For those of you who don't already know what this is about: I'm gathering various data (viewers, game, events, etc.) from all the streams that are presented on teamliquid.net (those that you can in the sidebar to your right) and use that data to produce the pretty tables and graphs you see below. The tables only contain SC2 players (that is, streams of people playing games of Starcraft 2) and not casters, teams or other streams. The tables also only contain Starcraft 2 related activities. So, for instance when CatZ is streaming Dota2, it will not be taken into account.
The data I gather is then turned into the tables you see below. One is sorted by the average viewers, the other is sorted by the average viewers times the hours streamed. The latter table favors those that stream a lot, while the former table favors popular streamers regardless of how much they stream. Either ranking has its advantages and disadvantages, and thus I present both.
For either table, I have a minimum required stream time of 5 hours to be included in the list.
The list
Due to space limitations, I have to shorten the headers and leave some data out of the tables presented here. You can get the full tables from the links below. The headers aren't as clear as I'd like them to be thanks to this, so here's a quick explanation, just in case: "Viewers" denotes the average viewers in the given month. "Hours" are the hours played. "Place diff" and "Viewer diff" are the place and viewer differences compared to last month.
Also, the HTML version linked beneath the images has some more information that I had to leave out due to space limitation, most notably the featured status of the players.
Also also, go and check outFuzic! Stijn created the awesome looking website with all kinds of stream viewership data. It's much better suited for immediate numbers and analyzing numbers from singular events. Also, it's way prettier than anything I could've ever design. (Note that his project is completely independent from mine, so if you have any questions about it, please ask him and not me. )
Now, Without further ado, here's this month's tables:
Grubby is at it again, taking a comfortable first place over DeMusliM. And this time it's a true first place, as Flash was not streaming at all last months. Congratulations!
Destiny is still pretty popular, despite being retired and out of the SC2 scene for quite a while now. In fact, he got over a thousand more viewers on average playing SC2 than playing League!
The largest drops in viewers this months are Polt, SeleCT and HuK, each losing about a thousand viewers on average. Ouch.
With Dragon retiring, this might be the last time we see him at the top of the viewers*hours list, but who knows.
PainUser scaled back his streaming habit a bit and was streaming a more reasonable 11 hours a day last month.
Congratulations to the German Protoss Honor for being the unfeatured streamer with the highest average viewer count last month, even beating the ever present Taiwanese streamer Hui!
Bisu would have made it easily into the list if it would also include BW streams. He'd be at #12 with 1754 average viewers, and a peak of 2263. Of course, that are only the numbers from snipealot's restream on twitch, and do not take into account the original viewer numbers from his afreeca stream. Brood War ain't dead!
Here's some information on some of the lesser known names in the lists:
Hui:Hui is a Taiwanese player who is mostly playing in the TeSL. His fanbase seems to be found mostly outside of teamliquid and in the Taiwanese community, unsurprisingly.
If you find any mistakes or errors in the lists, please do let me know, especially concerning team changes or players that you are absolutely sure should be on the lists, but are not.
The big picture
(The actual numbers are not important, it's the ratio between month that's important.)
Note that these are player streams only.
Much like the previous month, the player Streams are still suffering from lack of viewers. Last month I've asked for a few possible reasons for this, and here's what I've gathered so far:
WCS (1): At times it feels like there is a WCS stream on 24/7, and it is clear by now that most people prefer to watch WCS games (or any other big tournament) over a player stream. Player stream numbers always suffer once WCS is on, and subsequently, many streamers simply stopped streaming while WCS is on. And since WCS tends to stream at the most convenient times for those watching, this inevitably means worse numbers for player streams.
WCS (2): On top of that, countless streamers actually play in a WCS tournament themselves, and as such they actually have to prepare and train for their games. Practicing on stream is a very bad idea, as this gives away their builds for anyone to see, and so they practice without any audience. So WCS does not only cause less people to watch streams, it also causes less streams to be available in general.
Twitch sucks. Many of you have said that this is a big reason for not watching streams anymore. Lag even on lower quality streams, the lack of functioning chats and streams simply not working at all have all been factors to lessen the enjoyment of watching a player stream their favorite game.
School. Personally, I'm a bit ambivalent about this argument, but I'll include it here for completeness sake. School has started again for many of you, which of course means less lazy stream viewing and more learning of stuff you'll have forgotten by next year, anyhow. The reason I'm not quite convinced by this argument is that it can just as well be argued that the viewership ought to be lower during the school holidays instead, as that's the time where people go out and enjoy the real life out there, partying and dating and whatnot.
If there's any other arguments I've missed, do feel free to point them out.
WCS
The usual caveats applies:
The numbers are only from twitch.tv.
That means: No numbers from anyone watching on gomtv.net.
No numbers from Chinese streaming sites.
When there are multiple streams for one event, I will add them up only if they are different language streams. If they are the same language (OSL/GSL), I pick the stream with the higher average viewership.
Not a whole lot to say here. The numbers are down a bit, especially for WCS EU, but I'd say they're still pretty good. The really interesting numbers will come once the season finals and, of course, Blizzcon, have aired.
Go and check out these events at Fuzic for much more detailed numbers and prettier graphs!
GSTL vs. ATC vs. SC2L
There's was no Proleague last months, and god knows when the next one will be.
SC2L struggled during its first season, with vastly varying viewer numbers depending on the teams and casters (having TB cast sure never hurts the numbers), but it did pretty decently with its Final, thanks to being played live at Dreamhack. Let's hope they'll stabilize for season 2!
So that's all for this month. Hope you guys enjoyed, as always. Any kind of feedback is always welcome!
Holy crap I took a giant dive not streaming for a week to focus on WCG Canada and changing my streaming schedule to adapt to WCS Qualifier was deadly D: Thanks conti for doing these, alway super awesome !
You think you could add a "hour difference" to the 2nd graph. For example dragon got -27k viewerhour but streamed 175 hours. It would be interesting to know how many hours he streamed the previous month. Some of the streams going up in ranks or down could be easily explained by the -/+ hours streamed.
I think the personal stream stats not doing as well as it used to be is also because Grubby, Demuslim and IdrA haven't been as consistent as they used to and also WCS wrecking their potential/growth is not helping them wanting to stream more.
with dragon retiring, we won't have anyone big named and kinda high skilled to stream some high level games and occasional trolling games anymore. Anyone knows anyone who is at high level and plays some troll games from time to time? Watching dragon plays mass ghost only was probably one of my fav memory in SC2.
On October 01 2013 22:43 ETisME wrote: with dragon retiring, we won't have anyone big named and kinda high skilled to stream some high level games and occasional trolling games anymore. Anyone knows anyone who is at high level and plays some troll games from time to time? Watching dragon plays mass ghost only was probably one of my fav memory in SC2.
Bomber? He has another meaning for troll games though.
On October 01 2013 22:43 ETisME wrote: with dragon retiring, we won't have anyone big named and kinda high skilled to stream some high level games and occasional trolling games anymore. Anyone knows anyone who is at high level and plays some troll games from time to time? Watching dragon plays mass ghost only was probably one of my fav memory in SC2.
On October 01 2013 22:43 ETisME wrote: with dragon retiring, we won't have anyone big named and kinda high skilled to stream some high level games and occasional trolling games anymore. Anyone knows anyone who is at high level and plays some troll games from time to time? Watching dragon plays mass ghost only was probably one of my fav memory in SC2.
Fuzer
I wish he was streaming more, need my daily 2rax to stay healthy :D
On October 01 2013 22:43 ETisME wrote: with dragon retiring, we won't have anyone big named and kinda high skilled to stream some high level games and occasional trolling games anymore. Anyone knows anyone who is at high level and plays some troll games from time to time? Watching dragon plays mass ghost only was probably one of my fav memory in SC2.
With this destiny loses his argument that streaming sc2 cant support him. Also it was funny seeing IdrA switching his stream from sc2 to DotA while at the same time Destiny switched from LoL to sc2.
Great work, do you plan on making the same stats for DotA 2?
The lower numbers for WCS Europe may have a bit to do with Twitch. For instance, my brother used to be an avid SC2 viewer and would hardly ever miss GSL or whatever tournament was going on. However, nowadays he doesn't watch nearly as much, especially WCS, because he is fed up with how bad Twitch performs. And from what I've read on TL/Reddit, the same thing goes for plenty other people. Although I don't like blaming Twitch for the decreasing WCS numbers, they appear to be a great contributor to the declining viewership.
On October 01 2013 22:21 Uni1987 wrote: Less viewers in general every month ;(
WCS is like a vacuum. Very few time frame for players to have growth for their streams.
Is it just me, or are sc2 events badly distributed? I mean there are times with multiple tournaments running in parallel, and there are times where there is nothing at all (like the last seven hours). I mean sure, everybody wants to broadcast in the prime time, but would you also want to do it if you'd have to share the timeslot with other events? And certainly it would be better for the players, as if would allow them to participate in more tournaments more comfortable. That on the other hand would also benefit the tournament organizers because it means less downtime and a better pool of players.
edit: Agh, derailing thread again, sry.
On topic: ForGG not even top50, he is currently rank 3 gm ffs. Guess him using dailymotion and the reset of the stream just sucks too much...
Demuslim OP only 20 hours and came in 2nd place he's such a good streamer I feel sad when he gets depressed or I get depressed when he doesn't stream.... STReAM MORE DEMUSLIM IF YOU ARE ReADING THIS! <3
On October 02 2013 00:07 Pirfiktshon wrote: Demuslim OP only 20 hours and came in 2nd place he's such a good streamer I feel sad when he gets depressed or I get depressed when he doesn't stream.... STReAM MORE DEMUSLIM IF YOU ARE ReADING THIS! <3
Eh, the list for 2nd place was sorted by average viewers and is independent on amount of the hours streamed. Though on that list he is still respectable 16th place.
On October 01 2013 22:43 ETisME wrote: with dragon retiring, we won't have anyone big named and kinda high skilled to stream some high level games and occasional trolling games anymore. Anyone knows anyone who is at high level and plays some troll games from time to time? Watching dragon plays mass ghost only was probably one of my fav memory in SC2.
Have you watched QuanticYume? He's a NA GM player that plays some interesting styles, not on smurf accounts so you wont see mass PF build, but innovative strategies. I recommend him!
On October 01 2013 22:43 ETisME wrote: with dragon retiring, we won't have anyone big named and kinda high skilled to stream some high level games and occasional trolling games anymore. Anyone knows anyone who is at high level and plays some troll games from time to time? Watching dragon plays mass ghost only was probably one of my fav memory in SC2.
Actually Dragon is still streaming. I doubt that he will let his skill deteriorate too much compared to now, considering that he plans on a come back in LotV, though only time will tell.
yeah it isn't "less" viewers every month it's less people watching the personal streams of players because said viewers are either watching WCS or are tired of SC2 after having watching around 10 hours of SC2
Streaming during WCS is basically saying to yourself "I will stream with 1/3rd the audience.. if that!" Streaming after WCS means you are streaming to around half the normal audience due to fatigue.
The viewers are still there. It's just we have never had so much SC2 to watch... and it's all scheduled to cover the entire day basically.
Exactly what LiquidiNcontroL says at least for me.
also i must say the viewer perspective is much more entertaining when watching casted /observed games instead of a player ultra switching between screens, never watching fights till the end and all that and you get to watch the other side as well so yeah, just more information presented in a more pleasing way.. oh and imo many streamers have strange music taste^^
Blizzard should just allow ingame streaming basically. maybe even payed "streams/observers". No need for sync or worry that someone will lag behind cause it would be delayed anyways. I could watch at full resolution, while at the same time massivly reducing the amount of data transfered. Maybe even allow caster/observer-streams ingame so i get the explanations and observing as basically an added camera/sound option so i could follow what the observer shows or just do it myself if i wanna check something. I dont really understand why any game title wanting to be an esports major title does not include basic functions like this anyways. but well, one can dream
I myself haven’t watched any WCS this season 3, there are two main reasons for this. The first is the obvious one, the WCS novelty has well and truly worn off now, there is so much SC2 content it’s it just feels overwhelming at times. Also there’s a lot of doom and gloom in the scene right now (there’s always been the sceptics, but now it feels more real), what with the large number of retirements and the huge overhaul between the Korean teams. I just want to take a little break from SC2 for a while and come back when the scene has settled a little.
The second, and perhaps biggest reason for my lack of interest is actually Hearthstone. It’s a Blizzard game I really want but probably won’t get until commercial release (unless they start giving beta keys for pre-orders). For the moment pretty much the only streams I’m watching are of HS. It’s a poor substitute for actually earning the game, but it does help satisfy some of the cravings
On October 02 2013 00:39 iNcontroL wrote: yeah it isn't "less" viewers every month it's less people watching the personal streams of players because said viewers are either watching WCS or are tired of SC2 after having watching around 10 hours of SC2
Streaming during WCS is basically saying to yourself "I will stream with 1/3rd the audience.. if that!" Streaming after WCS means you are streaming to around half the normal audience due to fatigue.
The viewers are still there. It's just we have never had so much SC2 to watch... and it's all scheduled to cover the entire day basically.
Unfortunately this is wrong;
Not a whole lot to say here. The numbers are down a bit, especially for WCS EU
Please just stop the bias. Sc2 is in a decline and will continue its decline until LOTV gets out.
On October 02 2013 00:39 iNcontroL wrote: yeah it isn't "less" viewers every month it's less people watching the personal streams of players because said viewers are either watching WCS or are tired of SC2 after having watching around 10 hours of SC2
Streaming during WCS is basically saying to yourself "I will stream with 1/3rd the audience.. if that!" Streaming after WCS means you are streaming to around half the normal audience due to fatigue.
The viewers are still there. It's just we have never had so much SC2 to watch... and it's all scheduled to cover the entire day basically.
Not a whole lot to say here. The numbers are down a bit, especially for WCS EU
Please just stop the bias. Sc2 is in a decline and will continue its decline until LOTV gets out.
Just because the WCS EU numbers are down a bit doesn't mean that SC2 as a whole is in a decline. Incontrol is right, there is a whole ton of SC2 to watch these days, especially during the weekdays, and I have no doubt that it really does contribute to viewer fatigue.
Now what to do about this, or whether this is a bad thing in the first place, that's a whole different discussion.
On October 02 2013 00:39 iNcontroL wrote: yeah it isn't "less" viewers every month it's less people watching the personal streams of players because said viewers are either watching WCS or are tired of SC2 after having watching around 10 hours of SC2
Streaming during WCS is basically saying to yourself "I will stream with 1/3rd the audience.. if that!" Streaming after WCS means you are streaming to around half the normal audience due to fatigue.
The viewers are still there. It's just we have never had so much SC2 to watch... and it's all scheduled to cover the entire day basically.
On October 01 2013 23:58 bartus88 wrote: The lower numbers for WCS Europe may have a bit to do with Twitch. For instance, my brother used to be an avid SC2 viewer and would hardly ever miss GSL or whatever tournament was going on. However, nowadays he doesn't watch nearly as much, especially WCS, because he is fed up with how bad Twitch performs. And from what I've read on TL/Reddit, the same thing goes for plenty other people. Although I don't like blaming Twitch for the decreasing WCS numbers, they appear to be a great contributor to the declining viewership.
amen to that. i used to watch tons of streams but now that good quality stream just lags like crazy i just watch what i absolutely wanna watch.
While numbers are down in general-ish and to the obvious fact of WCS
I must say as a streaming up-and-comer I have really noticed a increase in my viewership. Last month I was averaging 20~ per sessions, now I am up to ~42.
Its a really good time to start streaming if you've always wanted to give it a shot at becoming a popular streamer! #positive
On October 02 2013 00:39 iNcontroL wrote: yeah it isn't "less" viewers every month it's less people watching the personal streams of players because said viewers are either watching WCS or are tired of SC2 after having watching around 10 hours of SC2
Streaming during WCS is basically saying to yourself "I will stream with 1/3rd the audience.. if that!" Streaming after WCS means you are streaming to around half the normal audience due to fatigue.
The viewers are still there. It's just we have never had so much SC2 to watch... and it's all scheduled to cover the entire day basically.
Unfortunately this is wrong;
Not a whole lot to say here. The numbers are down a bit, especially for WCS EU
Please just stop the bias. Sc2 is in a decline and will continue its decline until LOTV gets out.
Sorry, did you just ask me to "stop" my bias towards SC2?
I don't think I'd ever be more in the right when I say "get off my lawn" you are on a fucking SC2 forum you complete and utter idiot.
Until you provide legitimate numbers you have not proven anything in regards to the viewership being the same as previous month or increasing.
On October 02 2013 02:09 Darkdwarf wrote: Could you bring back the graph of tournament viewership as well?
I suggest Fuzic for that: Here's the page for Dreamhack Day 1, for instance. That site is far better to visualize singular tournaments than what I do here, though I was considering simply including their graphs in my monthly reports (only with permission, of course!).
wow, pain user and protech are streaming more than 50% of the time. so they're playing a minimum of 12 hours per day over a 30 day period. incredible.
On October 02 2013 02:25 Lukeeze[zR] wrote: I wonder if blizzard is
a) in a hurry and wants to release LotV asap b) concerned and wants to take time to release the best LotV possible c) unphased
i'd say in relation to numbers they're working on getting the WCS product better and better which should lead to growth. not sure. couple of things make me think why viewer numbers are (slightly) decreasing, and that's a) slow player growth b) people not enjoying the dynamic of the game c) quality of streamed product not high enough. not sure about a/c but we do see a lot of people complaining on tl.net about b
On October 01 2013 22:21 Uni1987 wrote: Less viewers in general every month ;(
WCS is like a vacuum. Very few time frame for players to have growth for their streams.
Sadly it would appear that WCS EU viewers have declined aswell.
Blizzard would be well advised to push out the last expansion and make some real changes. Not some balance changes, but change the gameplay. I'd suggest giving every race good static defense, so positioning and angle of attacks are most important. I'd suggest looking back at WoL TvT matchup as a role model. There must be more than on battle to decide the winner, there must be fighting for space on the map, there must be the opportunity to dig in at a position, punishing an opponent running his army in a suicidal charge, rewarding the opponent that finds a way around. There should also be more tech trees really viable in every phase of the game.
I wish this game was still interesting to watch for me, but I seldom really follow a stream or tournament for more than 15min these days. I miss the times when I watched White-Ra all night long...
I know that money is kind of the forbidden subject around SC2 pros, but how many viewer hours does someone usually need to support themselves off of streaming alone, assuming that they don't have a family or anything?
On October 02 2013 00:39 iNcontroL wrote: yeah it isn't "less" viewers every month it's less people watching the personal streams of players because said viewers are either watching WCS or are tired of SC2 after having watching around 10 hours of SC2
Streaming during WCS is basically saying to yourself "I will stream with 1/3rd the audience.. if that!" Streaming after WCS means you are streaming to around half the normal audience due to fatigue.
The viewers are still there. It's just we have never had so much SC2 to watch... and it's all scheduled to cover the entire day basically.
Unfortunately this is wrong;
Not a whole lot to say here. The numbers are down a bit, especially for WCS EU
Please just stop the bias. Sc2 is in a decline and will continue its decline until LOTV gets out.
Sorry, did you just ask me to "stop" my bias towards SC2?
I don't think I'd ever be more in the right when I say "get off my lawn" you are on a fucking SC2 forum you complete and utter idiot.
Until you provide legitimate numbers you have not proven anything in regards to the viewership being the same as previous month or increasing.
Its also september when people go back to school. In August I could watch WCS EU on days off during the week with an irregular job (student).
Now, I cannot.
So, lets say many people in the NA timezones aren't on vacation and are back at work/school. This could account for a drop in WCS EU viewership. IS IT!? I dont know for sure. But all we know is viewership dropped a little bit.
Personal stream viewership has been on a decline since WCS started with all these broadcasts. For League of Legends, when their LCS is on then personal stream numbers also go down during it. Unlike LCS for League, WCS runs almost all day almost every day.
You can't discount the MARKET when looking at pure numbers that have NO OTHER QUALIFIER with them. These are numbers they don't explain why people aren't watching only that some people aren't watching. SC2 Fatigue after WCS is one thing, lack of time, or timezones impacting WCS EU more now than before could account for some of it.
It's not just bias, Incontrol does have a point. Might not be entirely correct but it is true. People were watching personal streams much more BEFORE WCS than AFTER. And its not because the game is dying, if it were you wouldn't see Destiny grabbing more viewers playing SC2 than he does play LoL at the moment. You would see numbers drop drastically across the board for all WCS regions.
On October 02 2013 00:39 iNcontroL wrote: yeah it isn't "less" viewers every month it's less people watching the personal streams of players because said viewers are either watching WCS or are tired of SC2 after having watching around 10 hours of SC2
Streaming during WCS is basically saying to yourself "I will stream with 1/3rd the audience.. if that!" Streaming after WCS means you are streaming to around half the normal audience due to fatigue.
The viewers are still there. It's just we have never had so much SC2 to watch... and it's all scheduled to cover the entire day basically.
Unfortunately this is wrong;
Not a whole lot to say here. The numbers are down a bit, especially for WCS EU
Please just stop the bias. Sc2 is in a decline and will continue its decline until LOTV gets out.
Sorry, did you just ask me to "stop" my bias towards SC2?
I don't think I'd ever be more in the right when I say "get off my lawn" you are on a fucking SC2 forum you complete and utter idiot.
Wow, how can you be the quality poster with the star sign?
The charts show the facts and we need to respect that.
On October 02 2013 00:39 iNcontroL wrote: yeah it isn't "less" viewers every month it's less people watching the personal streams of players because said viewers are either watching WCS or are tired of SC2 after having watching around 10 hours of SC2
Streaming during WCS is basically saying to yourself "I will stream with 1/3rd the audience.. if that!" Streaming after WCS means you are streaming to around half the normal audience due to fatigue.
The viewers are still there. It's just we have never had so much SC2 to watch... and it's all scheduled to cover the entire day basically.
Unfortunately this is wrong;
Not a whole lot to say here. The numbers are down a bit, especially for WCS EU
Please just stop the bias. Sc2 is in a decline and will continue its decline until LOTV gets out.
Sorry, did you just ask me to "stop" my bias towards SC2?
I don't think I'd ever be more in the right when I say "get off my lawn" you are on a fucking SC2 forum you complete and utter idiot.
Wow, how can you be the quality poster with the star sign?
The charts show the facts and we need to respect that.
The star means hes contributed a LOT to TL and not quality poster to be fair. But even so Incontrol is trying to look beyond the raw numbers and into perhaps the why. And hes looking beyond the fact that there is less personal stream numbers, WCS has taken a LOT of viewers from personal streams when it is on and not everyone has time to watch WCS and then personal streams right after - fatigue or no fatigue. Some of the drop is attributable to viewer loss but certainly not ALL of it is that simple since overall viewership hasn`t dropped near as significantly as personal stream viewership has dropped.
The dip correlates pretty reasonably with the return to school in Europe. The real story here is in WCS Korea which has remained almost completely invariant and continues to improve despite the return to school and university.
It's not a big deal, in all honesty. The same pattern emerged last year as well. Expect the curve to bottom out this month (October) and begin to rise in November and December as university deadlines hit and workplaces start to wind down for Christmas.
On October 02 2013 00:39 iNcontroL wrote: yeah it isn't "less" viewers every month it's less people watching the personal streams of players because said viewers are either watching WCS or are tired of SC2 after having watching around 10 hours of SC2
Streaming during WCS is basically saying to yourself "I will stream with 1/3rd the audience.. if that!" Streaming after WCS means you are streaming to around half the normal audience due to fatigue.
The viewers are still there. It's just we have never had so much SC2 to watch... and it's all scheduled to cover the entire day basically.
Unfortunately this is wrong;
Not a whole lot to say here. The numbers are down a bit, especially for WCS EU
Please just stop the bias. Sc2 is in a decline and will continue its decline until LOTV gets out.
Sorry, did you just ask me to "stop" my bias towards SC2?
I don't think I'd ever be more in the right when I say "get off my lawn" you are on a fucking SC2 forum you complete and utter idiot.
Wow, how can you be the quality poster with the star sign?
The charts show the facts and we need to respect that.
he makes a valid point about the idiocy of accusing someone of a bias towards a subject that is the main premise of the forum. why else would you use an sc2 forum if not for a bias towards its main subject?
On October 02 2013 00:39 iNcontroL wrote: yeah it isn't "less" viewers every month it's less people watching the personal streams of players because said viewers are either watching WCS or are tired of SC2 after having watching around 10 hours of SC2
Streaming during WCS is basically saying to yourself "I will stream with 1/3rd the audience.. if that!" Streaming after WCS means you are streaming to around half the normal audience due to fatigue.
The viewers are still there. It's just we have never had so much SC2 to watch... and it's all scheduled to cover the entire day basically.
Unfortunately this is wrong;
Not a whole lot to say here. The numbers are down a bit, especially for WCS EU
Please just stop the bias. Sc2 is in a decline and will continue its decline until LOTV gets out.
Sorry, did you just ask me to "stop" my bias towards SC2?
I don't think I'd ever be more in the right when I say "get off my lawn" you are on a fucking SC2 forum you complete and utter idiot.
Wow, how can you be the quality poster with the star sign?
The charts show the facts and we need to respect that.
If you had bothered yourself enough to go and check the facts for the previous year as well, you would have found a similar pattern occuring, offset only by the increased interest in Starcraft 2 due to HoTS beta. Even then, there was a decline in interest.
It is September. People have gone back to school. Chill, man. Nothing is dying. People are just busy. This happens in every entertainment industry at this time of year. We are in the offseason.
It seems Hui has given his throne of being the streamiest man alive to Painuser and Protech, though even they don't stream as much as Hui used to if my memory serves me right.
On October 02 2013 03:09 Pontius Pirate wrote: I know that money is kind of the forbidden subject around SC2 pros, but how many viewer hours does someone usually need to support themselves off of streaming alone, assuming that they don't have a family or anything?
In the past DeMuslim mentioned this a lot on his stream, although it was a long time ago so someone please correct me if I'm wrong.
I believe he mentioned the top guys can earn somewhere around $2000/month from streaming. Obviously this is volatile, he metioned the same said people have earned as much as $6000 one month and as little as $500 the next month. Viewer numbers constantly change, and they aren't even reliable measures, since different people get adds and different times, and then there's no way to tell how many are using addblock. Realistically I think the only people who make a good amount from streaming include Grubby and the usual EG suspects (DeMuslim, plus Stephano and Idra when they were still on EG). I reckon others that also make a nice little extra on the side (but not a reliable source of income since their schedule is pretty intermittent) include InControl, Artosis, WhiteRa and TLO, they usually will pull 2000+ viewers. Also didn't Destiny pretty much live off the income generated from his stream? Pretty sure he would always get 2000+.
I should state again that you shouldn't read too much into this, this was pieced together from assumption, hearsay and sketchy memory. There is a chance this could all be bullshit :S
On October 02 2013 00:39 iNcontroL wrote: yeah it isn't "less" viewers every month it's less people watching the personal streams of players because said viewers are either watching WCS or are tired of SC2 after having watching around 10 hours of SC2
Streaming during WCS is basically saying to yourself "I will stream with 1/3rd the audience.. if that!" Streaming after WCS means you are streaming to around half the normal audience due to fatigue.
The viewers are still there. It's just we have never had so much SC2 to watch... and it's all scheduled to cover the entire day basically.
Unfortunately this is wrong;
Not a whole lot to say here. The numbers are down a bit, especially for WCS EU
Please just stop the bias. Sc2 is in a decline and will continue its decline until LOTV gets out.
Sorry, did you just ask me to "stop" my bias towards SC2?
I don't think I'd ever be more in the right when I say "get off my lawn" you are on a fucking SC2 forum you complete and utter idiot.
Until you provide legitimate numbers you have not proven anything in regards to the viewership being the same as previous month or increasing.
Its also september when people go back to school. In August I could watch WCS EU on days off during the week with an irregular job (student).
Now, I cannot.
So, lets say many people in the NA timezones aren't on vacation and are back at work/school. This could account for a drop in WCS EU viewership. IS IT!? I dont know for sure. But all we know is viewership dropped a little bit.
Personal stream viewership has been on a decline since WCS started with all these broadcasts. For League of Legends, when their LCS is on then personal stream numbers also go down during it. Unlike LCS for League, WCS runs almost all day almost every day.
You can't discount the MARKET when looking at pure numbers that have NO OTHER QUALIFIER with them. These are numbers they don't explain why people aren't watching only that some people aren't watching. SC2 Fatigue after WCS is one thing, lack of time, or timezones impacting WCS EU more now than before could account for some of it.
It's not just bias, Incontrol does have a point. Might not be entirely correct but it is true. People were watching personal streams much more BEFORE WCS than AFTER. And its not because the game is dying, if it were you wouldn't see Destiny grabbing more viewers playing SC2 than he does play LoL at the moment. You would see numbers drop drastically across the board for all WCS regions.
You still have not proven anything towards the argument of numbers being same or increasing like incontrol was talking about. You're just basically talking about some of the factors that may have caused the drop in the viewership, and a drop in the viewership = drop in viewership, no matter what the factors are.
the amount of we want LotV posts hidden with a Sc2 is dieing packing is increasing. I hope that subsides after Blizzcon again. Don't want to read those everywhere for a whole year, since it makes me want to have infos about it. On the other hand its easy to make something up and infuse it into one of the Sc2 is dieing threads and have them pick that up like a good parrot.
On October 02 2013 03:09 Pontius Pirate wrote: I know that money is kind of the forbidden subject around SC2 pros, but how many viewer hours does someone usually need to support themselves off of streaming alone, assuming that they don't have a family or anything?
In the past DeMuslim mentioned this a lot on his stream, although it was a long time ago so someone please correct me if I'm wrong.
I believe he mentioned the top guys can earn somewhere around $2000/month from streaming. Obviously this is volatile, he metioned the same said people have earned as much as $6000 one month and as little as $500 the next month. Viewer numbers constantly change, and they aren't even reliable measures, since different people get adds and different times, and then there's no way to tell how many are using addblock. Realistically I think the only people who make a good amount from streaming include Grubby and the usual EG suspects (DeMuslim, plus Stephano and Idra when they were still on EG). I reckon others that also make a nice little extra on the side (but not a reliable source of income since their schedule is pretty intermittent) include InControl, Artosis, WhiteRa and TLO, they usually will pull 2000+ viewers. Also didn't Destiny pretty much live off the income generated from his stream? Pretty sure he would always get 2000+.
I should state again that you shouldn't read too much into this, this was pieced together from assumption, hearsay and sketchy memory. There is a chance this could all be bullshit :S
Using Taeja as my math victim, I'm estimating that to be about 1.4 cents per viewer hour, or 24 dollars an hour. Pretty nice for those at the absolute top, but a bit rougher for a skilled amateur streamer like Ms. Spyte (the equivalent of $19/hour, but a poverty level of only ~$12000/yearly) or a superhuman stream zombie like Painuser (2 dollar bills, three quarters, and a dime per hour, and a mere ~$1100/yearly). These are all figures based off of a dangerously linear extrapolation of another TLer's comment of a rough quotation from just one pro-gamer, so take this all with a grain of salt.
If anything, this should really give you an appreciation of the amount of willpower it takes to eke out a living as the average pro-level player.
Are these numbers for _only_ when they're streaming SC2, or just total streaming hours? For example, I know Idra has been streaming quite a bit of dota 2 recently.
On October 02 2013 05:42 xxpack09 wrote: Are these numbers for _only_ when they're streaming SC2, or just total streaming hours? For example, I know Idra has been streaming quite a bit of dota 2 recently.
I'd assume only SC2, as Destiny streams a lot more than 23 hours a month, for instance.
On October 02 2013 05:42 xxpack09 wrote: Are these numbers for _only_ when they're streaming SC2, or just total streaming hours? For example, I know Idra has been streaming quite a bit of dota 2 recently.
Reading is hard
For those of you who don't already know what this is about: I'm gathering various data (viewers, game, events, etc.) from all the streams that are presented on teamliquid.net (those that you can in the sidebar to your right) and use that data to produce the pretty tables and graphs you see below. The tables only contain SC2 players (that is, streams of people playing games of Starcraft 2) and not casters, teams or other streams. The tables also only contain Starcraft 2 related activities. So, for instance when CatZ is streaming Dota2, it will not be taken into account.
This is literally the first real paragraph of the OP.
On October 02 2013 02:09 Darkdwarf wrote: Could you bring back the graph of tournament viewership as well?
I suggest Fuzic for that: Here's the page for Dreamhack Day 1, for instance. That site is far better to visualize singular tournaments than what I do here, though I was considering simply including their graphs in my monthly reports (only with permission, of course!).
I still don't get it, why is ForGG on that horrible stream site? He must be getting some serious cash? He is the only consistent high level Terran streamer nowadays and could build a strong viewer base on Twitch.
On October 02 2013 07:48 ImperialFist wrote: I still don't get it, why is ForGG on that horrible stream site? He must be getting some serious cash? He is the only consistent high level Terran streamer nowadays and could build a strong viewer base on Twitch.
It seems that Mill and gamecreed have some kind of partnership (yet i can see dayshi and babyknight on twitch ?) ForGG also stated that gamecreed paid quite well.
This being said i too think that he should stream on twitch,he would gain more followers. The streaming service he uses right now has issues with a lot of countries (i'm in korea atm and its unwatchable ).
Also GG to destiny and avilo,pretty good stats there :p
On October 02 2013 00:39 iNcontroL wrote: yeah it isn't "less" viewers every month it's less people watching the personal streams of players because said viewers are either watching WCS or are tired of SC2 after having watching around 10 hours of SC2
Streaming during WCS is basically saying to yourself "I will stream with 1/3rd the audience.. if that!" Streaming after WCS means you are streaming to around half the normal audience due to fatigue.
The viewers are still there. It's just we have never had so much SC2 to watch... and it's all scheduled to cover the entire day basically.
Unfortunately this is wrong;
Not a whole lot to say here. The numbers are down a bit, especially for WCS EU
Please just stop the bias. Sc2 is in a decline and will continue its decline until LOTV gets out.
Sorry, did you just ask me to "stop" my bias towards SC2?
I don't think I'd ever be more in the right when I say "get off my lawn" you are on a fucking SC2 forum you complete and utter idiot.
Wow, how can you be the quality poster with the star sign?
The charts show the facts and we need to respect that.
he makes a valid point about the idiocy of accusing someone of a bias towards a subject that is the main premise of the forum. why else would you use an sc2 forum if not for a bias towards its main subject?
truly idiotic.
So just becasue one writes in an Sc2 forum, one becomes an idiot in trying to be objective regarding the state of Sc2? Especially since all of the numbers are freely avaiable in the post we are discussing? That seems like a slilly onnection to make.
The star means hes contributed a LOT to TL and not quality poster to be fair. But even so Incontrol is trying to look beyond the raw numbers and into perhaps the why. And hes looking beyond the fact that there is less personal stream numbers, WCS has taken a LOT of viewers from personal streams when it is on and not everyone has time to watch WCS and then personal streams right after - fatigue or no fatigue. Some of the drop is attributable to viewer loss but certainly not ALL of it is that simple since overall viewership hasn`t dropped near as significantly as personal stream viewership has dropped.
Stream numbers for WCS are down as well (read the OP). I agree that this could have been a (weak) interpretation of the results some months ago, however, today that theory is simply falsified.
However, there is nothing wrong with it. Its just a normal life of a product cylcle, and it isn't like Sc2 will "die" anytime soon. It will just continue to decline with a couple of % each month. But let's be honest about this and try to come up logical/rational interpretations rather than maniputing facts in an attempt to make the Sc2 scene look better.
On October 02 2013 00:39 iNcontroL wrote: yeah it isn't "less" viewers every month it's less people watching the personal streams of players because said viewers are either watching WCS or are tired of SC2 after having watching around 10 hours of SC2
Streaming during WCS is basically saying to yourself "I will stream with 1/3rd the audience.. if that!" Streaming after WCS means you are streaming to around half the normal audience due to fatigue.
The viewers are still there. It's just we have never had so much SC2 to watch... and it's all scheduled to cover the entire day basically.
Unfortunately this is wrong;
Not a whole lot to say here. The numbers are down a bit, especially for WCS EU
Please just stop the bias. Sc2 is in a decline and will continue its decline until LOTV gets out.
Sorry, did you just ask me to "stop" my bias towards SC2?
I don't think I'd ever be more in the right when I say "get off my lawn" you are on a fucking SC2 forum you complete and utter idiot.
Wow, how can you be the quality poster with the star sign?
The charts show the facts and we need to respect that.
Those stats are not even 1/3 of the answer because WCS took hostage the sc2 viewership. Unless conti posts the overall sc2 viewership like he did last month, we can only speculate.
It's probably gone down a bit because NA is back to school and can't watch WCS EU. The NA and KR viewership hasn't changed much.
On October 02 2013 00:39 iNcontroL wrote: yeah it isn't "less" viewers every month it's less people watching the personal streams of players because said viewers are either watching WCS or are tired of SC2 after having watching around 10 hours of SC2
Streaming during WCS is basically saying to yourself "I will stream with 1/3rd the audience.. if that!" Streaming after WCS means you are streaming to around half the normal audience due to fatigue.
The viewers are still there. It's just we have never had so much SC2 to watch... and it's all scheduled to cover the entire day basically.
Unfortunately this is wrong;
Not a whole lot to say here. The numbers are down a bit, especially for WCS EU
Please just stop the bias. Sc2 is in a decline and will continue its decline until LOTV gets out.
Sorry, did you just ask me to "stop" my bias towards SC2?
I don't think I'd ever be more in the right when I say "get off my lawn" you are on a fucking SC2 forum you complete and utter idiot.
Nice passive-agressive comment right there. He is right when you say you're biased when you try to pass as facts some explanations as to why SC2 has been on a steep decline. WCS barely gets 10k viewers most of the time, this is NOTHING compared to 2011 (when I was all-in into SC2.. before actually watching some BW games you know) when IdrA was getting 10k, Destiny 6k, SeleCT 5k, etc etc.. all at the same time.
And before calling people idiots, may I remind you that TL, a website I've supported over the years by buying some wares, also have BW, DoTA2 and even LoL.
So yeah, keep defending that game until it, and you as a public figure, slip even more into irrelevance. Meanwhile, I'll enjoy watching some BW streams, as well as LoL which is now the driving force of E-Sports. Maybe if you ( as well as many others) haven't been blindly defending this game, we would have made Blizzard change the core of the game and we would actually have E-sports material, with great games and viewership.
I think the personal stream stats not doing as well as it used to be is also because Grubby, Demuslim and IdrA haven't been as consistent as they used to and also WCS wrecking their potential/growth is not helping them wanting to stream more.
Demuslim average viewers are down from 5k in June(even though he streams more rarely), which implies that he is getting less popular as a streamer.
Grubby has maintained average viewer count compared to June, however, he has actually streamed more this month.
The back-to-school argument could definitely explain some of the decline though. It is a bit difficult to know how big of a factor it is as we can't compare the numbers to last year due to the HOTS beta release.
I think the personal stream stats not doing as well as it used to be is also because Grubby, Demuslim and IdrA haven't been as consistent as they used to and also WCS wrecking their potential/growth is not helping them wanting to stream more.
Demuslim average viewers are down from 5k in June(even though he streams more rarely), which implies that he is getting less popular as a streamer.
Grubby has maintained average viewer count compared to June, however, he has actually streamed more this month.
The back-to-school argument could definitely explain some of the decline though. It is a bit difficult to know how big of a factor it is as we can't compare the numbers to last year due to the HOTS beta release.
They're getting less popular because they are less consistent and everyone is watching WCS and don't have time for personal streams.
EPT
)![[image loading]](https://dl.dropbox.com/u/8028950/TL/top%2050%202013%2009.png)
![[image loading]](https://dl.dropbox.com/u/8028950/TL/top%2050%202013%2009x.png)
Hui:Hui is a Taiwanese player who is mostly playing in the TeSL. His fanbase seems to be found mostly outside of teamliquid and in the Taiwanese community, unsurprisingly.
KingCobra: He's a Russian streamer and commentator, mostly playing daily and weekly cups.![[image loading]](https://dl.dropbox.com/u/8028950/TL/Monthly%20viewers%202013%2009.png)
![[image loading]](https://dl.dropbox.com/u/8028950/TL/WCS%202013%2009.png)
![[image loading]](https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/8028950/TL/GSTL%20ATC%20SC2L%2009.png)
not streaming for a week to focus on WCG Canada and changing my streaming schedule to adapt to WCS Qualifier was deadly D: Thanks conti for doing these, alway super awesome 
