I have (had) a twitch channel with a few thousand followers, maybe 50/100 viewers at any given time, doing speedruns. Relatively popular. But it was always just a hobby.

The economics simply don't work. Even if you ascend to the "middle tier". It works out to way less than (american) minimum wage, at best.

I now cringe a bit at the hours and hours i spent there, though i did make some good friends and had great conversations. But it really wasn't the best use of my Late 20s, in the longrun.

It should really only be seen as a hobby, for a few extra bucks on the side, at best, like mowing lawns or other odd jobs. If you think you can make a living, that is both dangerous and delusional thinking.

> and each Twitch stream attracts over two thousand viewers. It's not a good way to make a living.

To contrast with that, I know twitch streamers whose channel averages out at around 300 viewers a time, and who make a very comfortable living. Having a properly run channel that encourages donations, cash and bits, is a huge part of it.

I've seen streamers who pull an easy $200 a day in donations. Add in 500 or so subs, and it isn't too hard to break 6k a month. Not enough to live in the Bay Area, but a really nice salary in most of the country.

You also have to consider that the average length of a "day" for a popular Twitch streamer is 10-12 hours.

And that those streamers have to stream 6-7 days a week to maintain their audience.

Not worth it, honestly.

You also have to consider that many streamers are playing video games they love to play and casually chatting with friendly fellow nerds. Apples and oranges when compared to grinding out an 8 hour work day.

I can definitely see how it could/would eventually become more work than fun, but that doesn't seem to be the case for many streamers.

> You also have to consider that the average length of a "day" for a popular Twitch streamer is 10-12 hours.

carlsagan42 streams once a week for ~4 hours, and pulls in a couple thousand viewers at min, at 6pm on a Saturday.

His secret? He is super entertaining, hands down one of the funniest people and most entertaining people to watch on twitch. His YT videos of his streams then get a few hundred thousand more views on top of that. But yes he is an anomaly, in that he is really damn good at both game play and also entertaining.

Most streamers don't have that killer combo, so they have to work a lot harder.

Plenty of streamers are 9am-5pm, 8am-4pm, or 11am-7pm. Heck I know successful who are 8pm-midnight.

I'd argue that it really depends on the stream and the community. Streamers that build a super strong community can get away with shorter streamers and smaller viewer bases. They won't be pulling in millions, but they can get a steady income stream from it.

My overall point is that streaming is a valid career for people who have the right skills. The barrier to getting started is low, but the barrier to doing to an open mic stand-up is also low. The difference is there aren't a bunch of news articles about people flocking to open-mic nights, although I suspect on any given night there are a thousand or so people doing open mic in the US alone! But there is also a cultural realization that most people shouldn't quit their job, drop out of school, and start practicing their comedy routine 8 hours a day.

You can't really compare extreme outliers against the norm. Very few Twitch streamers can have that kind of community you're talking about. I would wager low double digits.

> I would wager low double digits.

I know of more than half a dozen who are just Super Mario Maker streamers.

I know, my pure happenstance, of two cooking streamers who have built communities.

I think low double digits is a low ball estimate. There are more successful retro gaming streamers than that, I have no idea what the contemporary game twitch scene is like.

No one ever talks about 300 viewer streamers, they make for lousy news stories. Drama with super successful streamers, and articles like this one that talk about failure at the bottom.

Someone working 9-5, 40 hours a week, pulling in 40-50k a year isn't a news story.

Few (if any) of those streamers are making a living wage off of just their few hours/week streaming.

It may be part of their income but not all of their income.

If you run the numbers on what's needed to make ~$1500/wk off of 4 hours/week of streaming, it doesn't paint the picture that you are.

Carl is so good. I made the overlay for a charity stream last year. The mario maker guys are a good bunch.

Yeah I will tell people I made 3000 dollars on cookbook sales.

Sounds great? Well if it takes 30 hours a week for 3 years, it really isnt great. (And I've probably spent 15,000 USD on interns and editors in 3 years)

Lucky I'm an engineer and my website is fun and I appreciate the traffic/comments more than anything.

^ You should plug your books here :)

Trying to win the lottery is not a good life goal.

Is aspiring to being a top Twitch streamer any different than those aspiring to be a top musician, artist or actor?

You'd have to be fantastic at your particular game or whatever they stream on Twitch (I know absolutely nothing about this platform) and great at self promotion. Not unlike wanting to be a rock star or movie star.

I fail to see how it's any more like a lottery win than being in other forms of media, other than it's a very new platform (in the grand scheme of things).

It wouldn't be for me but I'm sure plenty of people are making plenty of money and Twitch has its own Justin Bieber/Miley Cyrus (or whoever is the pop star of choice today. Yeah, I'm getting old).

It's a little different to me.

At least for music, there are some career fallback options if you really want to pursue that path, but lack the charisma / marketing skills to be a pop lead. Orchestras / Broadway, session musicians, game and film composition, studio work (production / engineer / composer), etc. A lot of these paths actually value technical competence way more than the self promotion necessary for pop music stardom. It's an extremely competitive field, of course, but it's possible to do very well as a musician without necessarily being a pop star. I'm not sure if the equivalent exists for Twitch streamers.

I'd argue it is no more a lottery than aiming to be a stand up comedian or any other form of professional entertainer.

It is a lot of networking to help make raids happen early on, a lot of learning to adapt to what the audience wants (which is hard with only a text interface to the audience!), a lot of hard work, and a good amount of natural talent.

You can live like a king on $72,000 a year in the midwest, and the bonus is that the northern part gets so cold in the winter that there's not much else to do but work and stream!

Don't forget to pay your taxes (about double what you would pay as a regular employee; your employer pays a portion of that behind the scenes) out of that, plus any health insurance you want to pick up. That $72,000 yearly will vanish pretty quickly.

Made $73,500 last year as a freelance software consultant last year. Sole breadwinner in my house - my wife doesn't work.

Paid my estimated federal and state income taxes through the year, paid federal and state taxes at the end of the year, paid for a decent tier in the healthcare exchange, put away as much for retirement as was prudent, and still had more than enough money to take two months of the year off and pay for a three bedroom, two bathroom house in the suburbs (mortgage, utilities, and insurance all paid).

It's not impossible here, but it is impossible in the Bay Area.

This isn’t true at all. The only extra tax you pay as a contractor is the other 7.65% of the FICA, or $5500 here. You also get a bunch of new deductions you can take, including that $5500 itself.

It's the same with sports, music, art, writing and lots of other hobbies-that-can-be-careers. Most people won't ever make a living, but plenty of people want to give it a shot. If it works, awesome, you get to play games or make art for a living!

And what better time do make a go at it than in your 20's?