Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Up all night with a Twitch millionaire

washingtonpost.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

51–60 of 320 posts

Re: Up all night with a Twitch millionaire

#51

Post by Permit »

Streaming aside, tyler1 has an almost inhuman dedication and focus when it comes to League of Legends. On Hacker News it's common to hear that programmers can't work (on classic programming tasks) for more than ~4 hours a day. I also feel exhausted after working for ~4 hours and have always wondered if this was some sort of mental trap I'd fallen into or a genuine limit.

Games like League of Legends require complete focus and attention yet he somehow manages to regularly stream for 10 hours and sometimes reaches peaks of over 30 hours(!!!)[1]. Can you imagine solving leetcode problems (even easy ones) for 30 hours?

In 2020 he paused streaming so he could focus solely on going from Diamond (mid-to-high tier) to Challenger (highest tier). If I recall correctly, he said he would sleep on the couch by his computer, wake up, play and go back to sleep on the couch after ~17 hours.

I don't follow League of Legends (I prefer Dota) but tyler1 has always stood out to me as a person with an incomparable focus and dedication. I haven't seen anything similar in the Dota community and the only programmers that jump to mind would be geohotz or maybe Nick Winter[2].

[1] https://dotesports.com/news/tyler1-marathon-stream-top-lane-...

[2] https://blog.nickwinter.net/posts/the-120-hour-workweek-epic...

Re: Up all night with a Twitch millionaire

#52

Post by short_sells_poo »

munk-a wrote: post #43
bbreier wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

depends on the Ferrari tbh

I can't tell if you're being sarcastic but cars are the definition of an absolutely terrible investment - they might beat out randomly hoping you'll land big on r/wallstreetbets but both are extremely poor investment decisions.

Ordinary cars are a strongly depreciating asset. However, above a certain level this stops being true. I had the fortune to buy, use and subsequently sell a number of higher end cars (Ferrari, Lamborghini) and I made little to no loss on any of them. In fact, the Ferrari 458, which to this day I consider the best supercar to drive, appreciated during the year or so I had it.

Re: Up all night with a Twitch millionaire

#54

Post by belval »

dvt wrote: post #46

Imo we should be lauding this brand new sector and the folks that made it in it. Twitch/YouTube/TikTok literally created a new kind of millionaire. Are we just upset we're also not uber rich for playing video games all day? It's the same with crypto, OnlyFans, and so on. It was the same in '99 with the dot coms. Merely from an economic standpoint, it's interesting to see who these new industries are displacing (since…

The article mentions that Tyler makes $300k per year in merchandise alone (so excluding any actual sponsored content). Frankly I don't get why this can't be seen as a legitimate very successful business. Where is the line? Is entertainment only valid on TV? YouTube?

Some commenters here even said that it's all good now but that it won't work in his thirties or something as if there aren't a ton of jobs out there that feed on young blood that won't be able to keep up later in life.

I completely agree with you, this kind of "this is not a real job" attitude really comes off as people upset that they can't be millionaires at their job.

EDIT: A lot of the comments point out that most people on Twitch/YouTube/OnlyFans don't make money and would be better off getting a "real job". I am not trying to argue against that or say that Twitch is a good job prospect. My point is that if they do succeed in that niche, trying to segment money-making endeavour between "real jobs" and "just a kid playing video games" seems very vain to me. Tyler is making millions providing entertainment, to me that is very much a real job.

Re: Up all night with a Twitch millionaire

#55

Post by kzrdude »

belval wrote: post #54
dvt wrote: post #46

Imo we should be lauding this brand new sector and the folks that made it in it. Twitch/YouTube/TikTok literally created a new kind of millionaire. Are we just upset we're also not uber rich for playing video games all day? It's the same with crypto, OnlyFans, and so on. It was the same in '99 with the dot coms. Merely from an economic standpoint, it's interesting to see who these new industries are displacing (since…

The article mentions that Tyler makes $300k per year in merchandise alone (so excluding any actual sponsored content). Frankly I don't get why this can't be seen as a legitimate very successful business. Where is the line? Is entertainment only valid on TV? YouTube? Some commenters here even said that it's all good now but that it won't work in his thirties or something as if there aren't a ton of jobs out there that…

Not a real job is a quite good stance to take. Because there is an absurd power law at play here, the absolute top make a lot of money. In a "real job" you are paid a living wage, on twitch you are paid scraps if you don't make it to the top.

Re: Up all night with a Twitch millionaire

#56

Post by bsder »

criddell wrote: post #11
jrockway wrote: post #3

What's the career progression for streamers and eSports players, anyway? I feel like everyone that does this now is going to be tired of it in 5 years, and then they're just 30 and without a college degree or job experience.

Do you have the same questions for professional athletes in traditional sports?

Yes.

I'm a proponent of the idea that your athletic scholarship at a Division I-A school should be for "sports degree" and that it should entitle you to come back prepaid for an "academic" 4 year degree when that track runs out.

That would stop a lot of the idiocy we see around "student athletes".

Re: Up all night with a Twitch millionaire

#57

Post by belval »

kzrdude wrote: post #55
belval wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The article mentions that Tyler makes $300k per year in merchandise alone (so excluding any actual sponsored content). Frankly I don't get why this can't be seen as a legitimate very successful business. Where is the line? Is entertainment only valid on TV? YouTube? Some commenters here even said that it's all good now but that it won't work in his thirties or something as if there aren't a ton of jobs out there that…

Not a real job is a quite good stance to take. Because there is an absurd power law at play here, the absolute top make a lot of money. In a "real job" you are paid a living wage, on twitch you are paid scraps if you don't make it to the top.

I am not saying this is a real job prospect. If a kid told me he wanted to be a Twitch streamer I'd say he can't be one, same as professional singer or musician in general.

What I am saying that what Tyler has very much is a real job and successful business. You wouldn't say Taylor Swift is jobless because very few people make it in the pop music world.

Re: Up all night with a Twitch millionaire

#58

Post by munk-a »

short_sells_poo wrote: post #52
munk-a wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can't tell if you're being sarcastic but cars are the definition of an absolutely terrible investment - they might beat out randomly hoping you'll land big on r/wallstreetbets but both are extremely poor investment decisions.

Ordinary cars are a strongly depreciating asset. However, above a certain level this stops being true. I had the fortune to buy, use and subsequently sell a number of higher end cars (Ferrari, Lamborghini) and I made little to no loss on any of them. In fact, the Ferrari 458, which to this day I consider the best supercar to drive, appreciated during the year or so I had it.

It sounds like the cars might have slightly more than broken even on cost for you which sounds like a terrible investment option when you've got everything from real estate to mutual funds that will generally outperform cars - and, much like stock picking, most of the models you purchased didn't significantly appreciate - just one ended up gaining in value.

I suppose I was misinformed in that I thought that cars of all value ranges were pretty disastrous assets to hold - but it sounds like holding on to them for value appreciation still isn't a particularly good tactic.

Re: Up all night with a Twitch millionaire

#60

Post by [deleted] »

munk-a wrote: post #43
bbreier wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

depends on the Ferrari tbh

I can't tell if you're being sarcastic but cars are the definition of an absolutely terrible investment - they might beat out randomly hoping you'll land big on r/wallstreetbets but both are extremely poor investment decisions.

[deleted]
Post reply on HN