? They have changed their policy a billion times because they seem hell-bent on avoiding censoring sexual content as much as the possibly can. It’s the users that inevitably find a way to push the boundaries so far that they are forced do something, that is usually so half-assed that it doesn’t change much. At this point Twitch is getting closer to a cam site that funnels people to OnlyFans than it is to its gaming roots.
- gurchik 3y ago
  Twitch will run preroll ads on your stream unless you elect to run at least 3 minutes of ads per hour. These preroll ads have a huge effect on viewership because new viewers who tune in to an immediate ad will typically just leave. So, these "elective" ads are not very optional. But, this is a lose-lose situation, because these elective ads are very disruptive to viewers too. They are often implemented as a 90 second ad every 30 minutes. If this doesn't sound bad, remember that this is live content. If you're watching an ad, you're missing out on content, and when the ad is over, there's no way to wind it back to see what you missed. Besides the ad policies, the Twitch revenue split for subscriptions has been changing over time. Historically it defaulted to 50/50 and most streamers of any decent size audience would have a contract to be granted 70/30 split. However, the 70/30 split has been phased out and today nearly no streamer on the platform has it anymore. This is a huge difference for streamers. The CEO of Twitch was handing out 70/30 split "coupons" as a prize in a live event[1], it's a big deal. Besides subscription revenue, Twitch is constantly battling to reduce other sources of income, like branded sponsorships. Last year they announced significant restrictions on streamers displaying branded content with sponsors.[2] While these rules were soon reverted, it suggests Twitch is in a fight for its life. All indications point that this is going to continue to be a problem in the future. In short, streamers need to deal with the ads because their revenue from other sources is constantly at threat. 1: https://www.dexerto.com/entertainment/twitch-ceo-surprises-streamers-with-70-30-revenue-split-coupons-on-live-show-2347744/ https://www.dexerto.com/entertainment/twitch-ceo-surprises-s... 2: https://www.theverge.com/2023/6/7/23752437/twitch-new-ad-rules https://www.theverge.com/2023/6/7/23752437/twitch-new-ad-rul...
  - dangus 3y ago
    And here’s the other thing: why doesn’t an Amazon prime subscription remove ads? Is there even a way to buy an ad-free experience? I’m not a heavy Twitch user so maybe I’m wrong but I’m struggling to think of a killer feature of Twitch or an aspect of the overall experience that’s better than YouTube Live videos. At least with YouTube I can watch ad-free with a Premium plan.
    - gurchik 3y ago
      > why doesn’t an Amazon prime subscription remove ads? Is there even a way to buy an ad-free experience? First of all, an Amazon Prime subscription soon won't even remove ads from Amazon Video, so why would it be any different for Twitch? Second of all, a channel subscription (through Amazon Prime or otherwise) removes ads from that channel. If you want an ad free experience across the whole site, Twitch Turbo is $11.99 USD.
ProfessorLayton 3y ago
I personally switched to youtube* for the streams I watch, since twitch's ads can be really disruptive. Not to mention they used to be ad-free for prime members, while at the same time the ad rolls became longer and longer. *I pay for youtube premium
- coffeebeqn 3y ago
  Every streaming platform seems to be converting to adding ads on top to cover the costs. Disney+ just did it for my paid membership - which I cancelled
  - andirk 3y ago
    People need to stop paying for a service and then also paying with their time via ads. Desperate moves like this make me wonder if these companies are regular greedy/shitty or if they're reading from the playbooks of cable TV early 1990s.
hsbauauvhabzb 3y ago
Basing ‘peak’ of a streaming service on a time when people were forced to be indoor seems like a bad metric. They (probably/hopefully) won’t see that rate of growth organically, but that doesn’t mean that it’s the peak.
- Brybry 3y ago
  I was responding to the OP statement (and source with 2021 as the last data point) that "Viewership growth seems good". Lockdowns were in 2020, not 2021. Yes, April 2020 gave a huge bump to Twitch and the pandemic obviously had a large impact on the following years. Twitch had really good growth. But look at the sources I linked. Looks to me like viewership has been down every year since 2021.

by Brybry 3y ago

joegibbs 3y ago

What happened to the ad policy?

echelon 3y ago
You can't show female-presenting cleavage, for one. They change their "attire policy" on a near-weekly basis. Is it exploitative? Empowering? Toxic? Who knows! Everyone argues about everything. Twitch is ban happy with anything even remotely controversial. Things that can be suggestive or comments that can be interpreted as offensive will garner a ban. And they hate anything even remotely sex-related. Honestly, this stuff needs to move P2P. Platforms are indecisive and fickle. Just a month ago, they flip-flopped on their policy in just two days [1]. And it happens time and time again. I don't blame the ad networks (after all Twitter had all of the world government and news orgs plus sex and nudity). I blame the Twitch leadership. If you follow Twitch, the entire leadership is embroiled in the kind of drama you'd expect in a middle or high school. The community is moving to mostly Kick [2] and somewhat to YouTube Gaming. [1] https://decrypt.co/209998/twitch-walks-back-changes-after-surge-nudity-went-too-far https://decrypt.co/209998/twitch-walks-back-changes-after-su... [2] https://kick.com/ https://kick.com/
- philwelch 3y ago
  > You can't show female-presenting cleavage, for one. They change their "attire policy" on a near-weekly basis…. And they hate anything even remotely sex-related. It seems incomplete to complain about this without also noting that Twitch (along with almost every other social media platform) has increasingly turned into a lead generation platform for OnlyFans. The rules keep changing because the OnlyFans streamers will find whatever line is drawn and absolutely spam the platform with whatever drives traffic to OF.
  - ta8645 3y ago
    Which suggests that a less prudish content policy at Twitch might have kept OnlyFans from ever being created in the first place. They literally drove those consumers away to other platforms, squandering their early and dominant position in the market.
    - hacketthfk 3y ago
      There is a reason porn sites are a separate category and not a section of mainstream sites. I don't want to see porn when I watch news or video games. If I want to see porn, I know where to find it.
      - Washuu 3y ago
        During this past Christmas Twitch "meta" I could not even link clips to friends because it would bring up "related" popular clips of what was basically soft core porn. It goes beyond what we want to watch. It affects how I can use and interact with the service to other people.
        echelon 3y ago
        Twitch should de-boost such content. That's the easiest method. Super easy to implement and moderate, no waffling on the rules, users are kept happy.
        philwelch 3y ago
        Much easier said than done. A million camgirls all trying to boost their engagement are going to find ways to game your algorithm faster than you are going to find ways to de-boost them. It’s the same fundamental reason Google is overrun with SEO spam and content farms that they can’t simply “de-boost”.
      - corobo 3y ago
        > There is a reason porn sites are a separate category and not a section of mainstream sites. Aye. Payment providers. Porn is "high risk" and the fees for processing payments for it are way higher.
- Spivak 3y ago
  I think this kind of thing is far far overblown, for the vast majority of streamers these kinds of "internet discourse" dramas don't affect them in any meaningful way. Internet drama is just fuel for the blogspam. It's all money anything else is rage baiting, kick's pull is the revenue split they'll never be able to maintain if they reach critical mass and the policies that get streamers to leave are the ad/revenue split changes.
- pclmulqdq 3y ago
  Kick allows sexual content and gambling content. Both of those are worth quite a bit for the content creators, the first of which is monetized by driving people to OnlyFans, and the second of which is monetized through incentives and partnerships with gambling sites.
  - boneitis 3y ago
    (I misread parent a bit.) Not to say that you are off, but what people here seem to be glossing over if not wholly overlooking is that Kick is entirely backed by founders of an online casino (quick searching will turn up very quickly who). "partnerships" and "intertwined" that I'm seeing on this submission feel like they are understating it: Kick is owned by a casino. A Harris Heller clip of a pretty thoughtful take, IMO: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QKMnBZ0LlP4&t=423s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QKMnBZ0LlP4&t=423s
- octacat 3y ago
  It is more tricky to do p2p because not all viewers use stationary PCs nowadays. There are mobiles or wifi users, who cannot be the rebroadcaster nodes. Bittorenty style delivery maybe will work, just with higher delays. Youtube is probably good enough for steamers.
- bart_spoon 3y ago
  Hate anything remotely sex-related? Are we talking about Twitch? They have changed their policy a billion times because they seem hell-bent on avoiding censoring sexual content as much as the possibly can. It’s the users that inevitably find a way to push the boundaries so far that they are forced do something, that is usually so half-assed that it doesn’t change much. At this point Twitch is getting closer to a cam site that funnels people to OnlyFans than it is to its gaming roots.
gurchik 3y ago
Twitch will run preroll ads on your stream unless you elect to run at least 3 minutes of ads per hour. These preroll ads have a huge effect on viewership because new viewers who tune in to an immediate ad will typically just leave. So, these "elective" ads are not very optional. But, this is a lose-lose situation, because these elective ads are very disruptive to viewers too. They are often implemented as a 90 second ad every 30 minutes. If this doesn't sound bad, remember that this is live content. If you're watching an ad, you're missing out on content, and when the ad is over, there's no way to wind it back to see what you missed. Besides the ad policies, the Twitch revenue split for subscriptions has been changing over time. Historically it defaulted to 50/50 and most streamers of any decent size audience would have a contract to be granted 70/30 split. However, the 70/30 split has been phased out and today nearly no streamer on the platform has it anymore. This is a huge difference for streamers. The CEO of Twitch was handing out 70/30 split "coupons" as a prize in a live event[1], it's a big deal. Besides subscription revenue, Twitch is constantly battling to reduce other sources of income, like branded sponsorships. Last year they announced significant restrictions on streamers displaying branded content with sponsors.[2] While these rules were soon reverted, it suggests Twitch is in a fight for its life. All indications point that this is going to continue to be a problem in the future. In short, streamers need to deal with the ads because their revenue from other sources is constantly at threat. 1: https://www.dexerto.com/entertainment/twitch-ceo-surprises-streamers-with-70-30-revenue-split-coupons-on-live-show-2347744/ https://www.dexerto.com/entertainment/twitch-ceo-surprises-s... 2: https://www.theverge.com/2023/6/7/23752437/twitch-new-ad-rules https://www.theverge.com/2023/6/7/23752437/twitch-new-ad-rul...
- dangus 3y ago
  And here’s the other thing: why doesn’t an Amazon prime subscription remove ads? Is there even a way to buy an ad-free experience? I’m not a heavy Twitch user so maybe I’m wrong but I’m struggling to think of a killer feature of Twitch or an aspect of the overall experience that’s better than YouTube Live videos. At least with YouTube I can watch ad-free with a Premium plan.
  - gurchik 3y ago
    > why doesn’t an Amazon prime subscription remove ads? Is there even a way to buy an ad-free experience? First of all, an Amazon Prime subscription soon won't even remove ads from Amazon Video, so why would it be any different for Twitch? Second of all, a channel subscription (through Amazon Prime or otherwise) removes ads from that channel. If you want an ad free experience across the whole site, Twitch Turbo is $11.99 USD.

ProfessorLayton 3y ago

I personally switched to youtube* for the streams I watch, since twitch's ads can be really disruptive. Not to mention they used to be ad-free for prime members, while at the same time the ad rolls became longer and longer. *I pay for youtube premium

coffeebeqn 3y ago
Every streaming platform seems to be converting to adding ads on top to cover the costs. Disney+ just did it for my paid membership - which I cancelled
- andirk 3y ago
  People need to stop paying for a service and then also paying with their time via ads. Desperate moves like this make me wonder if these companies are regular greedy/shitty or if they're reading from the playbooks of cable TV early 1990s.

hsbauauvhabzb 3y ago

Basing ‘peak’ of a streaming service on a time when people were forced to be indoor seems like a bad metric. They (probably/hopefully) won’t see that rate of growth organically, but that doesn’t mean that it’s the peak.

Brybry 3y ago
I was responding to the OP statement (and source with 2021 as the last data point) that "Viewership growth seems good". Lockdowns were in 2020, not 2021. Yes, April 2020 gave a huge bump to Twitch and the pandemic obviously had a large impact on the following years. Twitch had really good growth. But look at the sources I linked. Looks to me like viewership has been down every year since 2021.