Kick is a new competitor to the streaming platform Twitch on the market. However, some streamers suspect that things are not as they should be on the new site. This includes musician CodyRiffs, who ventured a try on Kick and came out with mixed feelings.
What is Kick all about? Kick is a new platform that seeks to compete with the venerable Twitch. The site primarily relies on two arguments: a 95% share of subscription revenues for the streamers and relaxed guidelines.
However, even though Kick has a questionable reputation in the eyes of some, the platform is also interesting for streamers who have nothing to do with gambling. Musician CodyRiff recently took the plunge himself – and suddenly became one of the top 10 streamers in his category, even though he wasn’t doing anything.
Even for streamers like DrDisrespect, who were banned from Twitch and had to switch to YouTube without a lucrative contract, Kick is an enticing option:
Too good to be true?
Why did CodyRiffs go to Kick? Although the streamer had some skepticism towards the new platform with just over 3,000 followers on YouTube and Twitch – it seemed too good to be true – he still decided to take a look for himself.
Especially his category, music, is still a largely unpopulated area on Kick with many 24/7 radio streams.
What experience did CodyRiffs have on Kick? In a video where the streamer summarizes his conclusion, he expresses positive surprise. The image and sound were better on Kick than on Twitch, and the sub-split is naturally great – even though CodyRiffs says that the money comes from gambling businesses.
He negatively assesses the lack of tools for interaction between streamers and viewers, as well as moderation. The fact that he was allowed to play copyrighted music in his stream without any problems is also viewed negatively: Because streamers are not protected from copyright strikes, which could become costly.
You can watch the entire video here:
Kick viewers apparently like countdowns
Was there any other criticism? One point stood out particularly negatively to CodyRiffs: The streamer suspected that the viewer numbers on Kick were artificially inflated, so-called view-botting. This observation has already been made by German content creators like Tanzverbot and Staiy.
What made the streamer suspicious? During CodyRiffs’ first Kick stream, everything seemed fine: Some of his Twitch followers were there, along with a few new viewers. Overall, a positive experience.
He became suspicious when he started a second stream that only displayed a 5-hour countdown – without music or context. Even though he wasn’t delivering any noteworthy content, the streamer was shown 40 viewers, none of whom were active in the chat.
The fact that this stream catapulted him into the top 10 of the music category on Kick didn’t help either.
Cody Riffs shared his observations on Twitter, where the post was seen by 360,000 people. In the attached video clip, the streamer says: “I was impressed by my viewer numbers on Kick. I was less impressed when I realized that it was worthless.”
Kick founder explains what is supposedly really behind it
Is there another explanation? Ed “StakeEddie” Craven, co-founder of Stake and Kick, watched CodyRiffs’ video and reached out to the streamer on Twitter: They are already working on the mentioned points of criticism.
Craven also had an explanation for the supposedly distorted viewer numbers: Of the alleged 58 million visitors on Kick, only 3 million are registered, so many viewers may still not be able to actively participate in the chat.
Since there are still relatively few active streamers, a new stream like this one in the music category would naturally attract clicks. Craven also promised a new analytics tool, which will soon give streamers more overview of the data of their content.
What was actually behind the countdown? CodyRiffs was just counting down the time he needed to be on air to receive a subscription button from Kick. In the end, there was only an announcement that he would now stream on Twitch.
Although he sees potential in the new streaming alternative, he still needs to protect his brand first; with Kick in its current state, that is not possible. Others have fewer concerns:
