The video platform YouTube apparently wants to learn from the competition at Twitch. They are now announcing a new “experimental” feature. It carries the innovative name “Clips” – it is exactly the feature that has brought Twitch immense growth in gaming and high relevance in social media.
This is the announcement from YouTube: On January 28, the “YouTube Gaming” channel tweeted (via twitter):
There will soon be an experiment on a limited number of gaming channels: Clips!
A YouTube person then explains: These are 5 to 60 second excerpts from videos on YouTube, whether from live streams or regular “videos on demand”. The clips are meant to be shared.
YouTube Gaming is “YouTube wants to be like Twitch”
This is the situation at YouTube Gaming: YouTube Gaming is YouTube’s response to Twitch, the live-streaming area of the platform designed for gaming. YouTube announced a strategy change in 2019 after the first version failed and was discontinued.
YouTube has apparently recognized how much potential Twitch has in recent years. Because the company, which belongs to Amazon, has grown significantly in recent years.
- YouTube is a massive platform covering all kinds of areas that relies on long “videos on demand” – recorded, edited videos. Users can then comment on these videos afterwards.
- Twitch is a smaller platform with a strong focus on gaming, primarily relying on “live streams” that are then available as long, unedited videos online. The appeal is that viewers can talk to the streamer while they stream. Hardly anyone watches a recording on Twitch afterwards.
YouTube Gaming is essentially “YouTube is trying to be like Twitch.”
Twitch already commented sarcastically on this back in 2015 with “Welcome Player 2 – add me on Google+” a reference to Google’s failed attempt to copy Facebook and its subsequent crash.
Clips as a bait for new viewers
That’s why Clips are so important: The clips have made Twitch relevant in social media: when something special happens in a stream, users have the opportunity to cut out this specific moment (up to 59 seconds) and pack it into a handy format with a nice title.
One of the most popular clips on Twitch of all time: A streamer fell asleep, woke up and saw that he had more viewers than before.
These clips spread on social media and can reach huge audiences: they are small bites of interest.
The clips are not edited later; they are just as they appeared in the live stream. Some content creators prefer to create their own excerpts to upload to Twitter or YouTube that are also cut and edited.
The clips serve to make one aware of streamers or Twitch; they are the “best bites” of a stream.
3 million watched this splendid clip:
By adopting this feature 1:1, YouTube hopes to increase its relevance.
One criticism that YouTube still receives from many Twitch streamers is that their chat is inferior and lacks many emotes. Perhaps YouTube will improve this next.
Meanwhile, live streaming on YouTube has significantly increased and achieved some success last year: YouTube poached streamer Rachel “Valkyrae” Hofstetter from Twitch and made her the world’s biggest streamer in 2020. She surpassed Twitch’s biggest streamer, Pokimane.
YouTube steals a 28-year-old from Twitch, making her the “biggest streamer in the world”
