TwitchCon is an annual convention hosted by Twitch, to celebrate the culture of video game streaming. TwitchCon came to Europe for the very first time on April 13th and 14th with the same enthusiastic spirit and charm that we have seen from them in all these years. TwitchCon Europe took place in CityCube Berlin, Germany.
In this article, I have covered all the highlights from the event. Let’s get started!
Day 1, April 13th
Day 1 of TwitchCon Europe started with the Twitch Rivals Apex Qualifier #1 and a streamer Meet & Greet event. Soon after, we got to witness some entertaining and informative events.
Streaming 101, Twitch Etiquette and more
Many successful and well-known streamers came together and hosted a series of discussions and Q&A sessions with the audiences, talking about many topics related to streaming. If you’re aspiring to become a full-time streamer, I suggest you to check out the complete VOD below.
The topics covered on Day 1 were ‘Twitch Etiquette’, ‘Variety Streaming: What Does that Mean?’, and ‘Branding Your Channel on and off Twitch’
A Thousand Years of Video Game Music with Philip Sheppard
The next big event was a musical performance and an amazing show, put out by the award-winning music composer, Philip Sheppard. Philip has composed more than 60 film, gaming, television and theatrical scores, including the award-winning video game, Detroit: Become Human.
Keynote – Emmett Shear talks Twitch
The co-founder and CEO of Twitch, Emmett Shear gave an incredible speech and revealed a lot of upcoming features on Twitch.
He started off by explaining that Twitch is ‘Multiplayer Entertainment’, meaning that every single viewer contributes to making Twitch what it is.
When we connect on Twitch, it isn’t just chatting. Through extensions, emotes or even just by lurking in the viewer count, we are adding to the experience together. We become a crucial part of the show itself. Its Multiplayer Entertainment – A live, shared experience, that is only made possible because of all of you. So, you, the entire community, do a lot to make Twitch, Twitch.
He explained that the company’s role, is to do everything they can to make incredible moments possible.
What’s our role in Twitch? We’re here to play support for you. To do everything we can to help you make incredible moments possible. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, we love doing what we do, because we love seeing what you can do. It’s a mission that doesn’t stop for us, with each new feature or upgrade. Your creativity, your courage, your ingenuity inspires everything that we do.
Later, he made a lot of announcements, and I am going to summarize them all for you.
Squad streams for affiliates
Squad Streams allow streamers to collaborate and present up to four gameplay sessions in a single window.
Previously this feature was only available to partnered streamers, but soon it will be available for affiliate streamers as well.
More sorting options in game directories
Starting in June, you will be able to sort a particular game directory by:
- Viewers (Highest to Lowest)
- Viewers (Lowest to Highest)
- Recently started
- Recommended for you
The program that recommends channels to you, will get ‘smarter’ as you discover and follow more channels.
Improved Search Function
The Search function on Twitch has always been very annoying to use, and many people have been asking Twitch to fix it from the time of its inception.
Starting in June, smarter functionalities like autocompletion of results, error correction for typos and a new search results page will be added. Shear promised us more improvements throughout the year.
Recaps – A new feature to easily create highlights.
After completing a stream, you will be presented with automatically generated highlights, based on the top moments from your broadcast. You can share these highlights or edit them a little first to make them perfect.
Twitch Rivals
Twitch Rivals is a series of competitive events designed from the ground up for Twitch streamers and viewers. 2019 will include over 100 event days featuring new formats, games, interactive extensions, and millions of dollars in prize money – from rivals.twitch.tv
Shear explained that any game can be featured in a Rivals event, regardless of whether it’s an Esports title or not. He went on to say that the community can suggest for any sort of Twitch Rivals event they’d like to see in 2019.
In just 4 months of 2019, there have been 27 Twitch Rivals events, and winners have earned over 1 Million Euro. It’s great to see that Twitch is putting more and more effort into these tournaments.
Twitch Sings
Twitch Sings is built from the ground up for streamers. With live singing, multiplayer modes, and features that let chat direct the show, our first game lets you and your community make one-of-a-kind performances together – from sings.twitch.tv
Shear gave an outlook on Twitch Sings and explained how successful it had become. He also gave us a small teaser of the Twitch Sings Live event which would take place on Day 2.
Twitch Sings is open to everyone now, and you can download the application here.
Bounty Board
Bounty Board is a way for creators to browse and accept paid sponsorship opportunities (AKA bounties) directly from their Twitch dashboard. With Bounty Board, Twitch handles the relationship with the brand and finds sponsorship opportunities for you. Twitch will also handle your payments, so you can concentrate on streaming and growing your community
Bounty Board is only available to partnered streamers from the US. Starting from May, Bounty Board will be available to partners and select affiliates from Germany, France and UK. Shear mentioned that more countries are on the way to make it to the list.
Quicker Payouts
Partners, affiliates and extension developers who cross the $100 mark, get their payout, 45 days after the end of the month.
Shear announced that ‘eligible creators’ who reach the $100 mark by the end of the month, will get the payout in just 15 days, starting from their earnings made in March.
That was all the announcements made by Emmett Shear at TwitchCon 2019, Europe. He concluded by thanking everyone for attending the event.
Twitch Rivals Apex Legends Grand Finals
Day 1’s finale was the Grand Finals of the Twitch Rivals Apex Legends tournament.
Jordan “HusKers” Thomas, Chris “sweetdreams” Sexton, and Mark “Dropped” Thees of Team Rogue came first place and won $74,600 – The prize money was based on number of eliminations and their placements in all the matches.
We present you the best #ApexLegends squad in the world! #GoRogue #TwitchRivals pic.twitter.com/gzBMT6S3rG
— Rogue (@Rogue) April 13, 2019
Coby “dizzy” Meadows’ team NRG Esports came second, and won $41,600. This came as a shock to the viewers, as dizzy is considered by many as one of the best players of the game.
With a tremendous performance @Rogue are your first #TwitchRivals @PlayApex #TwitchCon Europe Showdown Champions! 🏆
Congratulations @HusKerrs @sweetdreamsh1 & @TSM_Dropped! pic.twitter.com/FMfxgkZAUC
— Twitch Esports (@TwitchEsports) April 13, 2019
Day 2, April 14th
Twitch Rivals League of Legends Country Showdown
Day 2 started out with the Twitch Rivals LoL tournament. Four teams consisting of streamers from different regions of Europe, battled it out for a prize-pool of $75,000. Here’s all the teams and the participating players:
Team Germany: Krischan “Zenten” Warnusz, Zhou “XoYnUzi” En-Qiang, Frederik “NoWay” Hinteregger, Minh “Sologesang” Sang Ngo Tan, and Nicole “nylanaaa”
Team France: Solary’s Sakor “Le Roi Bisou” Ros, Alexandre “Narkuss” Mege, Luc “Sharkk” Gonçalves, Alexis “Melon” Barrachin, and Alexis “Chap” Barret.
Team Italy: Kevin “Lazuriel” Pirrone, Alessandro “Fragolaqt” Zappalà, Aki “lol_aki,” Manconi “Counter” Giacomo, and Paolo “paoloidolo” Marcucci.
Team Spain: Antonio “Th3Antonio” Espinosa, Daniel “ElOjoNinja” Vaquero, Alicia “Zeiing,” Carritos “Carritoskami” Kami, and Manute “manutegaming.”
Team France came out on top, winning $35,000.
Team France emerge victorious as the first #TwitchRivals @LeagueOfLegends Country Showdown Champions at #TwitchCon Europe! 🏆🇫🇷
Congratulations @NarkussLol, @LRB_LoL, @LoL_Melon, @Chap_GG & @Sharkk_LoL! pic.twitter.com/uVgkTBr9Oe
— Twitch Esports (@TwitchEsports) April 14, 2019
Twitch Rivals League of Legends All-Stars Showdown
The League of Legends tournament also featured an All-Stars match between Team North America and Team Europe. Streamers from these two regions battled it out for a prize-pool of $25,000.
Team North America: Foggedftw2, Christian “IWDominate” Rivera, Drew “Midbeast” Timbs, Hammoudi “Yassuo” Abdalrhman, and Nicki Taylor.
Team Europe: Andrea “Katare” Suchodolski, Frederik “NoWay” Hinteregger, Elm “ElmiilloR” Cherto, Amalie “Proxyfox” Reisvaag, and RealZenten
Team Europe beat Team NA, and won $20,000.
Team Europe reign supreme in #TwitchRivals @LeagueOfLegends All-Star Match at #TwitchCon Europe!
Congratulations @Elmiillor @ProxyfoxLoL @noway4u_sir @LRB_LoL & @ZentenLoL! 🏆 pic.twitter.com/vdkmSrEs8o
— Twitch Esports (@TwitchEsports) April 14, 2019
Streaming 101
Day 2 consisted of another Streaming 101 event, covering different topics and hosted by different streamers. The topics covered on day 2 were ‘Essential Legal Advice for Every Streamer’, ‘Working with Brands and Finding Sponsored Opportunities’ and ‘Collaborating to Grow Together’
Twitch Sings Live
The Twitch Sings Live event was hosted by Marcus “djWHEAT” Graham and Anna Prosser. The four finalists from Twitch Sings: Stream Star competed in an entertaining singing competition for a grand prize of $20,000.
KawauTV, fuslie and VenusWorld were the judges for the tournament. They provided great insight and feedback for all the performances. However, the winners were decided by viewer votes. All the viewers could vote for their favorite performer using a voting extension which was created for this event.
The Contestants and Winner:
The finalists from Twitch Sings: Stream Star, BrianBBright, LaraLoft, MermaidUnicorn and narindipity were the contestants. LaraLoft was crowned the winner of the event.
Article 13: What Does it Mean for You?
The following speakers gave a complete description of Article 13, and talked what kind of problems it causes to content creators from EU, and what it means for companies like Twitch and YouTube.
The Speakers:
- Christiane Stuetzle, Partner at Morrison & Foerster LLP
- Tiemo Wolken, Member of the European Parliament
- Pala “Pala” Gilroy Sen
Article 13 of the EU Copyright Directive (Which was later renamed to Article 17) is the European Union’s plan to fix/improve the way copyright works on the Internet. The main purpose of this directive, is to help divide money more evenly between artists like musicians and painters, and the platforms that share the artists’ content on the Internet, like YouTube, Twitch, Twitter and Facebook.
Instead of presenting you with the vague definitions provided by the article, I will give you a simple description of major points of this article. You can skip the description and watch the VOD instead. The description gives a basic idea of the problems posed by Article 13.
Article 13
Article 13 will hold platforms like Twitch and YouTube legally responsible for any copyrighted content that is hosted on their platform. Here’s what could be potentially described as content which infringes copyright:
The major issue with Article 13 is that it doesn’t mention how the platforms are meant to stop this from happening. According to the critics, there is only one way in which this can be made possible, and that is ‘upload filters’. Upload filters would be programs which would check all content that is uploaded onto the platform for any copyright infringement. If there is any copyright infringing content in what is being uploaded, the program will automatically delete the content.
The big problem with this is that we do not have the technology to create a program which can perfectly judge whether the content has any copyright infringing material or not. Because of this, a lot of harmless content will never reach the Internet due to these Upload filters.
The only other option is Human reviews, which basically means that the platforms will have to employ people to check all the content which is being uploaded onto their platform. This is clearly not a practical choice, because of the huge amount of content that is being uploaded every second.
Here’s the VOD from the event:
Special Performance by Philip Sheppard:
Philip Sheppard once again put out some wonderful musical performances and played some fun games with surprise guests.
Twitch Yearly Europe
The event came to a conclusion with a celebration of the Twitch community with Twitch Yearly Europe. AnnaProsser, djWHEAT and special European guest speakers present the Twitch year in review to close the convention.
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