Streaming platform Twitch is undergoing a ‘deep-dive look into gambling behaviour’ as it looks to assess the rise in gambling-related channels and their impact on viewers.
Gambling-related content has soared in popularity in recent years, and certain Twitch streamers even have their own sponsorship deals with betting companies, encouraging them to push the practice.
‘Slots’ is now the 15th most-watched category on the platform, posting numbers to rival some of the most popular slots, video games and genres available.
“We take any potential harm to our community extremely seriously,” a Twitch spokesperson told Bloomberg. “While gambling sites content represents a very small fraction of the content streamed on Twitch, we monitor it closely to ensure our approach mitigates potential harm to our global community.”
Twitch is easily accessible for minors and extremely popular among under-18s in particular, averaging around 2.5 million concurrent viewers (with a combined 1.9 billion hours watched) during July 2022.
Photo by Wes Hicks on Unsplash
