Working with big-name creators is more than just a revenue opportunity. Popular creators have a bigger voice in the community than regular users, and they may use that to push platforms to change their behaviour.
Twitch saw that this week, as The Verge reported:
On Wednesday, September 1st, a number of channels on Twitch will go dark as streamers participate in #ADayOffTwitch, a walkout designed to bring attention to the ongoing hate and harassment that’s plagued the platform for the last several weeks.
Created by Twitch streamers ShineyPen, Lucia Everblack, and RekitRaven, the walkout aims to bring greater awareness to the problems creators are suffering on Twitch.
Twitch promises that change to better protect creators is coming, but the walk-out this week shows how millennials and Gen-Z are far more comfortable using people-power to push for change than the generation before them, as we’ve seen in the push for unionisation in the US media industry, driven by staff in their 20s and 30s who want better working standards.
Another form of user protest got results this week over at Reddit, where many in the community were disappointed at CEO Steve Huffman’s decision to allow vaccine misinformation on the platform.
“Dissent is a part of Reddit and the foundation of democracy. Reddit is a place for open and authentic discussion and debate. This includes conversations that question or disagree with popular consensus,” he
wrote.
But when lives are at stake, many don’t see scaring people away from being vaccinated as a matter for debate. 135 subreddits went dark in a protest this week, stopping non-members from reading or joining their communities.
The move appeared to be enough to
prompt change, with Reddit taking action against many anti-Covid-vax communities just days after it had said they were welcome.
People power: it gets results.