As Twitch implements gambling ban, Slots streamers find new home on DLive
DLive / Pixabay: Aidan HoweTwitch’s gambling ban is now in place, and Slots streamers have been forced to find a new home. Enter DLive, which is opening up their doors to all of the platform’s gambling stars and promoting the practice widely on social media.
Slots streams were everywhere on Twitch earlier in 2022. It rose up to become one of the platform’s most dominant categories, and it led to an outcry from some of the platform’s stars worried about gambling promotion and its dangers on the site.
Twitch has made attempts to mitigate harm in the past by stopping direct links and affiliate codes on streams. However they were forced to pull the plug after a scandal surrounding Sliker guilting viewers and fellow streamers to send him more than $250,000 to fuel his addiction.
Twitch’s gambling ban, which went live on October 18, has had an immediate effect on Slots streams. Viewership has fallen from peaks of around 80,000 on October 17 to no higher than 25,000 in the days since the ban was implemented.
It has been on a significant downwards trend since Twitch announced policy changes were on its way though, leaving Slots streamers time to find a new home. DLive is now that sanctuary.
DLiveDLive brands itself as a “value sharing live streaming platform that empowers creators and viewers through a revolutionary rewards system.” This includes using “blockchain technology” and cryptocurrency which viewers can earn within DLive to support creators.
DLive also promotes a 75/25 revenue share split, which has become a contentious point in the streaming community since Twitch’s defiant stand on their 50/50 subscriber revenue split.
Over the last month, since the first whispers of Twitch’s gambling ban, DLive has increasingly promoted gambling streamers on their front page as well as on social media. Their stance has been clear with their #YourStreamYourRules branding in the face of increasing regulation on not just Twitch, but YouTube and Facebook as well.
“As of October 18, Twitch will be making a policy update to prohibit slots, roulette, or dice games that are not licensed in the US or other jurisdictions,” they tweeted on October 13. “We would like to announce DLive welcomes all streamers who create this type of content.”
At the time of publishing, Slots is by far the most popular category, with thousands of viewers compared to just hundreds in any other category. While big names like Tyler ‘Trainwreck’ Niknam or Felix ‘xQc’ Lengyel aren’t swapping platforms to just stream Slots, a vast amount of gambling streamers are.
‘AussieSlots’, who boasted 32,000 followers on Twitch before being banned for breaking the platform’s Terms of Service after the gambling policy change, is now one of DLive’s top streamers. ‘XzosT’, with his 50,000 Twitch followers, moved in the aftermath of the ban too.
Some aren’t completely diverting from Twitch. ‘Syztmz’ has used his account with 46,000 followers to direct viewers to DLive, going live on Twitch with his new stream link. This is a similar tactic being used by ‘Xposed’ and his 532,000 followers — except he is keeping audio on without any visuals on Twitch.
TwitchWhether Slots streamers can sustain full-time content creation on DLive remains to be seen. The platform is much smaller than Twitch — the biggest streamers get a couple thousand peak viewers at most, which is lower than what top Slots stars got on their previous home.
DLive will give them a platform safe from scrutiny, but gambling on Twitch isn’t exactly dead yet. Slots has fallen out of the top 10 most-watched sections of the site, but there’s still hundreds of channels live at any one time.
As some stick it out past the ban with bonuses and codes promoted in chat, it remains to be seen if Twitch takes further action on the practice.