1k True Fans? Try 100 (2020)

Games rely a lot on the one-time / tip model through Twitch.

Podcasts are almost exclusively through recurring subscriptions / support.

My impression of video / YouTube is that a lot of it comes through stuff like merch which is more of a drip of one-time support, but there's definitely continual support there as well, so a bit mixed?

I suspect that it would be hard to experiment too far outside of the standard in any of those contexts, since you'd have to convince people to support you in ways that aren't the norm.

You're pedantically nitpicking again, when you clearly understood that I was paraphrasing to highlight the obvious inflammatory intent behind your blatantly disparaging remarks. You're concocting confrontation. You even just edited your comment to include more disparaging commentary and suggestions that I'm ignorant of the existence of a group of people. All you did (before editing your comment) is claim that I don't know things because your extremely limited personal anecdotes somehow outweigh my professional experience, which is the definition of inflammatory behavior.

> Which is core to the arguments and the error major not minor. Companies like Twitch have multiple high-cost options

The core argument made by the OC was that "the vast majority of super fans" are "socially dysfunctional" and "companies pushing this have all the data and know exactly what's going on, but market to this demographic anyway." The suggestion here is that these companies are nefariously encouraging people to donate higher amounts. When in reality, the functionality to gift groups of subs isn't even visible by default on Twitch and the user needs to go out of their way to switch to the gift subs tab, before consciously deciding to click at the bottom of the list of amounts, which also requires scrolling on some mobile screen sizes before you can even see the higher amounts.

So, no, the higher-cost items are, in fact, not "pushed" or "marketed" as the OC or you suggest, which makes your entire argument a nitpick. All you did was mention that a thing existed, without providing any context or evidence as to how it's exploitative or how it could even be considered marketing. Twitch even makes a point in the site's verbiage of labeling any subs larger than $5 as "going above and beyond," which makes clear that even moderate amounts are more than is expected of the user. Again, the existence of functionality does not constitute nefarious behavior -- it doesn't even qualify as "marketing," and it definitely doesn't qualify as "exploiting dysfunctional users."

> Super Fans donate hundreds of dollars per action to streamers who are sometimes making millions per year. This is not the "I'm tier 3 for my favorite streamer so they can stay full time" crowd it's the "I'm top bit donator/sub gifter on a top channel" crowd. I consider myself part of the former hobby/support group but I can't see any way to construe the latter group as part of the same hobby either. I'm open to hearing ways that whale segment could be though if you'd be willing to expound

Super fans are not exclusive to million dollar streamers, so you're using a rare example to make generalizations which are not reflective of the overall industry or culture. The existence of a personality type which seeks attention by donating large amounts to see themselves on a leaderboard where thousands (or tens of thousands) of people are watching, does not magically mean that applies to all donors and, in fact, applies to so few donors that your argument really has no foundation.

For one of thousands of examples I could provide, a relatively small streamer I worked with has an average viewership of less than 150 per stream. Yet, roughly 20% of their regular viewers contribute more than $100/mo, with several over $500/mo, and exactly zero of them are doing it for attention -- a fact, given that there is no leaderboard and they receive no acknowledgement verbally or via overlays. In reality, most large contributors prefer to do so anonymously anyway, and streamers typically make a point of communicating with those supporters to ensure that larger donations aren't risking their financial well-being.

> Not working with folks that try to get this type of viewer to press this button multiple times per months is a fantastic thing not something to get inflamed about. At the same time it doesn't mean these types of streamers and fans don't exist just because you don't work with them and clearly they do exist or Twitch wouldn't have bothered to make all of these types of options and fancy effects and the aforementioned bad example streams wouldn't have them triggered constantly.

I'm genuinely interested in how/why this is being taken as disparaging or concocting confrontation. It's not intended to be so at all but often on the internet plain text can be interpreted many different ways, maybe ways I can't see from my point of view alone. Regardless, apologies if anything has come across as being written to incite confrontation.

Nothing I've talked to is about my personal experience vs your professional experience or anecdotes though, it's been about what is factually on the site and available for all to see. I do have some personal anecdotes I could bring but I haven't as I like to stay away from them when possible. Them same avoidance can be given as well to relying on any experience, be it personal or professional, when the information itself is readily available.

In general if there is something you find nitpicking, confrontational, disparaging, inflammatory, or so on I'd greatly appreciate if you could provide an example of what and how it could have been better worded to focus on the content. As it stands now I'm having a hard time distilling what or how you're expecting things to be different, just that you seem extraordinarily unhappy with every comment I make.

> The core argument made by the OC was that "the vast majority of super fans" are "socially dysfunctional" and "companies pushing this have all the data and know exactly what's going on, but market to this demographic anyway." The suggestion here is that these companies are nefariously encouraging people to donate higher amounts. When in reality, the functionality to gift groups of subs isn't even visible by default on Twitch and the user needs to go out of their way to switch to the gift subs tab, before consciously deciding to click at the bottom of the list of amounts, which also requires scrolling on some mobile screen sizes before you can even see the higher amounts.

On the contrary these things are extremely visible and advertised. Popping into a top Twitch stream right now with an incognito tab these are the things I see right away:

- The top gifters for the week are pinned to the top of the chat. The number 1 place has a large golden gift box with a 1 in it followed by their name and gift count (which is near 500)

- High spend actions result in ever more exclusive emotes next to names such as having max tier subscription and being the top gifter resulting in very elaborate icons while cheap actions like prime sub very plain ones. This is made apparent by these displaying by default next to every message these users type (both an advertisement and incentive system)

- High spend actions place themselves in chat with links to how you yourself can do the same thing

- Hype trains also appear on the page with much fanfare pushing the use of gifts and bits. These give exclusive emotes and individual callouts as well.

- Once subscribed (at any level) the gift sub button is actually displayed by default on the page and the section does list the $499.00 option by default. Hidden would be the $999.00 options for tier 2/tier 3 gifting I haven't even mentioned.

- Many of these are mirrored for bits

And these are just the things from Twitch itself, not the things Twitch is fine with streamers adding on top. On the flipside the strongest action you can do without spending money is highlight a message.

Marketing pushes aside though I also disagree with the premise that marketing is even central to whether it means it's not exploitative or not, to me it just makes it even more nefarious as a whole. Simply having a 100 gift sub button in the UI, well hidden and never mentioned otherwise, is still extremely hard to justify as anything but exploitative. There are very few select cases $499 is reasonable in one month let alone needs to be available in one purchase flow and Twitch is well aware it's being used more often than could ever be attributed to non-exploitative cases so I argue the existence itself is nefarious, before even getting into the whole incentive system built around it.

> Super fans are not exclusive to million dollar streamers, so you're using a rare example to make generalizations which are not reflective of the overall industry or culture. The existence of a personality type which seeks attention by donating large amounts to see themselves on a leaderboard where thousands (or tens of thousands) of people are watching, does not magically mean that applies to all donors and, in fact, applies to so few donors that your argument really has no foundation.

Million dollar streamers are the stealman case. One can still find this type of "Super Fan" in many other streams, no need to rely on generalization, but the example makes for a case where it's easy to show the exploitation is well known and large in scale.

Also the conversation was never about all "donors", from the beginning it was about "the vast majority of Super Fans are not buying courses or supporting the development of content". Disagree or not with the statement it never made claims every single

> For one of thousands of examples I could provide, a relatively small streamer I worked with has an average viewership of less than 150 per stream. Yet, roughly 20% of their regular viewers contribute more than $100/mo, with several over $500/mo, and exactly zero of them are doing it for attention -- a fact, given that there is no leaderboard and they receive no acknowledgement verbally or via overlays. In reality, most large contributors prefer to do so anonymously anyway, and streamers typically make a point of communicating with those supporters to ensure that larger donations aren't risking their financial well-being.

Sounds like a well built community :). Unfortunately even * 1000 these numbers pale in comparison and don't exactly line up with the "dump their life savings or steal a family member or relative's credit card" type users described in the GP, both in strength and volume, to the large stream examples and do not set what the majority is. The leaked Twitch payout data is a great example of this, a small handful of streams make the majority not the long tail of thousands.

Edit clarification: Remembered hard Twitch payout data was leaked and added a note on how you could help me with the items felt confrontational.

I'm trying to take your word that you don't mean to disparage, but I don't see another interpretation for what you've said. You suggested that I'm not aware of basic Twitch functionality (when I clearly am), then claimed that I must not have knowledge of the subject because the streamers I work with "by definition" don't have super fans (even though they clearly do), then claimed I said super fans don't even exist (though I never so much as remotely hinted it), then repeated the claim that I don't work with anyone who has super fans (even after explicitly telling you they do).

All of those things (and some that I left out) are disparaging, and the entire premise of your commentary has been that your perspective as a viewer can be applied to the entirety of the content creation industry as an absolute and indisputable fact, but that my perspective as a viewer, streamer and consultant strictly applies to a unique subset of streamers whom I've personally worked with -- because apparently I exclusively find the extremely rare streamers and whales who aren't part of "the vast majority" involved in an "exploitative" industrial complex, even though that would be a statistical impossibility. So, when you say "nothing I've talked to is about my personal experience vs your professional experience," that's patently untrue. It's the basis for everything you've said.

> Simply having a 100 gift sub button in the UI, well hidden and never mentioned otherwise, is still extremely hard to justify as anything but exploitative.

At the end of the day, you're attempting to perpetuate the completely false notion that "the vast majority" of large donors are "dysfunctional" and being "exploited." You witness people donate large amounts and for some reason automatically assume exploitation, but you have no actual evidence or justification for that assumption other than it seeming like a lot of money to you, personally. Unless you're a professional psychologist who analyzed these people, you don't get to declare that "the vast majority" of any population are mentally unwell or being exploited -- especially when your only knowledge of the situation is that you saw strangers push buttons on a website. That's not situational knowledge of anything.

In reality, there are magnitudes more large donors who contribute to be supportive and out of appreciation for the streamers time and talents. Some fans will spend 100+ hours per month watching a particular streamer, so if they can afford to donate $1,000, that works out to paying $10/hr for entertainment, which is less than many hobbies. Yet, I don't see you making claims that people who spend lots of money on other forms of entertainment are exploited -- just this particular industry, and for reasons you haven't actually articulated.

And that's all still ignoring the fact that your perceived observations do not apply to the content creation industry as a whole, or even the majority of it. When I tell you that what you're describing can't be applied to the nearly 1,000 whales I've personally communicated with over the past few years, it makes no sense for you to double down on a blanket generalization that "the vast majority" of streamers are exploitative and large donors are being exploited, because even basic math doesn't back your argument.

> On the contrary these things are extremely visible and advertised.

You listed the basic concept of subscriptions and rewards as evidence for nefarious activity and exploitation. That's rather silly, and I'm not going to engage with it.

> Also the conversation was never about all "donors", from the beginning it was about "the vast majority of Super Fans are not buying courses or supporting the development of content". Disagree or not with the statement it never made claims every single

Please stop making pedantic nitpicks. I've literally quoted "the vast majority" a dozen times in these comments, and you're choosing to pick a single instance where I generally referred to them as donors for the sake of brevity within a long sentence, which itself is inside a paragraph specifically about super fans and even started with the words "super fans." You know exactly what I was referencing, and that you continue to turn these false nitpicks into full arguments is both exhausting and starting to resemble gaslighting.