My idea to stop fraudulent bits and their impact on streamers is twofold: 1) Create a system or process that listens and supports streamers impacted by the complete removal of cheering for channels triggered by fraudulent bit donations. 2) Emphasize assessing security behind the bit donating process/software rather than punishing streamers who have received these bits from users taking advantage of this obviously weak security flaw.

Fraudulent bits are obviously a large problem for Twitch as a business; however, more importantly, these faux donations are a larger problem for streamers: the financial backbone and foundation of Twitch.

Currently, Twitch has an unclear and nonexistent communication process for streamers who have unknowingly received fraudulent bits and have, therefore, had this gifting option completely wiped from affected channels. Viewers can no longer financially support streamers who have been impacted this way. Streamers can no longer receive a substantial portion of their income. And finally, Twitch is negatively affected by this. If Twitch has no clear system on how to help these specific streamers, then they lose a large part of what makes communities so vital: camaraderie. Listen to streamers, strengthen communities, grow Twitch. That's all.

Once subscribed to a channel, a user will get access to the normal unlocked things but also access to a new tab next to "Gift Subs" called "Gift Bits." Gifting bits directly through a channel the viewer is subbed to will provide a discount. For example we'll say $1 = 100 bits. One option would be $1 = 110 bits if subbed...or, you could implement it as .90C = 100 bits.

You could scale bigger discounts based on longevity (consecutive months subbed) or through level of subscription (Tier 1, T2, T3.)

I do not have financial information on twitch but I imagine that the primary revenue stream is through subs/gifted subs and a supporting revenue stream of bits. This discount would encourage secondary monetary support and engagement from recurrent viewers. Providing an incentive to further support a subbed streamer will increase conversion rates for twitch and higher bit engagement for streamers.

With a volume discount theory backing this implementation, conversion rates, repeat purchases to a subbed channel, and profit margin depreciation would need to be monitored.

It could be possible to mitigate profit margin erosion through the use of a time limit ("You just subbed to x channel. You have 3 days to gift x bits for x discounted price.") This could provide both sense of urgency and increased optics that there are secondary methods to engage with a streamer.

A secondary option could be to split the profit margin erosion on the back end. The (profit margin - discounted profit margin) / 2 could be split between the streamer and Twitch. This would need to be implemented fairly and transparently as both Twitch and the streamer would receive less total payout. New bit volume would be key to sustaining this relationship.

Either way, I look forward to hearing any ideas about this!

Many Thanks,

GamerQing93

Imagine being able to recycle Bits that have been cheered to you. You could either store them in your Bits balance, cash them out via PayPal, or Re-Cheer them to other streamers!

Other streamers, like myself, who are constantly having Bits cheered to us during our own streams would greatly benefit from this feature. It would be a great way for the Twitch community to interact with one another, to support smaller streamers.

Consider that not all streamers need the income. Some only stream for fun, or as a hobby, so the choice should be left up to each individual streamer. If they feel that they could benefit from the income, they can choose to cash out via PayPal. If they feel that another streamer could benefit from it more, they can choose to support others, instead.

It would also help, timewise, for streamers who are more dependent on Bit Cheers, as there wouldn't be a 30 day roll-over period before the Bits were able to be withdrawn. Streamers who need their earnings sooner would have the ability to withdraw when needed, rather than on a set schedule.

As a Twitch streamer, I believe these can be improved to make bits a more fun and rewarding options for viewers:

1. Up to 5 Animated emotes as an option for bit emote rewards that streamers can put in any slot.
2. Allow streamers to give their bot access to using bit emotes. Currently, partnered streamers can give permanent tier 3 subs to bots, but this doesn't give the bot access to bit emotes.
3. Currently, bit badges go up to 5 million. It should go higher.
4. Expand the current channel points system to include redemptions with bits

I think these improvements would encourage many more people to use bits!

Something new that "could" be added to bits is when any viewer redeems 1 or more loot with Twitch Prime on any affiliate or partner channel, that channel owner could automatically get 0.15% off bits per viewer who have redeemed 1 or more loot when on that channel. It would take 100 viewers redeeming loot to reach 15% off bits for that specific channel.

The cap of the percentage off bits for the channel owner could be 5%-15%. Once a channel reaches the cap the channel owner could have one-to-two weeks to buy the bits with a percentage off, from viewers redeeming loot on their channel (before it resets to zero).

A lot of streamers support many other channels and it's out of love that people cheer streams, so it could be a good thing to have another way to support your favourite streamer with Twitch Prime by giving the streamer a discount on bits.

:)

As a part of our efforts to continually improve our products and creators and viewers build communities together, we are testing several possible updates to the Cheering experience. As a part of this effort, we are testing one of three prototype Cheering updates to a small number of hand-selected channels in order to observe how communities respond and interact with the feature. These three updates are:

• Cheer with Screenshot: viewers can add a creator-selected image to their Cheer to increase the expressiveness of their Cheer in chat.
• Cheer Message Size: viewers can choose how large their Cheer message will appear in chat based on the amount of Bits they use.
• Bits Rain: each Cheer will result in a rain of Bits gems over chat, the intensity of which is determined by the amount of Bits used.

These changes are intended to help us learn how new features like these might improve the experience of Cheering. They will be available only for a short period of time, and will not be expanded more broadly. If you encounter a channel where one of these experiences is available, please feel free to provide your feedback below.

Would be nice if there was a setting akin to the setting for sub gifting to no longer show up on the leaderboard. Would probably not be necessary to take away the cheer badges (since you can just choose what badge you want to use).

I know a lot of streamers prefer knowing where love and support came from so they have a slight dislike towards anonymous bits/gifts. But I personally prefer not showing up on the leaderboards when it comes to cheering bits/gifting subs, so I love the setting where you can hide from them for subs, would just love a similar setting for bits as well.