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Twitch’s Hottest New Thing: Vlogging
The video game streaming site is seeing a rise in people streaming anything but games
In 2016, two years after Amazon bought the company for $970 million, the livestream giant Twitch introduced the largest change ever implemented on the platform.
The website, known for its dominance in esports broadcasting and the burgeoning world of video game livestreaming, announced it would allow content not related to video games within its digital ecosystem.
Since opening its virtual doors to content outside the video game industry, Twitch has hosted an array of non-gaming content including partnerships to broadcast live sports with the NFL and Major League Soccer (MLS), and a catalog of classic TV shows like Power Rangers and Bob Ross’s The Joy of Painting — the latter a meme-driven movement that pushed the late painter to be reborn as an internet celebrity in his own right.
The majority of non-gaming content on Twitch exists today within the world of “Just Chatting”, a category on Twitch presented the same as any video game. “Just Chatting” is the third most-watched category on Twitch, surpassing games like Overwatch, Dota 2 and Apex Legends. During the first half of 2019, the section’s popularity rose by 55% compared to the same period the previous year. Nearly 350 million hours have been watched on “Just Chatting” channel in the first six months of the year, according to data from analyst company StreamElements. Only Fortnite and League of Legends have brought in more viewership hours on Twitch so far this year.
The majority of streams within “Just Chatting” aren’t from the NFL or Bob Ross but from the website’s community. They’re vloggers.
“While gaming is [Twitch’s] core identity, what we’ve heard repeatedly from them is that they are interested in sharing their everyday lives, thoughts, and opinions with their communities,” Twitch’s CEO Emmett Shear explained when Twitch introduced the shift. “IRL is designed to help our creators foster that kind of community interaction.”
Originally introduced under the catch-all label of “IRL” (in real life), less than two years after its inception, Twitch ditched the label in favor of a number of more specific non-gaming…
