Despite being the world's biggest video game streaming website, there are often controversies that get associated with the name Twitch. One of the biggest bugbears is the company's propensity to ban streamers. Sometimes users can be banned more than once, such as Indiefoxx whose account was suspended again recently with the reasons for the ban not being clear. Now a new law is being considered which could force the streaming website to make it more clear why users are being suspended.
In a recent report, the ban policy that Twitch employs has been under scrutiny from a court in California, which could implement a new rule which will force the company to be more transparent about its reasons behind bans. As it stands, the way the website goes about suspending streamers seems inconsistent, leaving some uncertain as to why their accounts have been targeted.
The reason behind this new potential law stems from a court case in which streamer James Vargas, also known as PhantomL0rd, filed a lawsuit against Twitch, winning more than $20,000 in damages, although he was originally asking for $35 million. PhantomL0rd won the case against Twitch due to the streaming service being unable to prove that he had been engaging in fraudulent tactics involving a CS:GO website. Such cases could potentially open up avenues for other banned streamers to file their own lawsuits against the site.
Vargas uploaded an additional post a couple of days ago in which he asked the courts to consider Twitch's policy under the California Unfair Competition Law, with the courts agreeing that the site "misrepresented" the streamer, and "acted unfairly" towards him. He went on to say that Twitch "bragged" about its treatment of him and other streamers, arguably down to it being a private company. While more often than not, it's Twitch that does the banning, there was an incident recently in which an entire country was banned by Twitch based on one streamer, essentially being on the other end of the so-called ban hammer.
With the website being somewhat notorious for its string of user suspensions, including one streamer who was banned for doing ASMR in a "suggestive manner", this new Californian rule would force Twitch to justify its reasons for its seemingly indiscriminate disciplinary practice. That doesn't mean users will be banned any less, but it does mean the site will have to offer stronger justifications for doing so and as such could hopefully see an end to unfair treatment.
Source: Dexerto, TwitLonger