Ending “It’s Twitch chat, there’s nothing you can do.”
How often have we heard someone dismiss Twitch chat as uncontrollable? How many of us just close it on a large stream rather than even try to engage? Why is it such a mental block that Twitch chat needs to be addressed?
The first piece of advice any talent had for me when I worked my first event was “Don’t look at twitch chat.” Doesn’t it seem odd that we all just look to excuse the problem rather than do something about it? I don’t subscribe to this line of thinking, and I truly believe there is so much more that can be done. After we have watched our communities rocked by victims coming forward with their stories of abuse, studies about in game toxicity, and a clear systemic problem of inappropriate behavior — doesn’t it seem like addressing the ‘Twitch chat culture’’ of esports and gaming might be a valid step?
Anyways, this isn’t a long philosophical ‘should we do something about twitch chat’ article. This is straight up me saying yes, do something, stop being lazy, stop accepting it, I don’t care how big the stream is, there are so many basic steps that can be easily followed to make a start.
This may fall on deaf ears, but for anyone out there who actually wants a better Twitch chat experience, here is what I do/would recommend. And none of these are perfect, everything takes iteration. But you need to start with something before you can iterate on it. (Examples provided at the end).
THE BASIC INGREDIENTS
1. Write real rules. Put them everywhere. (Under the stream, in a bot command, in a timer that regularly pops up in chat, in the chat rules section that people have to agree to, on Twitter when you announce a stream is live, the streamer/caster/talent/production reads them, visual pop up on stream etc) Do not apologize for them. And have this handy XKCD comic about free speech ready. Memes about whining about free content are good too.
2. Have mods. Even their presence in chat can be enough to deter people from inappropriate behavior. There are so many caveats to this point, I’ll try to keep it brief. If you are a LARGE stream (like a tournament organizer) then PAY ONE OF THEM at the very least. If you are a small streamer, sometimes you have to rely on a regular you may not know well. Establish clear boundaries that moderation status is based out of need and is nothing personal, so de-modding someone if they don’t measure up or are no longer necessary shouldn’t be taken personally.
3. Have clear guidelines for your mods. What kind of behavior is a warning? What equals a time out, and for how long? When do you just instantly ban someone? Who is the main decision maker, especially if the streamer/main production is busy? They need to be empowered the appropriate amount for the stream. The larger a stream is, the clearer this needs to be.
4. SET UP CUSTOM FILTERS FOR THE STREAM. Between automod, moobot, nightbot, and whatever else there is out there — there are so many ways to easily filter out 50% of toxicity immediately. I personally prefer using a bot, because that requires the user sends the messaged, then the bot bans it, and the streamer and mods see that it happens. Automod won’t send the message if it gets caught in the filters, which means you have a harder time knowing which viewers might be a problem. You can filter out specific phrases, use wildcards to catch spelling variations, and even ban certain emotes. Sample list found HERE.
5. Set up character and emoji limits, slow mode if necessary, follower requirements, and/or account verification requirements. Good faith discussions do not need 500+ characters in Twitch chat, and no one actually needs to spam emojis, everyone can survive with limits on those. If people truly enjoy the content, they can wait a set amount of time after following before they talk. Requiring accounts with confirmed email addresses can help limit new account spam.
EXAMPLES
RULES
Variable: Common themes: languages allowed, back seating allowed y/n, spoilers allowed y/n, politics allowed y/n.
Universal: No racism, sexism, bigotry, and/or toxicity. Good faith engagements only. Literacy required. Read all rules before chatting. Attempting to navigate the filters will result in a time out and eventual ban.
Custom: For my stream, as someone who plays solo and has very specific music tastes and gets creeped on a decent amount: Do not ask to play with me, do not ask to add me, do not demand music changes.
For a tournament stream: Do not spoil match results. No discussion of betting outcomes. Keep criticism of casters constructive. No threats of any kind will be tolerated, such as death threats against players/casters.
AND A REMINDER: Rules do nothing if they are not shared and enforced. No one needs to be ashamed for having rules, and those who scream loudly about rules being too strict are often the ones who want the freedom to be toxic. We should normalize regularly going over the rules on large broadcasts with verbal and text statements that constantly state that bigotry, racism, sexism, and toxicity will not be tolerated.
FILTERS
Banned emotes: Cmonbruh, Trihard, and Anele regularly get used in racist contexts. While it doesn’t seem great to only let a bunch of emotes of white people still be allowed and ban a lot of the not white people emotes, far too many users spam these emotes to be racist and then claim ‘what, it’s a twitch emote, I’m not racist!’. We all know exactly what happened when SumaiL is playing, or Team Nigma. There’s no reason to allow this to happen.
Additionally, I have the LUL emote banned. Initially it was because bad actors spammed CS LUL and I didn’t feel like seeing it — but then I realized something beautiful. People who actually want to use Twitch chat for conversation don’t particularly mind. It may occasionally annoy them when they forget, but their overall experience isn’t really hindered by typing lol instead of lul. People who complain non stop and starting whining about ‘muh free speech’? You can tell that all they want to do is be a toxic element, and if they can’t exist without their single emote spam, they are probably part of the problem. Having a common emote like that banned in your chat can be a very good way to identify problematic mind sets who don’t respect stream rules and dissuade them from even engaging/sticking around.
Filtered words: There are some basics that should be on every filter list. Obviously the n word first and foremost (and there is a global chat filter that you can enable as well that will hit some of these). Other good terms: rape, rapist, raping, faggot, fag, retard, slut, whore, cleavage, thot (I know, this one is going to have mixed feelings, and this isn’t the place to get into it). Pro tip — add an asterisk (at least on Nightbot) to expand the words that are caught. Thot* will catch thot, thotting, thotty. Retard* will get that and retarded, etc.
WATCH THE CHAT. These need to be regularly updated. EASY EXAMPLE — I had an entire 50K+ stream spamming ‘milk jugs’ about me during Epicenter because indeed, I am not flat chested. Am I offended? No, I was at a Major doing what I loved. I was pretty happy. Should it have been allowed? Heck no. Add it to the banned list immediately, there is literally no point in allowing it to exist. Stay vigilant on those trends, and stop caring about people whining about it on social media. By allowing that behavior to continue, you are saying that degradation is a part of your employment policy, and you care more about protecting the right of someone to be toxic than the right of someone else to be treated like a person.
Filtered phrases: This is the brilliance of filtering — you can cut out entire phrases! (Like the above example) As a woman, people seem particularly unable to keep their back seating to themselves, about everything, not just in game back seating. Yes, I had someone try to tell me ‘you should take care of yourself sexually, because in that moment, only you are worth it’ Crossing a line? Creepy? Weird? Yeah, all of those. That’s in addition to viewers saying what hero to pick, item to buy, color to dye your hair, workout pattern, music you absolutely have to change to right this second, etc.
My secret? Banning the phrase ‘you should’. You would be amazed at how much back seating it instantly destroys. It forces people to stop and think about if what they are saying is appropriate, and a nightbot automated 5s timeout means that the moderators and streamer knows that this is an account to maybe keep an eye on.
The key phrases for an individual stream are where a lot of iterating is required. Do you want to limit the amount of hate casters get? Banning ‘caster babyrage’ will cut out a lot of the instant whining. Do you want to cut down on spoilers? Ban ‘[team name] won’ (this will hit people who are just giving results after the fact though, so consider how strict you want filters to be). Other phrases like ‘kill yourself’, ‘hey baby’, ‘calm down’ are all useful to handle inherent sexism, tone policing, and inappropriate hate and rage.
I am constantly playing with phrase filters depending on current trends, new bad actors in chat, and which good faith actors are accidentally getting caught by them. Moderation isn’t one easy step, this is constant work. We have to acknowledge the problem that unmoderated toxicity creates, and constantly address it.
Sample list found HERE.
MOD RULES
This feels very stream specific but an example could be:
- Streamer makes all final decisions, mod X,Y,Z has pretty much free reign, ask them if you have any questions
- Offense: intentional chat filter evasion, mild sexism/racism, spoilers, back seating. First time message deleted and an @ explaining why it was against the rules. Second offense is a 5 minute ban, third is 30 min, then 24 hour ban, then stream ban if it is continued behavior
- Offense: Ban evasion with a new account and/or chat brigading. Instant ban and recommendation for everyone to report said accounts for ban evasion and harassment
- Offense: Extreme sexism/racism/bigotry, inappropriate pictures, doxxing, threats against streamer or other people: Ban and report. Screenshot and save for authorities when appropriate.
- Offense: Inappropriate username. Inform user their name is not acceptable. Do not ban and give them a chance to adjust it and/or explain. Report and ban as necessary.
All in all — we have a toxicity problem in the gaming space. We have acknowledged it and many people have paid the price to bring this issue into the light. You may have always known it was out there, but recently, the gaming space has done what they can to teach everyone how truly bad it is. It’s time to take the steps to address toxicity at every step of the pyramid, toxicity in twitch chat being one of those steps.
