Twitch cried havoc and let loose the dogs of sexual content on its platform, following changes to its policies. This led to specific categories on Twitch gaining massive instant traffic, especially the Art category, which saw a 250 percent increase in peak viewership in a single day.
After Twitch decided to update its policies to allow “artistic nudity” on Dec. 13, a wave of sexually explicit content suddenly hit the platform. The change followed a couple of controversies where streamers were naked live, or at least had implied nudity on their channels. OnlyFans model and Twitch streamer Morgpie popularized the whole trend, leading to her getting banned, as reported by Dexerto. But the changes only aggravated the issue, causing a platform-wide wave of questionable content, particularly in the Art category, where many streamers focused on drawing or creating sexually explicit art.
The Art category saw a massive increase on Dec. 14, a day after Twitch changed its policy to allow for “artistic nudity.” According to stat-tracking site SullyGnome, the category peaked at around 13,000 viewers 24 hours earlier before springing nearly tenfold, to 100,000, the following day.
Most of the new content was, it goes without saying, sexual in nature, and the moment Twitch backtracked on their changes, the entire thing came crashing down with no applause whatsoever. The viewership went down by 90 percent, SullyGnome shows—even below the earlier Dec. 13 levels. At the time of writing now, the viewership remains stable, peaking here and there at about 20,000 concurrent viewers.
The situation is only comparable to when Tumblr decided to ban sexually explicit content on their platform, leading to a massive purge and decrease in users. And, like Tumblr, the Art category was essentially abandoned as soon as the changes were recalled. Now, many are left hoping we don’t see issues like these again on a platform with a 13-year-old age minimum.
