Twitch

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Globe icon of the infobox
Twitch
Website logo
Live streaming portal for video games
languages 28, including German and English
operator Amazon.com, Inc.
Registration optional - required to follow channels, post comments, and live stream yourself
On-line June 6, 2011 (currently active)
https://www.twitch.tv/

Twitch , also Twitch.tv ( stylized as twitch ) is a live streaming - video portal , the priority for the transmission of video games is used.

history

After Justin.tv opened , the site and the video game category in particular grew rapidly. Therefore, the creators of the streaming portal created the sister site Twitch, which should only be used for video games and e-sports broadcasts. Twitch was released in a beta version in June 2011 .

On May 1, 2012, Twitch won a Webby Award entitled Webby People's Voice Award in the Video Games category.

In 2013, Twitch had more than 45 million viewers per month on 6 million streaming channels. As a result, the company that operates Justin.tv and Twitch was renamed from Justin.tv Inc. to Twitch Interactive Inc. in February 2014 .

In 2014, Amazon acquired the company for $ 970 million.

Twitch is also used by various specialized programs used by over video game - and e-sports to report themes. The German-language broadcaster ESL TV broadcasts its program on Twitch.

According to data from US company DeepField, Twitch generated approximately 1.8% of corporate Internet traffic in the United States during peak daytime hours in February 2014 . This puts the service in fourth place, behind Netflix , Google and Apple .

In early 2014, Twitch published many statistics about the previous year. Among other things, it was revealed that the 45 million viewers watched 12 billion minutes of Twitch content every month. That was doubling compared to 2012. The average age of the audience is 21 years.

To mark the 73rd birthday of the painter Bob Ross , Twitch launched the Creative format on October 29, 2015 with a nine-day marathon of all episodes of The Joy of Painting . The format should encourage artists to transfer their ideas to the web in real time .

On August 17, 2016, Twitch took over the Curse Gaming service . Its most important services, Gamepedia, and the Curse client, management software for game modifications, were then fully integrated into the Twitch brand.

On September 30, 2016, Twitch announced the Twitch Prime service for Amazon Prime customers with an active subscription. The service includes selected free games, game content ("Game Loot") and the option to subscribe to any streamer free of charge every month. In the beginning, the ad-free viewing was included, but this was removed at a later date.

On December 15, 2016, Twitch introduced the IRL ("In Real Life") category , which allows the audience to share events from one's own life and to conduct discussions. A reference to video games is not absolutely necessary as long as the audience is actively addressed. Since the German-speaking science fiction author Tom Hillenbrand did not want to cancel his reading tour due to the Corona crisis in March 2020, he moved it to Twitch without further ado.

Twitch shows mostly member-created content. However, the company also broadcasts professionally produced streams from large e-sports organizers. According to media reports, Twitch paid 90 million dollars for the streaming rights of the Overwatch League in early 2018.

In December 2018, Twitch sold the online game portal Curse Media to Wikia .

The site was in 2019 worldwide on the 26th Alexa rank. In Germany it ranks 23rd. The majority of users come from the United States of America .

On October 9, 2019, the perpetrator of the attack in Halle (Saale) broadcast his act live on Twitch.

Content and use

Each user with a user account can create their own channel and transfer gameplay from various games to it. Streaming software such as XSplit or Open Broadcaster Software is required for transmission . PlayStation 4 and Xbox One do not require any additional software.

The most popular games include Fortnite , League of Legends , Overwatch , Dota 2 , StarCraft II , World of Warcraft , Counter-Strike: Global Offensive , Hearthstone: Heroes of Warcraft and Minecraft . Many major esports events are also broadcast on Twitch. These include the League of Legends World Championships and the League Championship Series , the Dota 2 tournament The International , the StarCraft II World Championship Series , the world's largest LAN party DreamHack and the Intel Extreme Masters .

Twitch has a variety of emoticons , specifically called "emotes". There are freely available emotes for all users, emotes for turbo users, emotes for Twitch Prime users, and emotes for users who have subscribed to a Twitch partner or affiliate. In 2015, Kappa was the most used emote on Twitch. It denotes irony or sarcasm. Streamers with Twitch partner status unlock more “emote slots” depending on how many subscribers they win, up to a maximum of 50 emotes per channel.

Affiliate program

In July 2011, Twitch opened an affiliate program similar to that of YouTube . For a partnership, streamers have to stream regularly and, according to Twitch, have an "existing and constantly growing viewer community", an exact number of viewers is not given. These partners have the opportunity to display advertisements in their streams. In return, the partner receives part of the advertising income that is generated in this way. Additionally, viewers can subscribe to partner channels for $ 4.99, $ 9.99, or $ 24.99 per month . In June 2016, another way to support streamers was introduced with Cheering . So-called bits can be purchased for real money and donated to the streamer via a message in the chat.

In 2015, of the more than 2,100,000 streamers in peak months, 13,476 were active partners. That is 0.64% of all streamers.

Affiliate program

In addition to the partner program, there has been an affiliate program since April 2017. This is intended for smaller streamers who, due to their small size, do not meet the requirements for a partnership. Streamers in this program are given the opportunity to use Cheering, which was otherwise only available to partners. In addition, subscriptions have been available to streamers in the affiliate program since June 27, 2017. In addition, like partners, "affiliates" can place advertisements. To be invited to the affiliate program, one must meet the following criteria:

  • At least 500 total minutes transferred in the last 30 days
  • At least seven individual transmission days in the last 30 days
  • Average of three simultaneous viewers or more in the last 30 days
  • At least 50 followers

In addition, companies in the gaming industry also offer programs to support small streamers.

Extensions

Since September 1, 2017, livestreamer can use extensions , through which they can add various interactive functions to their transmission. Creators integrate these new extensions right into their live videos on Twitch. This promotes the special relationship between them and their community.

Applications

Twitch Sings

In early 2019, Twitch released its own karaoke application called Twitch Sings. This application enables users of the platform to select songs from a defined song catalog and then sing them live in front of an audience via a live stream. Twitch paid particular attention to the interaction of the users with the live streamer within the application, so the audience can use a specially developed extension to pose a variety of challenges to the singer, such as singing the song in dog sounds.

Twitch Studio

Twitch Studio is a recording and live streaming program that was released in beta on November 12, 2019 for Windows . It was developed because programs like Open Broadcaster Software were too complicated to get started easily for newbies. Twitch itself says that the program is only for newbies and that it is not necessary to change the program as an experienced live streamer. Twitch Studio is only live streaming on Twitch.

The fact that a few designs are already integrated, you do not have to enter your stream key and because "Twitch Alerts" are integrated, many complicated things in the program are simplified. It is possible for anyone to quickly start live streaming. A chat and an activity feed of the live stream are also integrated into the program.

Subscriptions

On Twitch there is the possibility to subscribe to streamers, provided they are a Twitch partner or Twitch affiliate. There are three different subscription options. You can subscribe for € 4.99, € 9.99 or € 24.99. A subscription English. Subscription , or Sub for short , has a number of advantages for the viewer: They get a badge in front of the name in the chat of the streamer with whom the subscription was concluded. He also gets emoticons that are exclusively reserved for the streamer's subscribers. The number of emoticons varies based on the number of subscriptions the streamer has. In 2016, Twitch announced at TwitchCon that you can subscribe to one streamer per month for free with Amazon Prime. In 2017, Twitch announced at TwitchCon that subscriptions can now also be given away. This feature has been on the market since November 2017; Since April 2018, a user who gives away a sub has received a gift icon in front of the name. Since August 2018 it has been possible to give away multiple subs to the streamer's community at the same time. These subs are randomly given to people who are currently watching the live stream. It is possible to give away up to 100 subs at the same time. There is also the option to give away subs anonymously.

TwitchCon

TwitchCon is an annual meeting of the live streaming - video portal Twitch. The first conference was held in 2015.

2015

The first TwitchCon was held at the Moscone Center  in  San Francisco from September 25th to 26th. A number of keynotes were announced by CEO Emmett Shear. The Finnish DJ Darude was a guest at the aftershow party . The entire meeting was streamed on Twitch.

2016

On February 18, 2016, Twitch announced the second TwitchCon. It was held at the San Diego Convention Center from September 30th to October 2nd.

2017

TwitchCon 2017 took place in the Long Beach Convention Center  from October 20th to 22nd.

2018

TwitchCon 2018 took place October 26-28 at the San Jose McEnery Convention Center.

2019

On November 21, 2018, Twitch announced the first TwitchCon in Europe . This took place from April 13th to 14th in the CityCube Berlin . In addition to the TwitchCon in Berlin , another took place in San Diego from September 27th to 29th.

2020

On September 27, 2019, Twitch announced the 2020 events. The European TwitchCon was to take place in the Amsterdam RAI convention center from May 2nd to 3rd, and the American one again in the San Diego Convention Center from September 25th to 27th. However, the European TwitchCon 2020 was canceled at the beginning of March 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic .

Logos

  • Twitch logo from 2011–2012

  • Twitch logo from 2012-2019

  • Twitch logo with mascot “Glitch” from 2012–2019

Broadest reach streamer

For followers

Overview of the streamers with the greatest number of followers - worldwide (as of June 21, 2020)
Lf. user Followers
1. Ninja 14.6 million
2. do 8.5 million
3. shroud 7.0 million
4th myth 6.5 million
5. summit1g 5.3 million

After views

Overview of the most watched streamers - worldwide (as of January 30, 2020)
Lf. user Views
1. riotgames 1.2 billion
2. shadbasemurdertv 719.0 million
3. fextralife 558.7 million
4th ninja 480.9 million
5. esl_csgo 420.2 million

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Live-streaming site Justin.tv buffing up for e-sports channels English article on video games on justin.tv; March 10, 2011, accessed January 7, 2014
  2. ↑ TwitchTV: Justin.tv's killer new esports project English article on the founding of Twitch.tv; June 6, 2011, accessed January 7, 2014
  3. ↑ TwitchTV Wins a Webby People's Voice Award , English article on the award ceremony; May 1, 2012, accessed January 7, 2014
  4. ↑ a b Twitch 2013 Retrospective. Twitch.tv, accessed February 11, 2014 .
  5. ↑ Rod 'Slasher' Breslau: Twitch Interactive replaces Justin.tv as parent company name. OnGamers.com, February 10, 2014, accessed February 11, 2014 .
  6. ↑ Amazon buys Twitch for $ 1 billion
  7. ^ Cody Conners, Rod Breslau: Wall Street Journal chart lists Twitch.tv fourth in US peak traffic. (No longer available online.) OnGamers.com February 5, 2014, archived from the original on February 8, 2014 ; accessed on February 6, 2014 .
  8. ↑ Rod 'Slasher' Breslau: 45 Million unique viewers a month tune into Twitch in 2013. OnGamers.com, January 16, 2014, accessed February 11, 2014 .
  9. ↑ Happy little stream: Twitch Creative starts with Bob Ross 'marathon'. winfuture.de, October 30, 2015, accessed October 30, 2015 .
  10. ↑ Introducing Twitch Creative. twitch.tv, October 28, 2015, accessed October 30, 2015 .
  11. ↑ Twitch Prime Guide . In: Twitch . ( twitch.tv [accessed March 22, 2019]).
  12. ^ Changes to Twitch Prime. twitch.tv, August 20, 2018, accessed on March 22, 2019 .
  13. ↑ Annie Berrones: Announcing: IRL, Mobile Broadcasting, and Updated Community Guidelines . In: Twitch Blog . December 15, 2016 ( twitch.tv [accessed January 24, 2017]).
  14. ↑ Twitch. Retrieved March 17, 2020 .
  15. ↑ Start of the Overwatch League: Twitch buys streaming rights for 90 million dollars on onlinecasinosdeutschland.com on January 10, 2018, accessed on January 15, 2018
  16. ↑ Fandom and Curse Media are joining forces. fandom.com, December 12, 2018, accessed March 22, 2019 .
  17. ↑ twitch.tv Traffic Statistics. alexa.com, accessed March 22, 2019 .
  18. ↑ Holger Kreitling: Video from Halle: Five viewers saw the attack live on Twitch . October 10, 2019 ( welt.de [accessed October 15, 2019]).
  19. ↑ Broadcast While You Play Official information page on streaming programs (English); accessed on January 7, 2014
  20. ↑ Twitch Emotes - Bringing a little Kappa to you everyday. In: twitchemotes.com. Retrieved April 27, 2020 (English).
  21. ↑ David Goldenberg: How Kappa Became The Face Of Twitch. In: FiveThirtyEight. October 21, 2015, accessed April 27, 2020 .
  22. ↑ Chat stats. In: StreamElements. Retrieved April 27, 2020 (English).
  23. ↑ Thomas Kolkmann: What does Kappa mean? Meaning of the smiley on Twitch. In: GIGA . August 6, 2018, accessed April 27, 2020 .
  24. ↑ Subscriber Emoticon Tiers. In: Twitch Help. Retrieved April 27, 2020 (English).
  25. ↑ JustinTV Lets Gamers Earn Cash with New Twitch Partner Service , Forbes article on Affiliate Program ; July 27, 2011, accessed January 9, 2014
  26. ↑ Partner application. Retrieved April 30, 2017 .
  27. ^ Robin Fontaine: New Subscription options: out of beta and into a Channel near you! In: Twitch Blog. May 23, 2017, accessed June 28, 2017 .
  28. ^ Robin Fontaine: Introducing Cheering: Celebrate, together. June 27, 2016, accessed April 30, 2017 .
  29. ↑ Twitch 2015 Retrospective. Retrieved April 29, 2017 (English).
  30. ↑ Robin Fontaine: Twitch Affiliate Program launches today! First invites going out ... April 24, 2017, accessed April 30, 2017 .
  31. ^ Robin Fontaine: Subscriptions for Affiliates coming this week. In: Twitch Blog. June 27, 2017, accessed June 28, 2017 .
  32. ↑ Customer Support. Retrieved June 6, 2020 .
  33. ↑ Participate in the affiliate program. Retrieved March 22, 2019 .
  34. ↑ Support your streamer from Hi-Tech
  35. ↑ Twitch Extensions: New feature announced for more interactivity . In: GIGA . September 1, 2017 ( giga.de [accessed on September 14, 2017]).
  36. ↑ A whole new level of interactivity: Here comes Twitch Extensions! ( wildcard-gruppe.de [accessed on September 14, 2017]).
  37. ↑ Download Twitch Sings. Retrieved on May 19, 2019 (German).
  38. ↑ The Twitch Studio Beta: Now Available to Everyone. November 12, 2019, accessed November 16, 2019 .
  39. ↑ Customer Support. Retrieved November 16, 2019 .
  40. ↑ Twitch: Two new subscription options for streamer support announced . In: Buffed . ( buffed.de [accessed on November 18, 2017]).
  41. ↑ Twitch - Free subscription and premium functions with Amazon Prime . In: PlayNation.de . ( playnation.de [accessed on November 18, 2017]).
  42. ↑ a b Give the gift of Twitch with Subscription Gifting! - Twitch blog . In: Twitch Blog . November 15, 2017 ( twitch.tv [accessed November 18, 2017]).
  43. ↑ Gift Subscriptions. twitch.tv, accessed on March 22, 2019 .
  44. ↑ New Twitch 'Community Gifting' Feature Allows Users to Gift Up to 100 Subs at Once . In: Dexerto . August 9, 2018 ( dexerto.com [accessed September 30, 2018]).
  45. ↑ Say “Hallo” to TwitchCon Europe, coming to Berlin in 2019. Twitter.com, accessed on March 12, 2019 .
  46. ↑ TwitchCon. twitchcon.com, accessed March 22, 2019 .
  47. ↑ TwitchCon is coming to Amsterdam and returning to San Diego in 2020. In: twitchcon.com. September 27, 2019, accessed October 11, 2019 .
  48. ↑ TwitchCon Amsterdam: Streaming event in May canceled due to coronavirus. In: PC Games . March 6, 2020, accessed March 11, 2020 .
  49. ↑ Top 10 Twitch Streamers - Sorted by Most Followed. Retrieved March 22, 2019 .
  50. ↑ Top 10 Twitch Streamers - Sorted by Most Viewed. Retrieved March 22, 2019 .