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Twitch streamers who spend years broadcasting to no one

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Re: Twitch streamers who spend years broadcasting to no one

#121

Post by JoshCole »

metalliqaz wrote: post #14

What I don't understand about Twitch is how anyone has time to consume this content. When it comes to sitting on your butt and watching something, the traditional TV show is moving to an on-demand model. Twitch is a step in the other direction, where if you faithfully consume content from any Twitch channel, you have to sit down and watch for hours every night when the streamer is online. Who does that? I imagine it'…

A guide to playing many popular games on twitch, written even a few months back, is outdated much faster than even JavaScript framework best practices. As a consequence of this, content which is new has natural advantages over content which is not new. Content even a week old can be so out-dated as to be worthless, not just in theory but frequently in practice. In fact, the strength of the advice and the likelihood that the advice is outdated within a week are actually correlated, because game developers do balance patches.

From these observations, if you assume that people are watching gaming content to learn, you should be able to reduce confusion at the popularity of live content on twitch and start to get an understanding of why Twitch does not represent a step backwards.

Re: Twitch streamers who spend years broadcasting to no one

#122

Post by soundwave106 »

welly wrote: post #97
izzydata wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Trying to win the lottery is not a good life goal.

Is aspiring to being a top Twitch streamer any different than those aspiring to be a top musician, artist or actor? You'd have to be fantastic at your particular game or whatever they stream on Twitch (I know absolutely nothing about this platform) and great at self promotion. Not unlike wanting to be a rock star or movie star. I fail to see how it's any more like a lottery win than being in other forms of media, oth…

It's a little different to me.

At least for music, there are some career fallback options if you really want to pursue that path, but lack the charisma / marketing skills to be a pop lead. Orchestras / Broadway, session musicians, game and film composition, studio work (production / engineer / composer), etc. A lot of these paths actually value technical competence way more than the self promotion necessary for pop music stardom. It's an extremely competitive field, of course, but it's possible to do very well as a musician without necessarily being a pop star. I'm not sure if the equivalent exists for Twitch streamers.

Re: Twitch streamers who spend years broadcasting to no one

#123

Post by Fnoord »

metalliqaz wrote: post #14

What I don't understand about Twitch is how anyone has time to consume this content. When it comes to sitting on your butt and watching something, the traditional TV show is moving to an on-demand model. Twitch is a step in the other direction, where if you faithfully consume content from any Twitch channel, you have to sit down and watch for hours every night when the streamer is online. Who does that? I imagine it'…

Dual monitor setup, minimised tab being effectively audio only, its also an equiv. to an online howto, cheat, or game mag. Don't underestimate how widely popular certain games such as LoL, SC2, PUBG, and many others are. I also suspect numbers are inflated.

Re: Twitch streamers who spend years broadcasting to no one

#125

Post by nicetryguy »

apeace wrote: post #51

I too have met kids who say they want to be a Youtuber or Twitch streamer when they grow up. It makes me sad. I love watching Twitch, and watch 5-7 gamers regularly (almost every night). From what I can tell, most of them: - Are in their mid-20's to early 30's. - Live with their parents. - Make just enough from Youtube/Twitch/Patreon/merch to fund their gaming rigs, buy new games, buy their own food, and maybe pay fo…

I have (had) a twitch channel with a few thousand followers, maybe 50/100 viewers at any given time, doing speedruns. Relatively popular. But it was always just a hobby.

The economics simply don't work. Even if you ascend to the "middle tier". It works out to way less than (american) minimum wage, at best.

I now cringe a bit at the hours and hours i spent there, though i did make some good friends and had great conversations. But it really wasn't the best use of my Late 20s, in the longrun.

It should really only be seen as a hobby, for a few extra bucks on the side, at best, like mowing lawns or other odd jobs. If you think you can make a living, that is both dangerous and delusional thinking.

Re: Twitch streamers who spend years broadcasting to no one

#126

Post by [deleted] »

wott wrote: post #75
metalliqaz wrote: post #14

What I don't understand about Twitch is how anyone has time to consume this content. When it comes to sitting on your butt and watching something, the traditional TV show is moving to an on-demand model. Twitch is a step in the other direction, where if you faithfully consume content from any Twitch channel, you have to sit down and watch for hours every night when the streamer is online. Who does that? I imagine it'…

Reading the answers to your comment is kind of depressing (and that's a depressive speaking :-)).

[deleted]

Re: Twitch streamers who spend years broadcasting to no one

#127

Post by chmars »

metalliqaz wrote: post #14

What I don't understand about Twitch is how anyone has time to consume this content. When it comes to sitting on your butt and watching something, the traditional TV show is moving to an on-demand model. Twitch is a step in the other direction, where if you faithfully consume content from any Twitch channel, you have to sit down and watch for hours every night when the streamer is online. Who does that? I imagine it'…

Many folks are obviously not that busy. Simple TV consumption for example is still a few hours a day … And I am not included in that average, so a lot of folks spend a substantial time of their day with passive screen use.

Re: Twitch streamers who spend years broadcasting to no one

#128

Post by degenerate »

Reedx wrote: post #104
degenerate wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Same boat. I find a chill streamer that doesn't talk much and plays a game I like. I set the TV to 30 minute timer and watch for ~10 minutes before falling asleep. This is similar to people that fall asleep to shows they like -- see https://www.reddit.com/r/Futurama_Sleepers/

Something I'm curious about is where that comes from. Why do people like falling asleep to the TV? Why is it preferred over white noise?

White noise is better than nothing, but my brain won't stop generating content (thoughts) with white noise. When the TV is generating the content, my brain focuses on that, and it's mindless enough to fall asleep to. I think it has something to do with being a mentally active person forced into a passive role, like shifting the brain into low gear.

Re: Twitch streamers who spend years broadcasting to no one

#129

Post by abixb »

xfs wrote: post #114
leviathant wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah. Speaking as someone who ran a rather large fansite about NIN in the 2000s (the entity now basically exists as a Twitter account), you really cannot just "grow organically" on today's internet. I like to tell people I have a marketing allergy. Self-promotion feels gross. The "if you build it, they will come" mantra from Field of Dreams is not applicable to a world where so much more content is being created than…

The question is what can we do about it? Are we stuck in the game of attention engineering forever?

>Are we stuck in the game of attention engineering forever?

More or less. As the content generated exceeds limits of human attention, it is our ability to pay attention that is scarce and much sought after. And I don't see that changing anytime soon.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Attention_economy

Re: Twitch streamers who spend years broadcasting to no one

#130

Post by anoncoward111 »

grogenaut wrote: post #112
metalliqaz wrote: post #14

What I don't understand about Twitch is how anyone has time to consume this content. When it comes to sitting on your butt and watching something, the traditional TV show is moving to an on-demand model. Twitch is a step in the other direction, where if you faithfully consume content from any Twitch channel, you have to sit down and watch for hours every night when the streamer is online. Who does that? I imagine it'…

I work for Twitch but I'll put it in old man terms: I have a subscription to MLB.tv. I watch EVERY SINGLE game of my team each year, that's 162*3 = 486 hours a year. That's 27% of a 1800 hour work year. If you go in season, that's 54%. It's on all day every day that I'm at my work desk. I watch Twitch the rest of the year. Do I watch it intently? No. Do I know the score and what's going on? Generally. Do I feel I fol…

It is really regrettable that humans have this incredibly illogical, subconscious algorithm for making otherwise logical decisions.

Most of the money and capital in this world are held by the older generations rather than the younger generations. The younger generations have to then spend their time "pitching" the older generations on ideas that, in a vacuum, are logical but not evident to the older generations.

As a result, anyone in the younger generations who has a personal relationship with the older generations (such as yourself) will become disproportionately wealthy if their pitch is accepted, compared to say the 27 year old single mother + person of color.

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