Dan Clancy, the CEO of Twitch, has appeared in an interview talking about the state of Twitch, the wider streaming industry, and the problems with his platform. In one segment, he took a deep dive into one of the most troubling concerns on Twitch to rise in recent years – viewbotting.
He admitted that the problem is running wild and nobody has an accurate picture of the state of play, but what he does know is that ‘thousands of small streamers’ are contributing to the viewbotting epidemic.
‘They Can Create Bogus Revenue’
In an interview with Noah Kara, a minuscule creator who has had suspicious success with his lineup of guests, Twitch CEO Dan Clancy lifted the lid on viewbotting. In one segment, Noah Kara simply asked, ‘Do a lot of people use viewbot on Twitch?’
Clancy was open:
Yes, that’s a constant battle. There are third parties that do it — especially when you get the ads, they viewbot for ads, they viewbot for all sorts of things.
The interesting thing is, the viewbotting isn’t always… There isn’t one big one. Most of the viewbotting and most of the fraud is not on a big streamer, it’s on the small streamer, but thousands of them.
If they can create a thousand bogus accounts, then they create viewbots, then, you know, they can create bogus revenue.
(thanks to Dexerto for the spot)
He went on to explain that he ‘has literally no idea’ what the worst example of viewbotting is on the platform, suggesting it’s a much more critical issue that Twitch is struggling to accurately get a handle on.
Here’s the full interview, you’ll want to fast-forward to around 1:10:30 for the snippet:
In March, one Twitch streamer was caught red-handed when she accidentally flashed her viewbotting ‘software’ during a stream. Hours after the slip-up, she was banned by Twitch and has since relocated to Kick.com.
Many mid-sized streamers are being accused of viewbotting on Twitch, and it almost always comes down to them having several hundred or thousands of viewers watching their stream, but almost no engagement in the chat. That’s the biggest giveaway on the platform that someone is viewbotting.
Do you think viewbotting is much more prevalent than we realize? Let me know on the Insider Gaming forum.
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Grant has been gaming for 30+ years and in the industry for 10+. You'll probably find him playing a post-apocalyptic game or an extraction shooter somewhere.
More from Grant Taylor-Hill
No its all your favorites the whole site and it’s still not profitable then the ties to Hasan and the underground freak offs you host. The federal government needs to get involved and Amazon needs to shut it down.