Blizzard and Twitch to Start Monitoring Twitch Chat

Blizzard's Dreamhack tournament was the other day, and golly, it was a treat to watch. I assume. I'm too busy to sit down and watch these things, and, as you may or may not know, I kind of dislike Blizzard Entertainment anyway, so.

Anyway, the long and the short of it is, one of the competitors was a young gentleman known as Terrence “TerrenceM” Miller, who is a Hearthstone professional and managed to get second place. Good for him. What's less good for him, however, is that he happens to be a young gentleman of color, and when the Twitch audience happens to see anyone who is not white and male, casual racism/sexism can be expected. But apparently, the level of racism Mr. Miller experienced during the tournament went beyond 'casual' into the realm of downright frightening.

In response to this, Blizzard has since made comment on the behavior of the Twitch audience, and has vowed to do something about their renegade racism:

“We’re extremely disappointed by the hateful, offensive language used by some of the online viewers during the DreamHack Austin event the weekend before last. One of our company values is ‘Play Nice; Play Fair’; we feel there’s no place for racism, sexism, harassment, or other discriminatory behavior, in or outside of the gaming community. This is obviously a larger, societal problem that affects us on many levels. We can only hope that when instances like this come to light it encourages people to be more thoughtful and positive, and to fully reject mean-spirited commentary, whether within themselves or from their fellow gamers.

“To help combat this type of behavior during live events, we’ve reached out to players, streamers, and moderators, along with partners like Twitch, DreamHack, and others, to get consensus and collaborate on what to do differently moving forward. To that end, we’re investigating a pilot program that Twitch has in the works to streamline moderation and combat ban evasion. We’re also updating our esports tournament partner policies with a stronger system of checks, balances, and repercussions to provide a better chat experience around our content.”

Looks like good ol' fashioned censorship is coming to the premiere video game streaming website. Now, anyone whose seen the Twitch chat can tell you that part of the appeal is the chaotic, wild-west nature of the chat, and how it can inspire a culture all of its own (see: Twitch Plays Pokemon). But, all the same, when that same crazy behavior can create such hate, I can see why some checks might be necessary, at least, during these professional events.

Man, that's sad. That we even NEED that kind of stuff in 2016, and people haven't figured out that it isn't okay, even over Twitch. Ugh. Now I'm depressed.  Whatever.  While it's merely a statement for now, Blizzard is clearly making steps to do something--as for what specifically that will end up being, it's hard to say now, but I'll keep my eyes peeled and fingers crossed... I suspect a sh*tstorm is soon to follow.