A stream is a very different format for content, but that doesn’t necessarily make it worse - only different.

1. As streams are live, anything could happen, so there’s the possibility for unexpected excitement and being a part of that as it happens
2. Live chat can make a stream feel social and connected with other viewers
3. Streams give you the ability to speak to the streamer and change the outcome of the stream

I think that the way people consume content has also changed. A lot of people watch streams “in the background” just as noise while they do other things, not in a way where they are giving the stream their 100% focus in the way you would with a short and well-edited video.

From my view, I enjoy watching Twitch for two main reasons:

1. For the same reason I like watching live sports rather than a 15 minute cut of highlights - the feeling of experiencing events in real time, the payoff of seeing a big play unfold after all the anticipation leading up to it, watching strategies and counter-strategies unfold in real time, that kind of stuff.

2. For the same reason I like watching video essays, stand-up comedy, interview shows, podcasts, or other media where one particular person is the focus - that person is entertaining to me. They have a personality I vibe with, they’re funny, they have an interesting perspective, etc.

To a lesser extent, it’s also nice background noise. I can throw a stream on at the beginning of my workday and not have to fiddle with it until I’m done with work, because it’s a constant, reliable source of background noise.

15 minutes of good content in several hours? You might not be watching the best streams ngl.

As a genXer I don’t get it either. The model at the moment referenced here makes much more sense to me at least. Not understanding twitch is a real marker of shifts in generational mindsets. I think I understand tech, but I wouldnt invest in tech sectors as I clearly don’t have the instinct for it anymore.

Watching someone play video games is straight up younger sibling energy. I don’t get it at all, but I was the older brother.

What makes sense is two things:

1. You can ask questions about the game and get a direct answer, often including someone showing you exactly the thing in the game you asked about.

2. Some streams are genuinely entertaining, such as GTA RP streams. These people mostly aren’t slobbering fat guys (though some are) but are actually working and acting the entire time.

A buddy from college is a somewhat famous twitch streamer. I remember seeing him a few years after college and asking what he was up to, and couldn’t believe he was making any money just streaming himself playing League. My brain couldn’t comprehend who would want to watch that. That was like 10 years ago, and dude is still doing it, and hasn’t worked a real job in a decade. I’m low key jealous AF.

Smaller streams make more sense to me. It’s like a virtual social setting, an old school chatroom, but with a focus of attention, and a guy kind of structuring the whole thing, and a guy who can be engaged with. Occasionally, the streamer can be cool, most of the time they’re kind of a goblin, though, so the good streams are few and far between.

Larger streams don’t make much sense unless you kind of view them as being like, the same appeal as talk radio, or something, because the chat scrolls way too fast and most of it is emotes, so most messages will never get read, and never have anything good to say in the first place. There’s not much of an advantage for any of it to be live content, it just sort of is a relic of the format. Sometimes you get higher production stuff, most of the time it’s just some bald asshole ranting about the prices of things in costco and doing other bad stand up bits.

Edit: Also a big appeal is how brainrotted people are. The focus (I’m generalizing now across all internet platforms) is less on some specific information, and is more on “personality” and appeals like that, because that’s the most sustainable way to pump out a metric ton of content at all times, and algorithms tend to reward when you pump out a ton of content. And so you get a lot of parasocial relationships and non-content, and viewers, frankly, just watch whatever’s in front of them. There’s not a lot of control these platforms, increasingly, give you over what you’re watching anyways, and people aren’t going to keep pulling that skinner’s box lever unless they get a hit at some point. Most of the content ends up being dogshit, so you get a kind of selection for people who enjoy dogshit, and a lack of other options, so people just acclimate to their lack of alternative and become kind of complacent in their environment.

For twitch more specifically, you also basically just get shit that’s meant to only reward people’s dopamine centers, when they get their message read by the streamer, and then they keep pulling the lever on the slot machine over and over multiple times per stream. Either that, right, or you’re getting a lot of people who just don’t have many social relationships, and just want to feel like they’re part of a larger organization, or being, even if it’s totally mindless and meaningless. People who want to “turn off” and just kind of mindlessly be part of the flow of the chat, or what have you. That last part is the brainrot, basically.

Right? The 15 minutes of watching someone else play would even be a challenge for me if I’m actually trying to pay attention. That is the kind of content I barely can do as background noise.

For me it’s that twitch is a lot more personal, at least it used to be.

I met some of my best friends hanging out in smaller streams. That was 8 years ago. We still hang out daily in discord or on twitch when one of them streams.

I much prefer to watch gameplay on twitch. It’s a much more natural way of consuming content vs the super energetic, loud, pushy YouTube videos.

Edited game content provides very little entertainment value to me, while I mostly have streams turned on as background noise and check in occasionally to see what happens.

I’ll never understand how Twitch became as big as a thing as it is.

You already answered that in your comment.

You want to watch videos, not livestreams. Of course a video will be better at being, you know, a video (nicely edited, in short format, etc). A livestream is different for many reasons, none of which interests you apparently.

Nothing wrong with that tbh. It’s just not for you.

But if you give the greasy man $50 he will say your name!!!

If you click “I want to watch mature content” on any profanity stream such as Soda or Summit your feed magically starts filling up with titty streamers.

The notion that you need to seek them out first is false.

You know how people watch videos of master carpenters or cobblers or whatever the fuck do their jobs expertly? This is like that but with videogames instead of building shit.

Alternatively, you know how people watch dumbasses with endearing personalities do whatever the fuck? This is like that. Exactly like that.

I sometimes watch it for games that I think I can learn/improve by watching. Like chess.

me too. honestly I don’t even watch video walk throughs it’s too uncomfortable

It’s the internet post-2014. If you have simply never heard of someone’s particular flavour of BDSM kink before, they take it like you’re attacking them.

Maybe growing up in a warm, costal area makes it more common, but young women just wear similar outfits to most feminine streamers where I’m from. They usually aren’t making a statement about it, it’s just hot outside and they don’t mind showing off. It’s normal.

Some streamers do embody the meme. Some focus cameras on their ass. However, feminine streamers aren’t the majority, and most of them aren’t even that sexual. On a whole, men have more viewers, with almost every top streamer being male.

Part of why the discourse around sexual streamers seems so prudish is that they don’t dominate on twitch. There are a few popular ones, but women don’t even dominate the site; there’s just more of them than in the past. Most feminine streamers aren’t sexual. People see what they want to see.

The only male streamer ever suspended for showing his bare chest was crossdresser. Masculinity is normalized, so femininity is othered.

there are a few in very popular yet casual categories like Overwatch, but yes you have to go into hot tubs to see them and spend time in those streams to get recommended them

As a father who is a linux wizard and knows every single ip our BABIES go to

why are you using a VPN son 😢???

In some countries, porn is banned so they watch this.

Yeah, I do a similar thing with youtube and reddit. I am interested in communities of humans I like curating content and conversations. I am less interested in a robot doing so, even if it wasn’t a crap advertisement and engagement robot.

I am interested in the humans and I find it infuriating how often these websites try to shove what the robots want me to engage with down my throat while hiding access to the humans/communities I am interested in so I always have to click through to see it.

Not interested is very different from disinterested or disgusted.

This single image really rustled your jimmies huh?

Without intentional effort to prevent it, every platform eventually becomes some level of this.

Youtube: remember when they had to scrap “reply” videos because they were all borderline NSFW spam?

Onlyfans: was originally intended to be a platform for fans of fashion, idols, etc. I guess they just embraced it since then.

Tumblr: banned NSFW content because they thought they were becoming a porn site and didn’t want to moderate that.

Reddit: Segregated it and relies on community moderation, because otherwise it’s like half of the front page.

Twitter: it’s still all over, under most popular posts. I don’t know if they moderate it out or not.

The fuck is this comment? Twitch is still 90%+ video games.

You know, I don’t get offended or anything. But it’s impossible to mute / block streamers, and there are some particularly annoying offenders which I just don’t want to see when I open twitch. Just give me the option to filter that out and I won’t complain again.