We’re used to microtransactions in games, but microtransactions in livestreams? I guess the future really is now. Twitch is going to allow us to pay to cheer for our favorite personalities, with the person streaming getting an undisclosed amount of money from each cheer.
Here’s how it works. People spend real money through Amazon Payments to purchase Twitch Bits. They start at $1.40 for 100 Bits, and go all the way up to $308 for 25,000 BBits. Discounts kick in at the 1,500 Bit/$19.95 mark. People can then type “cheer1,” “cheer100,” “cheer1000,” “cheer5000,” or “cheer10000” to trigger one of five different emote animations. As you cheer, you’ll earn Cheer Chat Badges for 1, 100, 1,000, 5,000, 10,000, and 100,000 cheers, to show you’re a big spender.
In a way, I suppose it’s a positive thing. People are getting a means of supporting content creators. But, it’s also super weird to see “Twitch” and “microtransactions” in the same sentence. We’ll have to see if cheering becomes the next big thing after the beta ends.
Source: Twitch