#i watched a video about streaming platforms and not so pissy about it if youre wondering where this is coming from

[charrfie]

Reminder that giant monopolistic corporations and subscription services and paywalls are bullshit and that at any given opportunity you should be preserving the media you love by any means possible

[jemej3m]

gamer au please 🥺👉🏻👈🏻

if anyone anons me those three emojis again i will have a conniption 

*

So what if Andrew was no longer in the top-three on the scoreboard? He didn’t care. He so didn’t care. He couldn’t give less of a shit, really. 

Riko had always been in the first-place slot, and Kevin had found himself quite comfortable in second. 

But now, a little shit by the username neiljosten, had snatched Andrew’s place in third. 

He didn’t give a shit. Who would? Definitely not him. He couldn’t care less about the game. EXY was a shit game, anyway. He barely played it. 

“Oi!” Nicky yelled, rapping his fist on Andrew’s bedroom door and making a general racket. “It’s almost time to stream, Andrew!” 

Andrew glared balefully at the screen before throwing aside his controller and storming out of his room. 

“Someone’s still pissy he’s not in the top three anymore,” Aaron taunted, already on the couch with a bowl of chips. His girlfriend, Katelyn, had the salsa between her knees as she tugged on her headset. Erik, Nicky’s husband, was already figuring out tech stuff and testing audio. 

They were called the Fantastic Five, mostly because they were all kick-ass and had made themselves careers through e-sports. Erik and Aaron both coded but had a small online following. Katelyn’s main passion was animation, but every Sunday she settled down with her boyfriend and her boyfriend’s family, posting stream highlights to her second channel the next day. 

Nicky had a day job as a marketing manager at Aaron and Erik’s game developing company, F0X Games. That was the same company that’d released EXY, the newest hot-shot game out there. 

With a public scoreboard. That Andrew was no longer third-place on. 

“Definitely salty,” Nicky agreed, settling between Aaron and Erik. Andrew took the chair in the corner, tugging his hoodie up over his mouth and nose and sinking into the cushions. 

“I didn’t think you cared about any of this shit,” Aaron muttered, knocking his controller to wake it up. Andrew just flipped him off and looked to the screen. 

“Okay, we’re live in three,” Erik said, settling back into the couch and leaning on his husband with a grin. 

“I’m going to tank all your asses in Mariokart,” Nicky said, cheerful. “Get ready.” 

Andrew just rolled his eyes. 

Fourth game in, Andrew was steadily coming 12th place. The others were all ignoring his tantrum, battling it out for the top three. Meanwhile, he was hellbent on driving backwards and tried completing the whole track in reverse. He didn’t give a fuck if everyone on the stream saw him sitting there, wallowing. He had his hood up and his cat socks on. He was definitely looking a little worse-for-wear.

“Ten dollar donation!” Katelyn cheered, squinting at the screen. “Uh, neiljosten says: didn’t realise minyard was such a sore loser” 

Andrew sat upright, glaring at the little laptop on the coffee table. Nicky was grinning, losing his first-place position to Erik, who whooped. 

“Looks like your new rival is watching our stream, Andrew,” Aaron said, biting his lip as he fought for 3rd place with his girlfriend. 

“Neil Josten just donated another $10 and said: ‘rival? we’d only be rivals if andrew could beat my score’.” Nicky howled. “He’s antagonistic, too! Oh, Andrew. You definitely have some competition.”

Andrew grit his teeth, sitting up. He had nothing to say except: “Fuck you.” Erik whistled lowly, blue-shelling Nicky off the side of the cliff. Yelling ensued but Andrew ignored them, waiting for a response. 

neiljosten, in his cryptid-like manner, didn’t appear for the rest of the stream. 

*

His channel was relatively small. He hadn’t even showed his face yet, in neither his streams nor videos. Andrew wasn’t scouring him for information that might give him a clue as to who the hell he thought he was. He definitely didn’t care about ‘neiljosten’, whoever that may be. 

“You know what I think is a fucking scam?” Neil said, in one of his stream-highlights. “The Moriyamas monopolise this whole streaming platform and still think we won’t notice if they just give hundreds of thousands of free subscribers and followers to loud-mouthed Riko Moriyama. No one even watches his shit. He’s boringly thick-skulled and can’t play to save his life. What a jackass. Get a fucking life: one that doesn’t include taunting 12-year-olds that you beat them.” 

Without even thinking about it, Andrew snorted. In horror, he shut all the tabs that he had open on Neil Josten. So far, all he knew about him was that he was about 23, so only a year younger than Andrew was. And that he had a wickedly scathing tone when he confronted people. He’d alluded once to knowing Kevin, but Kevin Day was a famous name. Of course he would hedge he knew Kevin. 

It felt one-sided, not knowing what he looked like, where he was from. He sounded like he was from the east coast, but sometimes his tongue had a British lilt. He sometimes swore in German. Sometimes in French. Sometimes, even, in Spanish. Andrew didn’t have a clue what to think. 

At four in the morning he gave up his search. Instead, he opened up his F0X file and clicked on EXY. 

The game uploaded itself and opened the launcher. 

Low and behold, the ‘people you might know’ section of the Online listings heralded the one and only: neiljosten. 

Neil-fucking-Josten. 

Andrew had never logged so fast in his life. He trotted over to Neil’s server and location, and plopped himself into the unknown landmass. 

It was time to figure out who this little fucker was, once and for all. 

*

ignore this travesty

[algandarsplaguepositive]

There’s always been something about certain street performers that didn’t sit right with me. I remember maybe about 10 years ago, I was downtown and there was a street performer who I guess was supposed to be a human statue but if you took a picture of him without paying him, he would get irate and this seems to be a common thing with street performers (granted, not all). There’s another street performer who I haven’t seen myself in real life but I’ve seen videos on the internet about him. He does some really neat tricks and wears a wacky outfit but apparently if you try to talk to him and you don’t pay him first, he’ll be extremely rude to you. I’m also aware of the street performers in Time Square who will dress up as cartoon characters that get pissy if you take a picture of them without paying but those types of people exist in other places as well and are the worst kind of street performer, in my opinion.

I’m not trying to downplay street performance as an art or say that they’re not entitled to make a living doing what they do but the way these particular street performers go about shaming people who don’t give them money just comes across as trashy to me.

I couldn’t quite understand why I felt this way until coming across some YouTube videos talking about certain Twitch streamers that will piss and moan that people are watching their streams without paying them. In the same way, Twitch streaming and street performance are very similar. 

Twitch streamers and street performers are promoting themselves on a free platform be it a sidewalk or a free-to-use streaming service but at the risk that they may or may not make any money off of it. Performers at venues make their money in ticket sales which ensures that everybody watching their performance has paid to do so but that kind of secure payment method comes at the cost of giving a cut to the venue for hosting them. That’s the trade-off.

When you’re in a public space like a sidewalk and you’re performing your piece in front of people who may or may not pay you, you have to take into consideration the fact that it costs you nothing to be there. Similarly with Twitch streaming--it costs you nothing to use the service. Any investments you make to hone your craft be it professional AV equipment for streaming, years of practicing a musical instrument, or the cost of a costume so you can walk around looking like Elmo, are investments you make at your own risk and you can’t expect passersby to foot the bill. If enough people think that you’re talented enough to deserve their money (and if they can afford to give you money), then they will. In the meantime, stop acting like a jackass to people who don’t pay to watch you play videogames all day or walk around in a costume. And believe me, I know all about walking around in a costume--I’m a cosplayer. Whenever I go out in public wearing my outfit, I know full and well people are going to take pictures of me. Hell, if I saw me walking around, I’d take a picture of me. I don’t expect any money from it and I’m not going to accost them over it. Certainly, it is rude to take pictures of people without their consent but if I start grabbing people by the shirt, demanding money from them, I’ll start looking like the asshole here.

What I’m trying to say here is there’s nothing wrong with wanting to make money off of the things that you do but be professional about it. Post a link to your Patreon, have a donation box, encourage people to donate if they can but for fuck’s sake, don’t shame people if they can’t or don’t want to donate. Chances are, if you’re the type of person to put very little investment or effort into your work, while not paying for the platform hosting you, and all you have to say to your audience is “fuck you; pay me” you don’t deserve a dime.