In the middle of watching someone's exciting steam, an ad pops up covering the entire video while chat continues. Chat is then going crazy because something awesome just happened, yet we were unable to see it because an ad was covering the video stream. What a disappointment.

Make the ad go into a corner with sound or something, but please do not block the whole image. That's the reason why we are here, to watch the steamers. You want the ads for monetary gain, fine, but find a happy medium where you don't disappoint your customers. Badly placed ads drive more people away than keeps them.

Since this change I've been driven further and further away from Twitch.tv as a platform. I find it ridiculous that the only way to not have to see this annoying Ad spam is by using my ONE prime sub or just not watching content on Twitch.tv. There is a major problem with that approach, and until something changes (and I'm certain thousands of others would agree here), I will no longer be using this platform for my viewing pleasure.I hope you guys get this figured out and find a better solution soon, like putting the Ads responsibility back on individual streamers, since that empowers THEM to generate revenue for themselves, as opposed to the obviously fake cop-out of "this ad supports -insert random streamer here- " since that just seems so disingenuous.

I formulated the title drastically because it‘s a serious problem lately happening on Twitch and don’t see that getting addressed from them, at least not in the level as it should.

I said it several times on social media and i also say it here: Twitch is ruining their ads business, constantly and -seems like- willingly:
- The sheer amount of ads which you face as a viewer of the platform is simply ridiculous
- You‘ve guys taken the control of the ads out of the hands of the content creators
- You implement changes to the ad system without notifying anybody nor testing it out
- the Ads for bits function is not working

So, let me explain that points one by one:
— Amount of Ads —
If i enter a stream (the so called „pre-roll ads“) the player tells me:
- „Ad 1 of 2“, then ofc „Ad 2 of 2“ and then it starts over again, 8 times in a row.
- Which makes by
- - an average ad length of 10 seconds (lowest value in Twitch advantage and easier to calculate here),
- - 20 seconds per „block“
- - which makes it 160 Seconds or over 2,5 Minutes i watch ads.
I really have to ask you Twitch: Are you guys kidding us?

Not is that just annoying, which leads me (and many others i spoke with) to leave the site. Which means the tab will be closed. And your mid-roll ads have the same issue.

— No Control for Content Creators —
Yeah when we are at the mid-roll ads let‘s come to a good point. You guys implement the mid-roll ads without any control for the content creators.

Okay, the streamers can trigger ads to push the mid-rolls out, but that‘s not the control i‘m talking about. It‘s about the content won‘t be interrupted suddenly by an ads in the worse timing, well how could we prevent that? OH by giving the streamers the fully control about the ad placement for example.

You guys know that streamers suffer from your „fantastic test“ right? They loosing viewers which leave the channel because of the mid-roll ads, they try to come back but the ads keep playing and playing and they won‘t come back. Many Streamers i spoke with recommended their viewers to install adblockers to keep them in the channel! If that is not an indicator to you Twitch that something is completely wrong with your ads then i recommend to not be ad based anymore.

— Implementation Failures and Bugs —
We, as Twitch Viewers, are already used to bugs all over the place: Emotes and Badges don‘t load, Whisper Function does often not working.

But the implementation of the mid-roll ads, takes failure to a whole new level! Not that nobody was informed, not partnered streamers, affiliates, normal streamers or viewers. The mid-rolls have also been served to subscribers of channels which is a complete no-go. Obviously nobody tested that before implementing it into production or the test methods are not working at all.

— Ads for Bits Function —
Okay, let‘s leave that all to the side and imagine: We want to watch ads and get something for it, like bits. Welp that‘s also not working.

For months i can‘t use the „ads for bits“ function, at all. Strange when i see that you guys can serve the ads over 2 minutes, but if i want bits to watch ads there are suddenly no ads?!? Why don‘t you use the amazon ads here, why i don‘t see the other ads here? The only time a user would get a literal benefit from watch the ads you block the function? I have to repeat myself: Are you guys kidding me?

I wish Twitch would think more about the user and the content creators and simply not backstabbing on both of them by spamming the user with ads and barely severing and of the revenue to the streamer

After having read your new feature that allows streamers to disable Pre-Rolls by playing enough ads (30 seconds = 10 minutes), I think you've missed the mark slightly.

I DO think it's a good idea to disable the pre-roll for people discovering new content. As such, I believe a better implementation of the no preroll idea is the following:

• No pre-roll for users the FIRST time they join your stream BUT a forced 30 second 10 minutes into the stream if they stay.

This solves two problems. First, it solves the problem of discouraging people from discovering new content. You have clearly identified an issue with pre-rolls in how it impacts new viewers and presented the current solution. Second, it solves the financial issue by running the ad they would have seen in the pre-roll. It's the best of ALL worlds.

Overall, ads on Twitch are reasonable and not too intrusive, but this one quirk makes it more difficult for small streamers to support each other.

If someone ends their stream by hosting mine, I would like to be able to thank them and welcome them and any viewers who came along with them. But at the moment that I receive the host notification, I have to assume that none of them can see me because an ad just started playing for them. And if I host another streamer at the conclusion of my stream, my viewers and I don't get to see their reaction unless without pre-loading their stream, or watching the VOD later, or enabling an adblocker.

Revenue from host-transition ads must be next to nothing, and this does not seem like something that is done to nudge people towards paying for Turbo because the hosted streamer obviously cannot assume that most of the viewers coming over to their channel have Turbo.

I have no problem with ads usually and I understand why they're there, but it seems that a new feature rolled out that makes it so that an ad plays every 20 minutes when you're watching a vod.

I find this really annoying, as the ads are usually about 100% more loud than the vod so every 20 minutes I need to stop whatever I'm doing and turn down the volume on my computer (since I can't change the volume of the ad, which is not great either btw) and wait for the ad to finish so I can turn the volume back up.

Even if tedious, I'd be ok with this if it happened like every hour or so instead of 20 minutes. So... pretty please?

Most of ads should be skippable. Your site is a live streaming platform, you cannot force people to watch ads while they were watching something else that they will completely miss because of ads. Same concept goes for the first AD you are forced to watch as soon as you open one live stream. If im forced to watch something without any possibility to skip unless i close the whole page, i will 100% start hating on the promoted product just beause it is disturbing my plans.
Also giving people the possibility to spam as many ads as they want, looks like a streamer paradise, right, but it became fkn hell for others not streaming and just watching. There are more ads on twitch now than in tv. At this moment, twitch is comparable to any illegal movie streaming platform where they spam 100 ads per second to earn the most possible income. Legit feels the same.
Also. Why do you think youtube lets people ADBLOCK ads, instead of adopting a different system like you are doing here? (yep, ads are impossible to block on twitch)
Because someone just dont want to watch ads end of the story. Not even 1. By forcing people to watch ads no matter what (unless you pay of course) you are willingly pushing a decent slice of audience away from this site, since they just dont have a chance to navigate ads-free.
It might look like a smart idea in short terms since everyone now is obligated to watch the same amount of ads, still, on a long run, you will scare away a decent slice of people just because of this issue.
Remove your stupid in-stream impossible-to-block abusive unskippable ads.
PS. i had to watch the omen desktop ads at least 500 times in the past 2 weeks. I never meant to buy that crap and i never will, so, exactly, how is it effective in any way to keep spamming that sht to me since im obviously not interested, i wonder.
Also, promoters will soon understand how uneffective it actually is to promote stuff here, because of what i just explained, and you will eventually scare away advertisers too.
Also i basically stopped exploring rooms, because now i have to watch a damn AD everytime i close a stream to open another one. It got so boring that i basically stopped searching for rooms and im always watching the same people just to avoid the system triggering new ads.
Was anyone even thinking to all this issues, when you added this ads-system on twitch?
I honestly dont think so.
This is a gigantic mess.

Dear Twitch,

I think I speak for most of the streaming community when I say we do NOT like your new mid-roll strategy. Ads are among the biggest annoyances on the site and the solution is not to give us more ads. Here are some ideas on making ads on Twitch better for both the creator and the viewer.

1. Give the creators an actual cut of the ad revenue
   Right now, this is absolutely peanuts when you compare it to other video content sites, it’s actually insane. This would make running ads also a bit more attractive for creators and viewers will know that these ads would actually support their favourite creators a lot more than now.

2. Make your ads shorter and skippable
   The ads that are currently running on Twitch are often way too long. Myself and other viewers have often skipped these ads by simply going to a different channel, that is not okay. That should not happen.

3. Consider adding closable lower third ads
   When you first launch a stream you can have a lower third ad hovering over the videoplayer. Be sure to make it so that viewers can click these away.

4. Let creators and viewers (individually) control mid-rolls
   I really like the fact that as a creator you can roll an ad, for instance, when you need to take a snack break or toilet break. What if we add a feature like that for every viewer. Let’s say you have a button somewhere next to the stream that viewers can opt for an ad to support their favourite creators, this way both the creator and the viewer has more control over when they want to see ads.

5. Bits for ads
   Why is this not a thing worldwide? This is such a nice concept and should be implemented all over the world because it gives the chance for viewers that can’t afford a sub or bits to give bits anyway by just saving them up by watching ads here and there. This can go hand in hand with the ad button for viewers.

6. A certain amount of paid subs (gift subs excluded) = Twitch Turbo
   Lastly, make it so that viewers that have a certain amount of paid subscriptions across multiple channels have Twitch Turbo perks. However, they could still opt to see ads to support a streamer with the button and still see mid-rolls from the streamer.

In summary, I think there is a lot to learn from other platforms in regards to ads on Twitch. These are just some loose ideas, I’m sure there are plenty of people that have better ideas than me or that can make these ideas even better. Thank you for reading and hopefully, maybe, something will be done with this.

Special shoutout to @HarrisHeller and @Jasper55RL (both on Twitter) for providing some of the points talked about in this post.

Automatic mid-roll ads would be much better for the streamer and viewers if there's ads that doesn't interrupt the stream audio content totally, instead just taking most of the screen to display the product/service advertised, with the stream visual being shown in the picture-in-picture. Leaving it as an option (if mid-roll ads have sounds or not) to the streamer would be the best so you could know what the creators want to have on their stream. I know silent ads usually doesn't pays as much as full video ads with sounds, but having less intrusive ads would allow you to play more ads before it's too much for the viewers and have them quit/use an ad blocker.

Ads are intrusive, annoying and serve no real value to a viewer or creator in a live streaming platform. But if they must exist, why not make them not so intrusive to the experience?

Currently the PIP solution does nothing good for either party. It still essentially shuts off the stream on a whim and if people don't know where to look, it's all but gone for the time the ad is running. Why not put the Ad window where the stream window goes now, and let the stream keep running as normal, so we continue our engagement with the creators and enjoy our time using the platform.

Right now Partners and Affiliates have the ability to give their subscribers 'ad free viewing'. I think subscribers should be able to opt-in to watching ads on a channel their subscribed to even if the channel has 'ad free viewing' turned on for subscribers.
There's not many ways you can have an ad feature that is a win for everyone involved, but I think this is one of those ways.

For Twitch:
- More ads watched on their site.

For Streamers:
- More ad revenue, while also keeping 'ad free viewing' as a perk for those who want to subscribe.

For Viewers:
- More control/choice over the content they're watching. The would be able to toggle ad free viewing on or off depending on if they want to see ads or not.

Some people may wonder why even have this as a feature?
My reason is because right now the streamer only gets ad revenue for ads that are viewed. If you have 'ad free viewing' turned on for subscribers, then none of those viewers will see the ads. If a channel's viewers are made up of mostly subscribers then no ad revenue is being made from an ad break. If anything that ad break is turning away non-subscribers who are the only one's seeing the ads.
Some subscribers may want the ability to support the channel their watching through viewing an ad so the streamer gets that ad revenue. It would be 100% voluntary by the subscriber to toggle on, and give them another way to support Twitch and it's streamers.

Currently, when some streamers play ads, their streams will still play in a little box at the top while ads play in the main video player. The problem comes when -- let's say something critical happens on stream, or chatter asks question you'd really like to know the answer to. You can't cash in on the information because the streamer's stream is either muted or gone during ads.

Yeah you can always go back and review the vods (unless streamer has them disabled) but that defeats the feeling you'd get out of experiencing whatever happened in the moment.

I don't mind ads that much but what if it were possible to have streamer audio playing at the same time as ads? Or be able to control the volume of ads vs. stream?