With the formation of the Safety Advisory Council on Twitch, some users are concerned about the power implications it gives some members.
The Safety Advisory Councilwas recently formed on Twitch in May of this year to minimize harassment on its platform. The group is comprised of both Twitch employees and creators who will help develop new safety features and identify occurring trends that go on within the website that could be detrimental.
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Concerns arose about what sort of unfair benefits the chosen creators of the council would receive with this decision. This fear showed itself inone of the latest cases of Twitch dramawhere one of the council members, “FerociouslySteph,” made comments about how this position has given her specific power and immunities. Twitch CEO Emmett Shear refutes these claims and has made a public declaration for the real purpose of the safety council.
In a post on the official website Blog.Twitch.Tv, Shear starts by clarifying that the council will not act as any sort ofmoderation task force. The council does not get involved in any type of isolated instances and will not receive any information related to cases. And while the council members have the freedom to share their opinions, This position does not permit members to speak on Twitch’s behalf.
Shear states that the purpose of the group will be to discuss and offer a different perspective with Twitch’s internal teams when it comes to the work decisions it makes to keep the community healthy. Emmett comments that “the council is not a governing body, rather, they are a purposefully diverse group of content creators and industry professionals that Twitch will work with to learn more about the wants and needs of the community, as well ashow to make Twitch a safer place.”
Emmitt Shear ends his post by reminding the community that no case of abuse will be tolerated on the platform and that actions will be taken against anyone engaged in bullying. In theory, the idea of the safety council sounds like the right step forward for a platform that has repeated cases of cyberbullying like Twitch. However, it seems that theannouncement of the safety councilto the community and selection for members was poorly executed. If Twitch took more time to plan these out before announcing the council carefully, perhaps it could have avoided this all together.
