A Mom’s Guide to Streaming on Twitch and YouTube
Yes, it is true… children, teens, and adults alike watch other people play video games online. Esports is considered one of the fastest-growing industries and is expected to grow to half a billion viewers by 2024[1]. No, it is not a scam if your child is claiming that they are being upgraded to an affiliate on Twitch and want to link your Amazon account to Twitch. There are two primary streaming platforms called Twitch (an Amazon subsidiary) and YouTube Gaming (a Google subsidiary) that players from around the world live stream everything from casually playing video games to cooking in their kitchen. These platforms can be great ways for your children to interact with others that have similar interests and learn tips and tricks to play their favorite game at a higher level. That said like any other online social media or networking platform, we as parents need to supervise what is happening while they are online.
What is Twitch or YouTube Gaming?
Twitch and YouTube Gaming are both media platforms that allow people to watch others play video games or to broadcast their own gameplay to the internet. Your child is not alone in wanting to watch, Twitch alone has close to 1 billion monthly viewers with 41% of the viewership being between 16 to 24 years old[2]. Like other social networking platforms, streamers are able to monetize their followers through an ad revenue share program or subscription revenue. We will cover the affiliate and partner programs in further detail in a later article.
These platforms offer almost an unlimited amount of content. You may find your children watching anything from professional eSports leagues for League of Legends, major conventions such as Comic-Con, to personal streams broadcasting Minecraft. In addition, there is non-gaming content that includes vlogging to Bob Ross’ The Joy of Painting.
Twitch: @GMHikaru
How do I find kid-friendly streamers?
Twitch does not offer parental controls and clearly states in their terms of use that children under 13 should not use their platform written by their expensive legal team. YouTube offers the ability to set parental controls based on age. Keeping this in mind, Twitch does allow you to sort through the streamers by category including Family Friendly and if your child does stumble across a stream that has questionable content a warning pops up blocking the stream stating that the content may not be appropriate and is for mature audiences only.
Surprisingly when you google “kid-friendly streamers” a lot of the streamers that come up may not be so kid-friendly as you watch their channel for a few minutes and begin to hear the f-bomb or griefing and/or trolling of other players. No mother wants their younger child to be in a hostile environment or for their teen to think that type of online behavior is appropriate.
To get you started on family-friendly streamers here a few that you can check out in various categories and in no particular order:
FalseSymmetry - Minecraft
GMHikaru - Chess
CoachCurtis - League of Legends
To get a more complete list check out the Gamer Mom’s Resources.
So your kid wants to start streaming?
It is a natural progression for your teen or maybe even pre-teen to want to stream and a fantastic way for them to meet fellow gamers. The rare few may even make a career of it. Like any other online platform, you need to supervise what your child is doing online.
This interest in streaming can lead to a great bonding opportunity between you and your teen to set up for streaming and to broadcast new content. Make sure that you are aware of the platform’s guidelines and terms of use, keep an eye on the chat, and silence or kick toxic users that may appear in the chat. In addition, if your child has dreams of making a career of streaming, this would be a great time to foster their entrepreneurial spirit!
