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Up all night with a Twitch millionaire

washingtonpost.com

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Re: Up all night with a Twitch millionaire

#91

Post by rhizome »

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…

>Frankly I don't get why this can't be seen as a legitimate very successful business.

This is going to sound glib, but I honestly think it's because Pinterest hasn't been able to create a comparable (or even marginally similar) business model for its users to capitalize on. Seriously, why isn't Pinterest a big shopping destination? The answer to that will tell us a lot about attitudes toward influencers and e-stars.

Re: Up all night with a Twitch millionaire

#92

Post by claudiulodro »

diognesofsinope wrote: post #22
jedberg wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The same career path as a professional athlete. Some go into commentating, some go into sports management, and most retire broke and have to pick up a whole new career in their late 20s/early 30s.

Bingo -- they struggle through their 20s until they realize they need to pick a practical career in their early 30s.

The skills and experience they've picked up directly translates to a number of "practical" careers: affiliate marketing, social media marketing, PR, community building, video and audio editing, etc. not to mention game-related careers in eSports, game development, etc.

Re: Up all night with a Twitch millionaire

#93

Post by lhorie »

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…

> Imo we should be lauding this brand new sector

I disagree. Twitch/YouTube/TikTok didn't create a new kind of millionaire. They're simply celebrities. The only thing that arguably changed is that content production is so cheap and saturated now that consumers get a lot more choice in terms of who they want to watch, without being constrained by TV schedules and other distribution/logistics limitations.

There is no "new industries", it all still falls under the entertainment industry umbrella, and even the monetization mechanisms are the same old ones (ads, sponsorships, merchandising). By "lauding celebrities", all we're accomplishing is consolidate consumer attention into fewer content production channels, solidifying the position of the platforms where these celebrities operate.

Arguably the only noteworthy thing here is that technology changes and companies that embrace innovation will eat the lunches of those that fail to keep up (e.g. Blockbuster). "Everyone wants to work for FAANG" because a good chunk of the entertainment industry money is flowing there.

Re: Up all night with a Twitch millionaire

#94

Post by munificent »

This article is fascinating for the effects it has on readers.

We likely all understand that one of the toxic forces in our culture today is the compulsive need to turn every story and news article into a clear moral narrative with a pure protagonist and a villainous antagonist. Reality isn't like that at all, and when journalists force reality into that framework, it distorts our perception of the world in unhealthy ways.

But when an article comes out that doesn't do that, that just says "here are some people and what their experience is like", it seems many of us are unprepared to handle it. In the comments here, I see this rorschach-like phenomenon where each reader imagines a morality play, superimposes it on the article, and then gets surprised when others saw something different.

This isn't an acticle about good guys and bad guys, winning and losing, the good or evil of capitalism. It's just a window into one person's life. It's a useful article because this is a kind of person whose life affects many of us—a lot of people here watch popular streamers—but where we have little insight into the whole picture of how that impacts their life.

We should relish journalism like this. There is no need to jump to any moral conclusion. Just witness and understand a bit more about the variety of lives people live today.

Re: Up all night with a Twitch millionaire

#95

Post by sailingparrot »

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…

> 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.

You provide no explanation as to why we should be lauding them. Or are you implying that because someone is a millionaire then we should automatically laud them? Is that what late stage capitalism looks like?

Re: Up all night with a Twitch millionaire

#96

Post by verve_rat »

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.

I'm assuming they were making a comment about the value of classic cars. Some of them could absolutely be a good investment, if, (big, giant, planet sized) if you know what you are doing.

Re: Up all night with a Twitch millionaire

#97

Post by aidenn0 »

mym1990 wrote: post #26
siruncledrew wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If someone is an esports player, it would be hard to stay a professional (in most action games at least) at age 30 simply due to natural wear on your hands and reaction times getting slower.

This doesn't really make sense. Athletes in many sports are playing way past their 'prime' these days and they are wearing out much more than just their hands. Consistently good reaction times are a result of consistent training. Plenty of older baseball/tennis players have superhuman reaction times. I would see mental fatigue and boredom as being the major hurdle to playing esports on a professional level at an olde…

1. Most professional athletes have very short careers.

2. The athletes who do play "past their prime" are usually making up for reduced physical acuity with other skills (e.g. you don't see very many baseball players hit triples after 30).

3. Players with long careers invest a huge amount of time in conditioning, and to a hard-to-measure degree, PEDs.

4. I don't really follow eSports; If someone played Starcraft competitively 20 years ago, are they still playing SC, or do they switch to something else like LoL? What's the typical competitive "lifetime" of a game? If you picked up game-specific skills, it might be harder to apply #2 when the game du-jour changes.

5. As a slight nitpick to the whole conversation, my understanding is that "reaction time" is perhaps a misnomer; the drop in reaction time with age for performing a simple activity appears to be relatively minor, but more complex activities (including habitual ones like driving), which suggests that the performance decline is in selecting and/or executing the proper response to a stimuli rather than what we think of as pure "reaction time"

Re: Up all night with a Twitch millionaire

#98

Post by kubb »

Permit wrote: post #76
kubb wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you really imply that playing the same game over and over again (with some variables but still) is the same as solving programming problems? The game is literally designed to hook you in and make you play one more and one more. You absolutely can autopilot through a game and still win. Don't get me wrong, the guy has a lot of dedication for sure. But playing League all day is really not like coding all day, I don'…

Have you played League of Legends or Dota 2 before? It will be hard to convey the mental/emotional exhaustion that most people feel from playing MOBAs at even a semi-competitive level. In my experience it's a lot different than playing FPS or other games. I have a distinct memory of finishing a game of Dota 2 and realizing that it felt as though I'd just finished a 3 hour exam. I didn't feel happy that we'd won, just…

Yeah I've played League for a bit. It really does get easier the more you play.

By the way, I've just read in the article that Tyler's been on Adderall since first grade, I guess that will help him stay focused.

Re: Up all night with a Twitch millionaire

#99

Post by jeffchien »

npinsker wrote: post #35

This reads as very biased and judgmental. It treats streamers as kids who can't take care of themselves and don't understand the long-term impact of their lifestyle and career choice. It honestly makes me wonder if the author is jealous of the subject. It seems like the piece is really reaching to make Tyler's life appear as irresponsible as possible. Plenty of people in all careers don't know how to run their lives…

I think it's possible to both respect how they got there and their agency, but also feel some mixed feelings about their lifestyles. Especially if you see tyler1 and xqc do 8+/10+ hour streams every day respectively, while taking 1-2 vacations per year.

"Pity" might be too judgemental, but I personally don't envy that lifestyle. It's just like respecting boxers' and NFL players' success, while not wanting to be in their shoes and risk getting killed in the ring or CTE.

Re: Up all night with a Twitch millionaire

#100

Post by thesuitonym »

jrockway wrote: post #67
somerando7 wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you're one of the top streamers, with decent financial literacy, you will easily make enough to retire by 30 if you started streaming at say 20.

But what if you're not one of the top streamers, and you just get 250 viewers a few times a week? I watch a lot of people like that. It seems to pay for room and board, but I worry about their future.

For some people it's a career. For people with ~250 viewers a few times a week...they probably need another job.
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