Felix "xQc" Lengyel is one of the most popular Twitch streamers out there. He's well known for weighing in on controversies within the Twitch community. Now he's making it clear that he dislikes the new Twitch channel booster, which he claims is one of the worst ideas he's ever seen.
Possibly as a response to the infamous hot tub meta, Twitch has been slowly revealing a series of new features in the last several months. The new stream boosting feature is the latest to be revealed as of writing and it allows fans to boost the discoverability of a content creator’s channel by donating real money. Unfortunately, it appears that streamers are less than impressed with the new feature, particularly xQc.
In a recent live stream, xQc discussed how the new feature would work and immediately expressed his distaste for it. Not only does the new system bear an uncanny resemblance to the "pay-to-win" features found in some games, but it may also pose a threat to the existing Twitch ecosystem. Twitch has been accused of paying streamers less in recent years, and now xQc is accusing the company of creating a new feature that is functionally the same as view-botting, meaning that streamers won't need to bother creating exciting content to succeed. Instead, they can just pay to ascend rapidly up the ranks of Twitch streamers, which may allow the rich to get richer and shut the door on everyone else.
The streamer went on to explain that the stream boosting feature still has too many question marks attached. It doesn't show fans what the recommendations will look like or where they will go on the site. He also states that the new feature could make it harder for streamers like xQc, who built up an audience over half a decade, to become successful. “I honestly think that this hurts the website a lot more than it boosts anyone,” xQc claimed. “It’s kind of worrying because it’s going to hurt the whole ecosystem.”
As of writing, a number of fans seem to agree with xQc's position on the stream boosting feature. This isn't the only new feature Twitch has implemented recently, but it may be one of the most unwanted. One Redditor commented that this new feature won't give any exposure to small streamers, while another called it "Payed Viewbotting" and wondered if it was on someone's 2021 Twitch bingo list.
Source: Twitch