When it comes to Twitch's chat, it is very important for the platform to keep weirdos in check, so the community can enjoy their time. Twitch therefore decided to combat toxicity and harassment in chat.
Communication on Twitch, can be a bit chaotic. It can also be absolutely impossible to read all the messages, when there are thousands of people spamming "LUL", "4Weird" and "TriHarding" to get the streamer's attention.
It's a bit tricky to manage the absolute onslaught of messages and filter out the weird ones. Moderators and streamers do their best to ban the people making inappropriate comments, but those can just go to the next channel and harass another streamer there.
A popular example when it comes to streamers being harassed is Pokimane. She shut down more sexist comments than Anakin Skywalker shut down younglings.
- Pokimane Shuts Down Gross Simp
- Pokimane Awkwardly Tells Off Sexist Fan
- Pokimane Has Banned an Insane Amount of People from Twitch Stream
But those people can just go to another streamer's chat without pretty much any consequences!
Twitch Improves Ban Management
To make managing the chat across the platform easier or, let's be real, filter out all the creeps and users posting inappropriate comments, Twitch just released a brand-new ban function.
Our new Shared Ban Info feature rolling out today helps you easily share banned user information with trusted channels to help keep your community safe.Learn more: https://t.co/zhvOMnj8Bn pic.twitter.com/wVKcIaVHU0
— Twitch (@Twitch) July 21, 2022
It's a shared ban info, that allows streamers to better communicate who they got banned from their chats. This will make it way harder to evade bans across the platform.
Twitch released a statement to clarify their intentions regarding shared bans:
We’ve heard your feedback and know that many communities already rally together to share information about users who they have banned. This tool will help streamline those efforts. We want to help streamers and mods protect themselves and their communities while also helping to prevent harassers from attempting to harass other channels
So, Twitch actually does care about the user experience! Well, maybe. We will see if it has the desired effect, or if it is just an ice cube thrown into a volcano of problems.
But I guess it is nice to see Twitch care for the user experience, albeit a little late and maybe a little less impactful than it could and should have been.
What Will Change?
Well, for the viewers, little to nothing will change really, unless you are one of those people asking Amouranth for feet pics. If so, here is an article you should read next.
For streamers on the other hand, it will be way easier to identify people that are already banned in other channels. All you have to do is send a request to your streaming buddies, well, I guess they have to accept it, too.
Using Shared Ban Info
The way this works is that if a user is banned in one channel, he will be flagged in all the other channels that share ban info. Flagged users will be restricted from participating in chat automatically, unless adjusted in the settings.
So better think twice now before commenting on Amouranth's Breasticles, or making a sexist comment in Pokimane's chat. It might just so happen that you will not only be banned in their channels, but also restricted in up to 30 other channels as well.