2021 is only 2 months old and yet the streaming platform Twitch has already temporarily or permanently banned 270 partners. One Ukrainian streamer has been hit particularly hard.
Here’s what it’s about: The eSports bookmaker Unikrn has looked into the bans of the first months on Twitch. They found that at least 270 partners have been banned on Twitch. In total, 321 bans are reported, meaning that several streamers have received more than one ban within 2 months.
We will show you more numbers and explain the background of Twitch’s controversial banning policy.
6 bans within 2 months for Dota 2 caster
This streamer is particularly in trouble: The streamer with the most bans in 2021 is Vladislav “KVYZEE” Kovalchuk, a Ukrainian caster for Dota 2. He received 6 bans within 2 months.
Most of his bans only lasted a few hours or days. There was even one ban that was lifted after 5 hours. Currently, KVYZEE has been banned since February 15th – that is, for over 2 weeks.
According to his own statement, the streamer was banned for toxic statements. On Twitter, he apologized and wants to ensure that his temperament does not harm the community in the future.
What other bans were there in 2021? There was a lot of excitement over the ban of Fortnite pro player Clix. He was permanently banned from Twitch – presumably due to a sexually explicit image he showed on stream. However, the permanent ban was lifted by Twitch in less than 2 days.
In early February, there was controversy over a ban of AirsoftPhatty. He was allegedly banned for not properly moderating his livestream chat, which displayed hateful content.
To this day, it is still not clear why DrDisrespect had to leave the platform permanently. The streamer himself hinted that it was probably about his exclusive contract. Twitch apparently didn’t want to pay the streamer’s salary and preferred to finance 3 other content creators instead.
Numerous critics of Twitch’s banning policy
Here’s how the banning policy looks: Bans on Twitch rarely happen without major discussions. Twitch is not really transparent when it comes to bans and often remains silent about imposed bans.
There is also the opposing side. Twitch is accused of not banning some streamers even though they actually deserve it. A well-known case was the ban of Swedish streamer Forsen. He was permanently banned for a mistakenly shown image.
There were many discussions about it, so Twitch reversed the permanent ban after a few weeks. In return, the community demanded that Forsen, for example, should ban Pokimane. She allegedly showed pornographic content accidentally and only received a warning.
In general, many Twitch users often get the impression that Twitch gives in to a lot of unrest, reinstating permanent bans or subsequently banning streamers who had not been banned yet.
MeinMMO author Schuhmann wrote: Twitch’s banning policy is getting more ridiculous.
