After dealing with lots of bad PR from terrible decisions, Twitch now has to deal with one of its biggest streamers moving to another platform, Kick, with a deal larger than those of most athletes
Good for him, if they can actually pay. And I thank Kick for letting me know that I have 0 interest in that platform. xQc's content isn't for as I'm an adult that isn't a complete asshat. Only partial, but xQc is far too toxic for me.
I mean, xQc is only one streamer. So... If there's other popular streamers who you like who migrate to Kick, then... You might find someone to watch there.
So far the only people I know joining Kick are xQc, Train and Adin Ross... if that's the kind of content they're trying to curate early on I can say with 100% certainty that its not for me.
Also doesn't help that they're funded by a gambling company
I get what the guy above is saying - first impressions mean a lot and this site wants XQC so badly they're willing to pay an absolutely obscene amount for a non-exclusive deal.
I went to the site and aside from X's stream one of the top categories was "pools & bikinis". Granted, "Casinos & Gambling" was higher up, but still, tells you a lot about what kind of site this is willing to be.
This is how mixr - or whatever it was called - died out.
They bought in a couple big streamers expecting the rest to follow.
But what makes twitch so good are the smaller communities.
They often play niche games, have their own fantastic history, raiding each other, nice people, nice streamer interactions.
Some streamers I know have talked about kick. Apparently they are offering a 95% split.
I know twitch is probably extremely inefficient, but if twitch is struggling with a 50/50 split, how the fuck can kick maintain a 95/5 split? And if you move your entire community to another platform, just for that platform to die?
YouTube is probably in the best position to rival Twitch.
But their live stream system and discovery is severely lacking
Mixr had exclusive contracts with the streamers they bought. Meaning they could only stream on Mixr.
Interestingly, Kick is going for a different approach with non-exclusive contracts, allowing XQC to stream on all other platforms as well. It sounds crazy when they’re spending $100 mill, but they’re betting on being able to bring users from other platforms over time, rather than just expecting the audience to all move over at once.
A big similarity being Twitch and Reddit don't create the content, they rely on users of the platform. Hope this becomes a message that users can't be expendable
@Shadocvao Stake (a sketchy online casinos) made Kick after Twitch banned gambling using sketchy online casinos from the platform.
XQC was one of the streamer sponsored by Stake.
Xqc got mad when another streamer (Mizkif) were campaigning to get gambling banned from Twitch, so XQC try to weaponized a girl sexual allegation against Mizkif's friend in order to cancelled Mizkif.
Well, good for xqc for nabbing that deal. He would be a fool not to. But $100 mil seems like a massive investment for his... 'content.' It's definitely going to attract the wrong viewers that are extremely unhealthy for the platform, severely limiting the potential for more advertisers.
The ownership of Kick.com is currently unconfirmed. However, there are signs that suggest the crypto gambling site Stake.com may be backing the project. Job listings posted by Australia-based start-up Easygo state that “Kick.com is a new venture created by the founders of Easygo and Stake.com”. Stake accounts also created and previously moderated the Kick subreddit. According to confirmation by Stake representatives, Eddie Craven, an owner of Stake, is not the owner of Kick.com, but only an investor. Trainwreck could also have a stake in the company.
Wow, Bing's search is pretty damn good andlinkedsources. Anyway, this is actually so predatory of a business I don't even want to delve any deeper than I did in 10 minutes. He's going to actively push users toward these gambling websites, and we all know how destructive that addiction can be.
I think this is all for show, to be honest. The New York Times broke the story, but do they even do pieces like these? Is it possible this Stake company paid for NYT to publish the article? They even include statements from Kick and xqc. I'm not a subscriber so it's a genuine question. I think the crypto gambling people and xqc have a shady partnership going on and he's not actually receiving $100 million, but definitely is getting paid. It just seems that $100 M for one person isn't fiscally reasonable. Anyway, crypto on its own is shady and combine that with gambling? Sounds like trouble.
Kick also replaced Stake as car sponsor for the F1 team Alfa Romeo. Judging by the prominent logos on the car, the partnership would be very expensive too.
Stake (a sketchy online casinos) made Kick after Twitch banned gambling using sketchy online casinos from the platform.
XQC was one of the streamer sponsored by Stake.
Xqc got mad when another streamer (Mizkif) were campaigning to get gambling banned from Twitch, so XQC try to weaponized a girl sexual allegation against Mizkif's friend in order to cancelled Mizkif.
That is some excellent context, thanks.
I know a few streamers that have been chatting about kick. The gambling origin/backing makes it seem sketchy AF.
This seems to be a no strings attached good deal on xQc's side given the lack of exclusivity clause. Worst case scenario is a particularly bad scandal hitting the platform could tarnish xQc's reputation such as it is but that's a risk for literally any platform. However...
As a start-up, Kick is prepared to operate at a loss
Aaand the platform is doomed. Focusing on growth over viability is whats makes you a prime enshitification target.
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