Is YouTube Creating a New Rival to Twitch?

For all of the various competitions getting streamed via TwitchTV, it is unfortunate to see the platform itself does not have any major competition. Yes, ESPN3 has shown esports in the past, Major League Gaming TV is making strides, and Azubu is still a thing, but without another titan to battle, TwitchTV holds all the cards as streaming’s primary go-to website. Cue the whispers of YouTube preparing to re-launch a gaming centered live-streaming platform in this Daily Dot piece.

The rumor mill has an acute sense of things given the recent Twitch password issues. While it isn’t on the same scale as Sony storing user passwords in plain text, on Tuesday certain TwitchTV users were hit with the a concerning email. A subject line of “Important Notice about Your Twitch Account” immediately caught the eye of channel owners as the body of the email revealed that unauthorized access within accounts may have taken place:

As a relatively long-time Twitch user — my account registration is dated January 1, 2012 and the company officially split from JustinTV in June of 2011 — I can even remember the JustinTV days and the issues that have hampered the streaming platform back then. From out of sync audio and video to levels of lag that turned videos into slideshows, Twitch seems to take one step forward and two steps back in terms of being the best available. Now offering the ability to at least report issues on hand with a few simple clicks, Twitch has nonetheless introduced other problems.

From a sub-par VOD catalogue that lacks a basic search function to their music policy that causes large areas of previous VOD’s getting muted (as indicated by the warning and large red bars), many — myself included — have expressed frustration with the platform.

Hopes are high that a rival service will end with the companies bringing out the best in each other for the consumers. Google previously showed interest in purchasing the Twitch platform before backing out, but if you can’t join em, beat em.

(Special thanks to the GSL and TakeTV channels)