6.12.3 Importance of communication: Streamer to viewer and viewer to streamer (prospectus)

In my final essay I will be discussing how and why communication happens between streamers and viewers. This topic is relevant to my experience because I am new to the streaming world. Being new to streaming and trying different platforms to gain and reach audiences in the last month I have gained 50 followers. Hearing how other streamers started and how fast they reached their growth inspires me to keep streaming. You must stream gameplay at least 40 hours a week. For instance, there is a streamer who started out the same time I did he now has 14,000 followers, the only difference between me and his stream success is he did 24-hour streams, 48-hour streams. The followers came easy for him after 3 or 4 weeks of streaming. Communicating with the viewers is a big reason they will keep coming back to view your stream. Also, the level of gameplay on how good you are at the game is a deciding factor for viewership. Im not trying to get rich from streaming but by doing the research essay I will gain knowledge on how and why viewers watch a stream. My Thesis statement will be how communication leads to viewers and why they stay in the stream.  

Streaming is all about communication from viewer to streamer, streamer to viewer and talking throughout the stream with teammates. Communication is a major key to a streamer’s success. I did not realize how much communication is being used while streaming Until I started researching the topic. In my experience I would communicate to viewers but there is more communication that is required to be successful in streaming. Any one can communicate but to communicate effectively is a different story. Having an intelligent engaging interaction with someone through a camera lens, viewers talking to you through commenting in a chat box, reading the viewers comments and acknowledging them is hard to do all while playing a game. With going back to school and learning to communicate in a more effective way will help with streaming. Communication is simple enough, the literacy is difficult, from reading comments, engaging with the audiences, answering as much questions and playing well all determines the how and why viewers watch.  

Some of the research questions I will be answering are why does a viewer watch a live stream? How communication helps the stream? Does communication help with other interpersonal skills? Do viewers watch stream to gain gratification from streamer acknowledgment? Why is communication in streaming important? What kind of literacies are used within streaming? I will also include my experience with watching and communicating with streamers I watch and my experience when I am streaming. 

The academic fields that are related to my topic of communication from streamer to viewer and viewer to streamer are linked to one another. These academic fields are communication technology, behavioral psychology, Computer sciences, computer technology, developmental psychology, and social psychology. These academic fields investigate how and why communication from streamer to viewers and viewers to streamer happen. Streaming is up and coming there are studies happening to gather data on recent years since there are more platforms for streaming in recent years.  

I will start my research essay with an introduction paragraph. Within this introduction paragraph I will discuss how communication reading and writing plays a role on the streaming platforms in a brief condensed paragraph. In a couple sentences I will discuss how streamers interact with there audiences, how viewers interact with the streamer, why they interact with one another, and show the importance of communication from my own experiences. These questions will lead to other questions on how and why interactions happen within a stream. I will end my intro with a thesis to my essay which is why and how communication happens within a stream. 

 In my next paragraph, I will discuss how communication happens within a stream. I will go over some streaming terms and how the viewers to streamer communication happens. In this section I will be putting info I find from a scholarly article with the data they find on how communication works within a stream. I will have a few articles to help break down how communication happens in a stream. In this paragraph I will discuss the research topic of how communication works within a stream.  

Next, I will start discussing why the communication is happening. I will explain why from a viewer’s point of view and I will explain from a streamer point of view. In this section I will use a scholarly article data on why communication happens within a stream from both views of viewers and streamers. In the paragraph I will discuss the research topic of why communication is important during a stream. 

Next, I will discuss if communication within streaming helps other interpersonal skills. I will use the data in a scholarly article to determine whether other interpersonal skill are developing. I will also show how communication works by a stream setup video. This will show what kinds of equipment is used to broadcast a live stream. By showing how communication starts from the equipment to streamer engaging with the audience. This will bring in another research question of how and why a viewer communicates to the streamer.  

I will use live streams from primetime gaming on Facebook. He is a great example and shows how he communicates to his community. He has 45,000 followers 3,000 supporters, and at least 200 people watching his stream at once. He reads almost every comment that is being asked to him. He engages with the audience and the audience is intrigued to stay around. Primetime is a great example because he talks for hours and barely plays the game anymore. To just sit talk and have 200 viewers is impressive. This also shows the gratification that happens through the interactions happening during the stream. Which will help answer the research question of why communication happens.  

Another streamer I will show is hitman gaming, why people watch his live stream is because it is very entertaining. The worst gamer but he keeps viewers coming back to watch. He has over 200,000 followers and a minimum of 1,000 people watching him live and had 4.5 thousand viewers watching him live at once. He demonstrates how and why communication is important during the stream. The way he interacts with his community is in a vulgar, rude, sexual way but it is very entertaining. 

To wrap things up I will take my personal experience of how and why I watch some streamers. Some streamers I watch because they do read off my comments and I feel important. Other streamer I watch because of the high level of gameplay and try to re enact their gameplay in my own. Other streamers I watch is because I play with them and I am part of the community. The streamers I will use for these examples are king Kaplow live gaming, stylez qp gang, and phree gaming. I will also show from my experience how I communicate and interact while I am live and streaming. This is how I will write my final research paper for English 102 

Annotated Bibliography 

Diwanji, Vaibhav, et al. “Don’t Just Watch, Join in: Exploring Information Behavior and Copresence on Twitch.” Computers in Human Behavior, vol. 105, 2020, p. 106221., doi:10.1016/j.chb.2019.106221. 

In this article, “Don’t just watch join in” by Diwanii Vaibhav, et al. explains how experiences of live streaming helps create the interaction between viewer and streamer on streaming platforms. The interactions happen in various ways such as production information, reception information, reaction information and reward information. By observing how streamers on twitch, dooleynotedgaming and gotholion, over a period they gained enough valid information to on go the research question. These research questions gathered by observing and monitoring the live stream helps obtain the data needed. The data collected what favorite to least way of interactions were taking place and how they were taking place. 

Wohn, Donghee Yvette, et al. “Understanding Digital Patronage.” Proceedings of the Annual Symposium on Computer-Human Interaction in Play, 2019, doi:10.1145/3311350.3347160. 

In the second article,“Understanding Digital Patronage: Why Do People Subscribe to Streamers on Twitch?” by Donghee Yvette Wohn Peter Eskander et al.links how a community is created around a particular streamer. The interaction of subscribing to a streamer is key to create a digital patronage. Why do people subscribe to a streamer which involves paying a monthly sub fee when anyone can view a streamer free of charge. Interviews were performed on 16 different subscribers. From the interviews conducted the question why subscribe was answered by the subscribers saying the quality content was key selling point.  

 Sjöblom, Max, and Juho Hamari. “Why Do People Watch Others Play Video Games? An Wohn, Donghee Yvette, et al. “Understanding Digital Patronage.” Proceedings of the Annual Symposium on Computer-Human Interaction in Play, 2019, doi:10.1145/3311350.3347160. 

In the third article, “Why do people watch others play video games? An empirical study on the motivations of Twitch user” by Max Sjoblom Juho Hamari explain that viewers view streams for the gratification and why do viewers watch streams for hours upon hours. The viewers want the content of live broadcasting “real time” rather than a television broadcast. The study enlisted an investigation of five ways to motivate the viewer to chime in a certain streamer . The main and overall reason people tune into a stream from the results gathered is to release tension. The findings also indicated a positive predictor of how many hours users watch a stream. 

Recktenwald, Daniel. (2018). The Discourse of Online Live Streaming on Twitch: Communication between conversation and Commentary.  

In the fourth article by Recktenwald, Daniel,”Live streaming is a new form of online broadcasting of video games from live streaming platforms”. In the visual game, it has a “computer-mediated communication” between a streamer and a decently sized active chat. The way of communicating online via live stream is quickly spreading to other kinds of online live broadcasting (gaming platforms, discords, obs equipment, just chatting live streams). A few experts in sociological and ethnographic studies argue that live streaming is a mix up of talking or commenting and gameplay commentary. In this study the conversation is told to dissolve in higher viewership’s because how chaotic chats are with people commenting to the streamer. In this study they research on describing the organization of how discourses occur during the live stream.  

Nascimento, Gustavo & Ribeiro, Manoel & Cerf, Loic & Cesario, Natalia & Kaytoue, Mehdi & Raïssi, Chedy & Vasconcelos, Thiago & Meira Jr, Wagner. (2014). Modeling and Analyzing the Video Game Live-Streaming Community. Proceedings – 9th Latin American Web Congress, LA-WEB 2014. 1-9. 10.1109/LAWeb.2014.9. 

In the fifth article, “modeling and analyzing the video game live streaming community”, discusses that with higher growing rates in the gaming industry, streaming video games are rising. By how popular of live streaming platforms are creating more platforms for video gaming. They study how streamers and spectators behave by observing the chat to gather a more thorough understanding how streamers behave, and how online entertainment like live streaming is different but changing the gaming world by being different than previous platforms. They observe the time spent on a streamers page based on current viewers which help describe behavioral patterns.  

Wulf, T., Schneider, F.M., & Queck, J. (in press). Exploring viewers’ experiences of parasocial interactions with videogame streamers on Twitch. Cyberpsychology, Behavior, and Social. 

In the sixth article, they study the difference of watching regular tv and live video streaming where you can directly talk to the streamer. They observed and analyzed in three categories, individual, collective and no addressing and attention vs no attention with the chat. They come to find that more interactions helped with why viewers viewed the stream. 

gaming,primetime.“StreamingTips!!”Https://Www.facebook.com/2263866483670387/Videos/457919612092126, Facebook.com. 

In this 7^th source is video, you will visually see comments being answered streamer to viewer. This video shows how communication works within live streaming between streamer and viewer. He begins with I’m opening chat ask me something and he starts replying. He answers a large amount of question. He also describes some equipment needed for live streams and why he uses certain equipment. 

Hitmangaming“warzonetimebaby,letsgo!”https://www.facebook.com/102135107877754/videos/201256565099085, Facebook.com 

In this 8^th source is video that shows you will see how viewers in the chat are entertained. He is a horrible gamer, but he is entertaining therefore people love him. He is vulgar and people love how vulgar he can be. Hitman gaming engages with his audience but overall he receives views because of the entertainment which answers the question of why viewers watch streamers.  

King Kaplow Live “follower Fridays”, https://www.facebook.com/110232784004090/videos/913491892759836 facebook.com 

In this 9^th source is video of king Kaplow has the follower Friday games. This is a day where the streamer plays 2 consecutive matches with 3 people that follow his streaming page on facebook. He demonstrates and explains the gameplay strategies as the progresses. He communicates with followers in the way of playing games and helps gain his community. 

Phree gaming, “#2 sniper in warzone” https://www.facebook.com/103870221691735/videos/459218541799975 facebook.com 

In this 10^th source is video, Phree gaming is new streamer on facebook gaming. In this video it shows you how he engages with viewers. Where phree asks the viewers if they are not following type in chat a way he can gain your followership. His gameplay is advanced and tells play by play gameplay. He has only been streaming for 8 weeks and has gained 25 thousand followers. This is a reason why people follow and watch his stream because of the high level of gameplay.  

Stylez qp, “TOP 9000 IN THE WORLD -“KILLS”#1 AFRO ON FACEBOOK!” https://www.facebook.com/112076670215695/videos/184384773300805 facebook.com 

In this 11^th source is video of another streamer that has higher average viewers. This video shows how communication happens during a stream. He interacts with the community and gives high level gameplay. He plays games that consist of quad matches mainly and as you can see in the game title, he is top 9000 in kills in the world. 

Youtube.com. 2021. [online] Available at: <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7xggjnvT_Ok> [Accessed 30 March 2021]. 

In this 12^th source is video of equipment that is necessary for streaming video games. It explains a cheaper way to have a streaming setup. They go over pc monitors wires software and mic setup. This is how the communication happens during the stream by having the proper equipment that helps streamers engage in their live stream.