With the recent launch of YouTube’s gaming hub, Twitch now has some real competition in the world of video game live streaming. YouTube’s new service has received a lot of positive feedback so far, and in order to keep pace, Twitch has announced several new features of its own. During the first annual TwitchCon event, which took place between September 25-26 in San Francisco, Twitch CEO Emmett Shear revealed his company’s plans to launch direct video uploads and playlists for its streamers.
Twitch is first and foremost a platform on which gamers can live stream their play sessions (and pick up thousands of viewers along the way), but the new video uploads will let those gamers share with their fans without having to first complete a live stream. Twitch’s playlist feature will also afford the site’s users an opportunity to move away from streams by allowing them to share a selection of archived videos on their channels, even when they’re not live.
Both of these new features are clear attempts to compete with YouTube. Twitch’s high-quality live streams have always been an undeniable strength, but skipping around those streams to find specific moments has stood out as a specific weakness. As a result, many of the site’s users have spread their video presence across two platforms: They stream live on Twitch, and then collect the best moments from their streams in highlight videos posted to YouTube. By enabling video uploads and playlists, Twitch has a chance to keep some of that “highlights” traffic on its own site, and that’s particularly important given YouTube’s plan to host more live streams of its own, thus making inroads into Twitch’s territory.
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Other changes coming to Twitch include an update to the site’s “Whispers” feature and a switch to HTML5 in favor of Flash. Shear’s entire keynote address, which also includes an appearance from popular streamer djWHEAT, can be found on Twitch’s official channel:
