Twitch may be forced to listen to its users as streamers prepare to strike against the platform with the #ADayOffTwitch campaign. Those participating hope to bring more power back to the streamers by forcing the company to improve its widely criticized services.
Criticisms of Twitchare continuing to ramp up as streamers become even more frustrated with the platform's lack of action on important issues. In particular, the recent cases of plugin doxxing and failure to provide adequate tools to prevent large harassment campaigns against streamers in marginalized communities can be blamed for the frustration. The strike will take place on September first.
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The harassment campaigns earlier this month are a widespread issue that shows no signs of slowing down, and many streamers have had enough of Twitch's failure to adequately respond to this problem. Streamers are using the #ADayOffTwitch campaign to have as many users as possible stay off of Twitch on the strike day, as a demonstration of the amount of control organized streamers can have over the platform.
Twitch has long been under fire for various issues, and harassment campaigns are not new to the platform. Especially within the past few months, however, the campaigns have been increasing in frequency. These come in addition to Twitch's already frustrating copyright policy, which can be difficult for streamers to work around if not impossible for certain games that include licensed music.
Despite its many issues, Twitch is an important platform because it can provide new means of telling stories or showcasing other ideas in creative ways not seen much on its competitors. If Twitch's plugin system makes a real-life adaptation of The Simspossible, it is difficult to predict what kinds of creative things streamers will do with the platform in the future. However, to many streamers, Twitch's behavior and responses to criticisms against it are unacceptable, and if the strike fails to solve its issues, streamers will be forced to deal with the problems for even longer until a viable alternative is created. However, creating a streamer-focused alternative is very difficult considering that its main competition also has the funding of major companies.
Over the past year, the platform has made some positive changes as well, including the introduction of a less intrusive advertising system for Twitch viewers. However, the largest problems with the platform still remain unsolved, and the direct action and control a strike gives the streamers will hopefully lead Twitch to fix its issues and become more viable.
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