Jacob Keisler

The Evolution of the Video Game Community: Twitch TV

Video games have always pushed the limits of new technologies. From the beginning
with pong to the newest modern games Which took advantage of technologies like the use of
motion sensors to accurately depict hand movements or the use of 3D to allow for more realistic
world design. There is always going to be a next big thing. Except this time its not just about
one game or gaming system. Its about a place that has every game and every system. Anyone
one can take part and anyone can become as famous as a movie star. Its a community made by
gamers and for gamers. And its become the most popular gaming social media sites on the web.
To most people Twitch TV has little meaning but to a member of the community it is a place to
find entertainment with a common interest, discuss strategies of popular games, and connect with
people from different backgrounds and ethnicities to make a community.
First what it twitch? Twitch is the world's leading video platform and community for
gamers with more than 60 million visitors per month. We want to connect gamers around the
world by allowing them to broadcast, watch, and chat from everywhere they play.(All about
Twitch). Its has a regular maximum viewer count averaging at about 750,000 people per day
on the weekends and 600,000 people per day on weekdays (Stats). Its a place to go for any
gaming need. Especially for entertainment. With every person with an account able to stream
there isnt a limited amount of content.
What I observed was that there are 2 types of successful streamers with success defined
as 1,000 plus views. Ones who are really good with a game and end up only playing that game.
Most professional gamers fall under this category. There game play is watched because its one
of the best so the entertainment value is in how well the streamer does. Most of them dont talk
unless they give a tip about a game. Then theres the ones that arent very good gamers but what
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they dont have in gameplay they have in sociability and unique personalities. The most viewed
streams at 70,000 viewers are just normal people that started recording themselves playing video
games (Stats).

With new games coming out weekly it becomes costly quick so Austin Feather, an
regular Twitch viewer, along with others had a common response to why they watch twitch I
dont Have to actually buy the game, I can watch it pretty much as I would play it I assumed
twitch was only for entertainment but it also has other benefits like helping gamers safe money
while also showing a gamer what to expect from a game.
Electronic sports better known as Esports is another huge part of Twitch TV. Twitch
hosts multiple professional events including StarCraft II World Championship Series, League of
Legends Championship Series, DreamHack, The International Dota 2, Evolution Championship
Series, and Electronic Sport League just to name a few of the well-known ones (Twitch). With
every event they host theres a cash prize for example the Dota 2 tournament for 2013 had a
$2,874,380 as prize pool. This years the prize pool is $15,247,068. The winning team members
each receive $1,000,000 cash (Dota2). The size of prizes pools increasing in a year by
$13,000,000 gives a perfect forecast to the growth of Esports and professional gaming scene.
Many professional players stream on twitch while they arent at tournaments. Which allows you
to communicate with the gaming celebrities and to view how high level play is obtained on a 1
on 1 kind of way.

Jacob Keisler

Another aspect to twitch is that it involves multiple groups of people from different parts
of the world. At any given time I was able to talk to someone from California to someone from
South Korea. For that as an example I was able to experience 2 different cultures while we tuned
in and watched some random person play video games. The community of a stream is extremely
irreplaceable. Every stream has its own group of people and following.
Depending on how large the fan base of a channel, another name for stream, they will
have a Subscription button. A viewer can pay $5 to get special privileges for that channel, this
created a divide between the chat, the people that paid and the people that didnt (Twitch.tv).
This separation creates another Subculture within the chat. I witnessed several times people that
subscribed would gang up on the people that didnt and vice versa. What I understand for the
subscriptions is that people want to subscribe so that they can be a part of the group.
The chat allowed for the stream to be interactive. Its created an interdependence between
the streamer and viewer. The streamer asked what to do at certain parts of a mission if maybe
they were suck or asked the viewers what they should play that particular day which gave me a
cool feeling knowing I could have been the one to motivate a person to do an action while
thousands of people were watching. On occasion the streamers would play with viewers and
other times have giveaways.
Another monetary way for viewers to Thank the streamer were through donations.
Viewers donated between $2 and $20. While donating to the channel, messages from the
donating would be displayed on the stream. Most of the messages were of saying how much they
enjoyed it or words of encouragement or thanking for a fun night of streaming, or they would
reference some funny moment earlier in the stream. The channels were able to connect me to

Jacob Keisler

many different people with different backgrounds while also giving me an opportunity to be a
part of a group of people that supports the streamer with a subscription.
After spending so much time on watching these streams I discovered a few flaws. One
are the donations. The idea of donations in small numbers is maybe reasonable. A kind of tip,
just like you tip a street preform or a band in a restaurant. Except not all donations were in small
amounts. A popular streamer named Summit1g had two of his viewers go into a donation
battle. The end result was both the donators stopped at $20,000 each (YouTube). The outrages
donations show the lack of economic knowledge the two donators have and it worries me that
someone would spend a very large sum of money to get essentially nothing. The next two
involve the viewer somehow obtaining the streamers IP address either by hacking him or if the
streamer leaks it by accident. The first is an attack called a DDOS which a temporarily interrupt
or suspend any use of the Internet. Basically its a network pinging another network except it
does it so much it stops all other traffic (SearchSecurity). So now the stream is shut down until
the streamer changes there IP. The next one uses an IP to address tool to find the streamers home
address. The attack is called Swatting its were the viewer precedes to call the local police and
make what seems like a very real 911 call and tell them the address of the streamer. Then swat
shows up and raids the house. Its happened so many times too popular streamers that they have
to make special calls to the streamers make sure its a real threat (Austin).
The Twitch community that has become part of gaming culture continues to show how
entertaining the game playing and game streaming can be. It lets the common gamer connect to
and learn from the gaming celebritys and professions while also being the platform for todays
modern gaming communities were its more about interdependence and the viewer than anything
else. Even though there are a few flaws in the community I believe its still going to flourish and
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should be a good example of for communities to follow while taking the unusual leap to the
modern world.

All about Twitch. Twitch. n.p n.d Web. 14 Nov. 2014.

http://www.twitch.tv/p/about

http://stats.twitchapps.com/

http://www.twitch.tv/year/2013

Jacob Keisler

http://dota2.cyborgmatt.com/prizetracker/

http://www.studentpulse.com/articles/821/2/evolution-of-the-gaming-experience-live-videostreaming-and-the-emergence-of-a-new-web-community

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4wY03K7LrbM

http://searchsecurity.techtarget.com/definition/distributed-denial-of-service-attack