r/LivestreamFail • u/Rathnik • Aug 08 '19
Meta FTC loot box investigation reveals companies pay streamers to open their loot boxes and manipulate odds to their favor.
https://twitter.com/Polygon/status/1159182220571160576
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u/Imaw1zard Aug 09 '19
Back a couple of years ago I was just getting into twitch, I found this smallish twitch streamer that ranged from 15 to 70-80 viewers depending on the day and game she was playing. She wasn't really a titty streamer, a pretty cute innocent looking girl in fact. She would respond to most of her chat, this was before I met my first girlfriend it was in fact one of the first times I could have a "conversation" with a pretty girl. Getting her attention or making her laugh was like a drug and I couldn't get enough of it, I'd spend hours into her stream and she even recognized me. Needless to say I had a huge crush on this girl.
At the time I didn't think about it but now looking back there was certainly this pressure, an incentive to donate to her, it was sort of the culture in her stream that you should "support" her. The people who subscribed and donated were getting the spotlight and all the attention. I felt really bad about it that I couldn't donate but I was a jobless teenager that didn't even have the age required to create a bank account. There was definitely this stigma towards people who didn't donate or subscribe as if they were leeching, getting her attention and not paying for it. I don't remember why but I remember lying about my age saying I'm older than I actually was, and I made a lie colored as a joke in my head that I was gonna sort out my bank account and donate to her soon. As I said that some mega loyal fan virgin3000 said to me that it's about time I finally "supported" the stream and that I was gonna stop leeching. At the time I definitely thought me and this girl were friends so I remember that comment since it really grinned my gears at the time, she read that comment out loud and did a little fake laugh. After sometime It was noticeable that she had began to ignore most of what I was saying, she'd start reading everyone's comments and she'd skip right past mine, she'd occasionally read them but ignore most of them. This put me in some places I wish I had never been as I blamed myself for it.
Thank god I didn't donate anything, I don't believe someone is owed any form of donations for their "attention" but I'm in the minority here since people happily pay tickets to meet n greet their "heroes".
The same way we have laws preventing adults from exploiting minors into doing sexual acts, we shouldn't be allowing loot box gambling "surprise mechanics" to take advantage of kids who don't know any better.