Twitch purchased by Amazon

Wait. Hang on a second. Up until I read a business article on this purchase, I really didn't have much of an idea of what Twitch even was. I just saw it mentioned in the occasional Other Games thread, and ignored it. You're telling me that people are paying monthly subscriptions to watch other people play video games? And that that business is apparently worth close to a billion dollars?

This fucking world, man.

LOL, you really are out of it then.

It's more entertainment then anything. Its free, the coverage is great for any games, and their tournaments etc.
People listen to Jackasses talk on the radio all day, it's no different then that.

Eomer_sl said:

Wait. Hang on a second. Up until I read a business article on this purchase, I really didn't have much of an idea of what Twitch even was. I just saw it mentioned in the occasional Other Games thread, and ignored it. You're telling me that people are paying monthly subscriptions to watch other people play video games? And that that business is apparently worth close to a billion dollars?

This fucking world, man.

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It is mostly because they find a source of entertainment out of it. You could argue many forms of entertainment don't make sense. People pay real life money to watch someone stand up on a stage and tell jokes. People pay real life money for people to talk to a camera for two hours. I don't know if it is your place to judge what is entertaining for someone and where they should spend their money.

Taking the Starcraft 2 example, many events will stream the games for free in low/medium quality but require a subscription to view in HD. Others won't let you chat and internet hate brigade unless you're a subscriber either.

No...

Viewers can choose to support Popular Twitch channels and personalities by clicking a "Subscribe $4.99" option. Subscribers then have the ability to do extra chat emotes and get a fancy name in the chat box of the channel they are subscribed to. Of that $4.99, Twitch and the channel host split it 50/50. It's all optional and voluntary.

I'd guess a lot of their revenue still comes through traditional banner/stream ad's.

Haha, yeah, pretty much. I was never a fan of watching others playing (when I can play it myself) but I did watch a shitload of commented competitive Heroes of Newerth matches over the years.

BrutulTM_sl said:

This is my reaction too. I have heard people talking about how watching other people play video games is a large percentage of the total traffic on YouTube. I can't imagine spending time doing such a thing personally.

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There are really three sectors of people who watch video games.

#1) There is a personality driving the viewership. In this case the video game is basically a good excuse to listen to the guy comment on the game. It can be he has developer insights, he is funny, he is witty or any plethora of things that make for a charismatic entertainer. This isn't really too different from watching like the Food network. They make food, you can't eat it but people still watch it anyways. Because the hosts are entertaining and you pick up little factoids here and there.

#2) The person is better than you at the game. This is the competitive side of things. You want to watch this guy to improve your own game. I fall heavily into this sector. Often times the quickest way to get better at something is to watch it done at a high level. There are many tricks and tips to make you better at the game you can pick up via watching the livestream.

#) Tournament play. This is really no different than watching sports IMO.

I watch Hearthstone streams. Some are pretty entertaining and you can learn a lot from them.

Amazon Prime has paid for itself many times over for me so if they integrate it into Twitch, it won't affect me at all.

Eomer_sl said:

Wait. Hang on a second. Up until I read a business article on this purchase, I really didn't have much of an idea of what Twitch even was. I just saw it mentioned in the occasional Other Games thread, and ignored it. You're telling me that people are paying monthly subscriptions to watch other people play video games? And that that business is apparently worth close to a billion dollars?

This fucking world, man.

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What if you could pay 5 dollars a month to help a show you liked stay on the air? Would you do that?

I personally don't pay for any Twitch subs because no one is offering a product that I particularly care about, but I certainly can understand it.

Yeah, I guess the idea of watching someone else play video games is just really foreign to me. To each their own I guess.

I enjoy watching Dota 2 tournaments and pro player streams because it's entertaining, and I feel like I learn new tricks or strategies all the time that I can use when I play. I frequently have a stream running while I'm cooking food, at work, or doing something else that requires me to be stationary but not 100% mentally engaged. I noticed that when I went for a long time without playing Dota, I never watched streams, so I think (for me, at least) it's only interesting if it's a game I'm actively playing a lot. Also, I am only really interested in watcing people who are vastly better than me, so I'm sure if I had a certain skill level, I'd lose interest. Probably the way a ton of people can sit down and watch football all day, but a lot of pro players say they don't care about watching other games.

I was reading anarticle on NYTimesabout this merger. A lot of the commenters there were baffled at the concept of Twitch and calling the end of humanity, etc. I can understand it coming from that comment section considering it's the New York Times.

NYTimes Commenter_sl said:

There is just something wrong with the whole concept. To sit around for hours playing video games is enough of a time waster, but to sit and watch others play those games is even worse. Don't people have better, more interesting things to do? And of course, the craziest part is that Amazon, or any company for that matter, is willing to spend money buying such a company. I guess P. T. Barnum was right, "There's a sucker born every minute."

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But on Rerolled? I guess I really didn't expect that here. Twitch must be a little more niche than I thought.

Well you also have to take in the fact that Eomer is fighting his last brain cell. I'm surprised he gets any concept at this point.

Neph_sl said:

But on Rerolled? I guess I really didn't expect that here. Twitch must be a little more niche than I thought.

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Nah, seems like I'm in the minority, I guess.

BrutulTM_sl said:

This is my reaction too. I have heard people talking about how watching other people play video games is a large percentage of the total traffic on YouTube. I can't imagine spending time doing such a thing personally.

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I can understand Twitch, even though I have spent maybe 2-3 hours watching streams ever. If I was into any of the major competitive games I'd probably watch more of it.

It's the YouTube channels that make me question humanity. There's something fundamentally wrong with any person who'd willingly listen to PewDiePie, and that retard has more subscribers than anyone.

Twitch pulls in 250k + concurrent viewership just for LoL and Dota 2 major events. Hardly niche.

There are some niche channels on twitch though, for instance: LethalFrag is a fairly popular indie game streamer who has done cooking shows in the past and will be starting up a live Pinball machine segment here shortly.

I watch Twitch.TV instead of regular cable at my place. I have maybe 17 channels or something on my living room TV.

I flip on the football game from time to time and that's about it.

its a generational thing. i don't get watching other people play video games either, but then again pretty much everyone i know watches sports games on TV and its not that different really. my daughter loves lets play videos, she doesn't like gaming herself but she will watch "funny people" play old school 8 bit games and horror games all day on her ipad, she hardly watches any TV or movies. it makes me sad when she tells me all about some retard playing Space Quest, and when I offer to install it on her laptop and let her play she just rolls her eyes and says I don't get it BITCH YOU DONT GET IT STOP WATCHING OTHER PEOPLE DO SHIT DO IT YOURSELF AAARRRRGGGHHH

i mean, the most watched Wakandan on youtube is some norwegian fuck named pewdiepie who gets millions of viewers per month and is making $20m+ a year... for playing games

MOBAs and twitch and facebook have completely changed the way people want to interact with their digital entertainment from the MMO era. Instant gratification and easy sharing among small group of friends with absolutely no barriers to entry (levels, factions, servers, monthly sub) is here to stay.

My Girlfriend watches a couple channels on twitch just because they have cats in the background doing stuff. Also she likes watching mario kart 8 streams. If it's a gateway to playing video games with me or sparking her interest I'm all for it. Means less shit I'll have to take down the road.

I show her the dark side of the site (Kaceytron + other boob shot channels) it's good for a chuckle. Marketing geniuses.