According to “sources familiar with the pact”, Variety is reporting that Google (specifically, YouTube) has already reached a deal to buy game streaming service Twitch. For, oh, $US1 billion.
UPDATE: The Wall Street Journal disputes this, and claims that while a deal is indeed being worked on, “The talks are at an early stage, and a deal isn’t imminent”.
That’s an insane amount of money, but then, thanks to the growing popularity of streaming – not to mention the fact Twitch has become a key player in the next-gen console marketplace – it might, in the long-run, turn out to be a savvy investment.
Variety reports, however, that it’s not quite a done deal; seems Google’s lawyers are ready for a challenge from the Justice Department on the grounds of competition issues, given the fact that both services are already #1 in their respective fields.
A recent report from networking company Sandvine says that Twitch has now broken into the top 15 users of bandwidth during peak hours in North America, growing from 0.46% of all “downstream bandwidth” in Fall 2013 to 1.35% by March this year.
It doesn’t take long to envisage the potential pluses in such a deal. Twitch could definitely benefit from YouTube’s tech and reliability. Then again, we have enough trouble with copyright claims on YouTube as it is. Bringing Twitch into that fold could be a nightmare-in-waiting…
We’ve contacted Twitch for comment, and will update if we hear back.
UPDATE (this is Twitch PR):
YouTube to Acquire Video game-Streaming Service Twitch for $US1 Billion: Sources [Variety]
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30 responses to “Report: YouTube Is Buying Twitch For $US1 Billion”
This is Sparta
Update : This is Sparta too
It is? Man, I knew I should have taken a left at Albuquerque.
“and now here’s something we hope you’ll really like”
“and now for something completely different”
Here is the Update
Looks like the update was supposed to be this tweet: https://twitter.com/ChasejustChase/status/468164124111695872
“For those asking about the story today, Twitch doesn’t comment on rumors.”
So not much of an update anyway.
Weird I’m sure I both saw the updated article with Update 2 on it and edited my joke to match but it seems to revert back to the old article. Ruined the joke 🙁
Yeah, I saw the update 2 as well…
$1 billion seems low if it accounted for 1.35% of NA downstream bandwidth. Also would it be Google’s money or Youtube’s?
I think the article’s first sentence is misleading as Youtube belongs Google and not separate entity. The wording should be:
Noooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo o.
So they can bring the same log-in crap which everyone hated on Youtube? =/
Yeah I’m not sure how this will go. Content moderation etc. By any means I don’t think it will benefit Twitch users at all.
Twitch would pretty much die if Google even attempts to shove the same Content ID system they have on Youtube.
I hope this happens if only so that someone somewhere will get off their fat ass and fix their ridiculous braindead fucking traffic routing “solution” which sees connections from Australia and New Zealand receiving data from American servers being routed through Europe then back to viewers.
Fucking absurd.
Oh boy! I can’t wait for all streams to get copyright claims and shut down!
Or “This stream is unavailable in your country”
But, it’s my stream and I live in Australia…
Doesn’t matter. They won’t care lol
Well it was fun while it lasted 🙁
Dammit – I was just getting into twitch and now along comes google to fuck things up yet again.
1) Streamers will lose revenue from ads due to copyright.
2) Some games will be banned from streaming out-right, or a paid licence will be required.
3) Full time streamers will stop, as their income lowers/stops.
4) Twitch dies out, streamers will build up a new streaming site.
5) Copious amount of suing ensues.
Twitch wasn’t the first streaming site, and it has no patents / copyright on streaming from what I can see.
Also US1billion is pennies. I hope the actual figure is much higher.
Content ID notices streaming in HD!!!!
Content ID notices I’m streaming games! Better stop streaming in case they ban my account for showing gameplay
I can’t wait to tie my google+ to twitch!
Can someone explain why Twitch is so popular? I tried it, and maybe it’s just not for me, but why watch someone else play a game when you can just enjoy the game yourself?
It’s kind of like watching sport, but also not really. I can even sort of understand watching the top players in the world eg, SC or Dota Tournaments. But the “Pro” crowd make up a tiny amount of Twitch…
The rest just seems like anyone can just turn it on and stream their gameplay. Who would want to watch me play a game? Why would they?
Sometimes it’s more interesting to have on in the background than television.
You’ll see new games pretty quickly – went to twitch to see Ground Zeroes and the 360 version of Titanfall
Plus you see some incredible things – I watched one guy speedrun Dark Souls and was absolutely blown away by how many levels are in that game!
I’m super conflicted on this. On the one hand maybe streams will work at resolutions higher than “potato” even on a reasonable 30mbps connection. On the other hand the stream will no longer have audio or gameplay footage due to ContentID finding “infringements”. So it’ll just be smooth Hd playback of a streamer’s facecam.