Up all night with a Twitch millionaire • Hacker News Board

Re: Up all night with a Twitch millionaire

#171

Post by jackothy » Sat, Dec 11, 2021, 12:35 AM UTC

paulpauper wrote: post #135

lhorie wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 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 "…

it is different. the old celebrities were chosen by media execs, who wielded all the power. now the audience decides.

That is partially true but not entirely. Twitch still has a somewhat strict TOS and regularly bans streamers. The audience is not always allowed to watch what they want. I'm guessing this is because Twitch needs to be advertiser friendly.

Re: Up all night with a Twitch millionaire

#172

Post by jayd16 » Sat, Dec 11, 2021, 12:36 AM UTC

slightwinder wrote: post #167

lhorie wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 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 "…

> I disagree. Twitch/YouTube/TikTok didn't create a new kind of millionaire. They're simply celebrities. Yes and no. They are celebs, but definitely a new style of celebs. They are your average Joe, with barely any special skill. They could be your neighbor or the dude next to you in a supermarket, and you wouldn't know. Furthermore, they are millionaire working from home, growing from home, with average equipment an…

>They are your average Joe, with barely any special skill.

Their skill is usually something like live broadcasting and/or interviewing depending on the streamer as well as brand marketing.

It's essentially the further democratization of talk shows, right?

Re: Up all night with a Twitch millionaire

#173

Post by slightwinder » Sat, Dec 11, 2021, 12:37 AM UTC

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…

People are generally upset when people succeed with evil deeds. And those new millionaires are often walking a very fine line between good and evil. The amount of trash they sell and scams they do is insane. And even the good ones still play on psychological mechanism, which can be questionable.

Not saying that we should despise them all by default, but one should be very aware of the mechanism and plays of those people and not blindly accept everything. It's an entertaining space, but also a dangerous one. And that too many young people fuel this industry is a problem IMHO.

Re: Up all night with a Twitch millionaire

#174

Post by lhorie » Sat, Dec 11, 2021, 12:38 AM UTC

notJim wrote: post #157

lhorie wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 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 "…

In addition to what others have said, I think the fact that people can make a living from very very niche content is novel. Arguably, it works so differently that it could be considered a new sector. > 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. I think you're on p…

I mean, cable was already in the niche catering business in the 90s. Gordon Ramsay or Jacques Cousteau or Mythbusters are all quite niche IMHO. I'd be willing to acknowledge that the existence of gaming/mukbang/etc content creators nowadays is merely the entertainment industry catching up with the fact that the world is a lot more vast (and dare I say mundane) than TV would have you believe.

As for platform power and user choice, I think people have a misconception about how much "power" they have, considering that search results and recommendations are entirely at the mercy of the companies that provide them and they're very much aggregated by user profiles, much like cable had "hundreds of options" that are in actuality largely curated to target audiences.

There are a variety of niche old videos that I can no longer find on youtube. The long tail does disappear for no rhyme or reason (actually, if you understand the logistics of live/cold storage and the scale at which youtube operates at, it totally makes sense). It certainly isn't like the napster days where you could in fact find that one ultra rare file that only one person in the world was seeding.

As for content creator mobility, I don't consider twoset's presence on tiktok any more novel than hollywood getting into home video. Content creators and distributors interests' don't always align and there has never been an actual monopoly on distribution channels, even despite the existence of large media conglomerates. It's just the individual players that are different, IMHO.

Re: Up all night with a Twitch millionaire

#175

Post by dathinab » Sat, Dec 11, 2021, 12:40 AM UTC

Permit wrote: post #51

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…

I don't think leetcode problems are a good example.

But I have worked (programmed) two 9h days without sleeping in-between before and it worked somehow well???

Through normally I often have problems working 8h a day without taking a fairly long lunch brake.

But then sometimes I just went 10h with close to no brakes (some ad-hock food) without even realizing it.

It's still puzzles me what makes the difference.

Re: Up all night with a Twitch millionaire

#176

Post by antisthenes » Sat, Dec 11, 2021, 12:50 AM UTC

slightwinder wrote: post #167

lhorie wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 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 "…

> I disagree. Twitch/YouTube/TikTok didn't create a new kind of millionaire. They're simply celebrities. Yes and no. They are celebs, but definitely a new style of celebs. They are your average Joe, with barely any special skill. They could be your neighbor or the dude next to you in a supermarket, and you wouldn't know. Furthermore, they are millionaire working from home, growing from home, with average equipment an…

> They are your average Joe, with barely any special skill.

Absolutely, provably false.

It takes a lot of skill to constantly produce content at the rate that millionaire twitch streamers do. Most of them own youtube channels as well, which requires additional time to process, edit, and mix videos, depending on what they're doing with it.

It also takes a high level of creativity in order to come up with new ideas for streams, keep the audience engaged while playing the same game for hundreds of hours on end. This means doing giveaways, interacting with the audience without offending them, planning contests, negotiating advertising deals with game-makers for promo-streams, etc. etc.

It's an incredibly demanding gig, that, at the very least, requires a pretty insane schedule, or being really passionate about the job. Most people would burn-out at their rate, and a lot actually do.

Maybe some streamers get help in production and orchestrating their stream, but for most it's more than a full-time job commitment.

Those average Joes you mentioned? They get 1-2 viewers, who are usually their closest friends. This the skill ceiling for "barely any special skill" people. If they stream a game that just came out, they may break 10 viewers once in a while. That's about it.

Re: Up all night with a Twitch millionaire

#177

Post by slightwinder » Sat, Dec 11, 2021, 12:53 AM UTC

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…

> 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.

This is more or less what many streamers are saying about it too. And most streamers are eager to get out of this self-destructive lifestyle with age. Streaming is a though gamble, and most are losing it. Educating about the harsh price of this is good and necessary, and the article is pretty fair there IMHO.

Re: Up all night with a Twitch millionaire

#178

Post by jay_kyburz » Sat, Dec 11, 2021, 1:01 AM UTC

belval wrote: post #57

kzrdude wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

If my kid told me they wanted to be a twitch streamer I would advise them against investing a significant amount of time and effort building a business with a single gatekeeper.

If they wanted to be a famous personality, I would insist they start building a profile on every platform.

Re: Up all night with a Twitch millionaire

#179

Post by MrStonedOne » Sat, Dec 11, 2021, 1:02 AM UTC

dathinab wrote: post #139

I think it's totally ridiculous that some are treating this at "not a real job". It just shows that many people do not understand what is going one at all. Sure it's a form of "entertainer" job, but actress, synchron speaker or comedian are also real jobs. And no one would go and say "oh say just need to say some lines on stage so it's not a real job". It's not at all as simple as "just playing games in front of came…

A real job is one where a boss can arbitrarily fire you so that you learn to respect your elders and anybody who doesn't have a real job is bypassing the critical societal conditioning step and should be shamed.

-some old fucks. probably

Re: Up all night with a Twitch millionaire

#180

Post by tinus_hn » Sat, Dec 11, 2021, 1:06 AM UTC

slightwinder wrote: post #152

kzrdude wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

To give some numbers: There are more than 10 millions Streamers on Twitch, of which 5 millions are streaming regularly. The top 10_000 of them earns barely minimum wage or more. The Top 1000-5000 is earning some decent money on middle-class-level and the millionairs-club is around Top 100. And these numbers are globally, meaning all streamers from all countries. So we are still talking about an absurd low number of p…

A service that makes 100 users a millionaire is a low number? And by the way, there is no way to know how much people are really making because they not only get money through Twitch but also through tip systems, merchandise, promotion, sponsors and other revenue generating activities.