But when seemingly everyone wants to record footage or live stream, who ends up watching the content?Ī promotional image for a Twitch post about what makes people come back to the site.

Some parents note that their children pretend to unbox toys to a nonexistent audience, and teachers report that their students often say they want to pursue YouTubing as a career. The rise of popular (and profitable) influencers on platforms like YouTube and Twitch has also made the idea of being an online influencer aspirational. With the push of a button on your game console or phone, you can share whatever you’re doing at that exact moment with friends and strangers alike. The number grows each year, thanks in part to how easy it has become to live stream, and platforms like Facebook, Instagram and YouTube also increasingly encourage people to share and watch live stories. Twitch, the leading live streaming platform where people play games, make crafts, and showcase their day-to-day lives, attracts over two million broadcasters every month. Hopstad has been streaming to largely nobody for the last five years, and he’s not alone in this pursuit. What Hopstad didn’t know then was that this would be the start of an even more difficult journey to make connections with other people. Famed for its brutal and exacting gameplay, Dark Souls is a popular game to live stream: if you’re going to die hundreds of times, you might as well perish with some digital company to lighten the mood. When John Hopstad first descended into the virtual world of Dark Souls in 2013, his mission was to save a decaying world.

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