Keep the Maturity Tag *AND* have Content Classification
I think the new content classification feature is an incredibly useful tool to have. Allowing creators to specify their content and giving an audience the ability to know that a stream may have something that is not for them is great!
As a streamer who is SFW and doesn't have any content that would fall under these classifications, though, the loss of the maturity tag means that I am losing a valuable feature to keep my community safe.
Why I don't want children in my space despite being completely SFW:
It is a LOT of work to keep children safe when you are allowing them in your community. They are inherently vulnerable. Not every content creator is equipped or prepared to take on that burden. Allowing children into your space means that your moderation has to be VERY strict to protect them. Their brains are still developing and you have no idea what passing comment could stick with them forever. Not to mention that regardless of how well you try to curate your community, anyone can watch whisper children privately. It is not something every content creator is prepared to take on. Children are considerably more likely to form unhealthy parasocial attachments to you and not recognize your and this can make enforcing healthy, distant relationships considerably harder. Many streamers are not equipped to take on this burden and used the blanket moderation tool as a way to enforce this boundary.
Why having the blanket "mature" tag in addition to the content classification labels is the safest option for many spaces:
I sat in on the Patch Notes today and brought this up. The staff that was there offered a somewhat helpful alternative after clarifying that they are not considering both of these options together. This suggestion was:
Use the freeform tags as a way to let people know your content isn't for kids.
While this is helpful in a small way, many people completely miss these tags. Sure, kids may ignore all the messages anyway, but a parent monitoring their kid's watching habits and helping to determine which streams are safe for them may very well not notice a tag-- they WILL, however, notice a message on the screen letting them know that I have set the boundary with my community that it is intended for non-minors (Mature content warning). Removing this ability makes it considerably easier to violate this boundary on accident.
I know MANY streamers who do not have the bandwidth to dedicate extra resources into moderating with children in mind, communicating with them in a way that doesn't impact them harmfully long term, and doing the extra steps to do what they can to help protect them from predators. In these cases, the blanket maturity tag allows us to easily and clearly set the boundary without risking it go unnoticed by parent OR child.
How I would suggest implementing this:
Just have both. The blanket maturity tag wouldn't absolve people of having to specify the kinds of mature content under the new standards for classification. It would just also allow those of us doing our best to keep communities safe by gently keeping children out a much easier time to enforce these boundaries.
I'm also happy to speak to anybody further about why this is so important to me, or to connect you with other partnered/affiliated streamers who feel the same.
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ErinusTV commented
The new Content Classifications for mature content are great but based on the advice in the townhall + the information in the blog page there is no longer a way to blanket label content as for mature audiences without having to select one of the classifications, even if none of them fit.
Content creators who only want their content & community to be open to people 18+ should be able to use this feature to inform viewers that their channel is for mature audiences only, even if it doesn't focus on any of the content within the classifications.
In addition, there are games without ESRB ratings that are absolutely mature, but the Mature Content label is greyed out unless it is specifically tied to the game in Twitch's back-end, which feels like an oversight. Again, this could be solved with being able to select a blanket "mature content" label.
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Candy_Dagger commented
Make it a not for children tag
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Jasmineitor commented
Agree with all of the above - my stream is primarily SFW but I still don't feel comfortable with children in my space either. Keep the new labels, but don't get rid of the old one!
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melwithac commented
Yes please! I mostly do SFW content but that doesn’t necessarily mean my stream itself is for children.
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goodappleboy commented
I agree! A lot of streamers don't have the tools and team it takes to keep kids safe. Even if you set up safety tools ahead of time you can't always ensure hate speech or direct messaging won't happen from viewers and/or hate raids.
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captocie commented
i agree! i don't want children in my space when im streaming. i stream to hang out with my friends and meet peers in my community--children are not my peers. i am not looking to babysit and neither is my community. i shouldn't need to be streaming "adult content" to be able to MEANINGFULLY enforce this boundary for myself and my community. i completely agree that we need to have the option for BOTH the specific tags AND the blanket mature tag.
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pinuwuk commented
Well said!
Not everyone who uses the "mature" tag creates "mature content"--this should be recognized and reflected in these new features. -
tanookEXP commented
Well said! For many variety streamers, allowing the 'mature' tag also allows a greater freedom of entertainment without having to triple-check every single bit of planned content. Sometimes innocent-looking games can have a mature scene or two that the streamer didn't anticipate ahead of time. Knowing they're covered in these examples and other 'special instances' can relieve many otherwise stressful situations that may cause anxiety for streamers. The focus should be to prevent not only parents and children from possibly harmful spaces, but also to alleviate stress from the streamer, too.
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JessiNaka commented
I really don't understand why Twitch feels the need to *remove* helpful features every time they *add* them. This reminds me of removing standardized content tags when adding the ability to create your own, splintering things like the LGBT+ space into different categories because there are slight variations (LGBTQ, LGBTQIA, etc.) Can't we have both? Isn't it better to have both?
I agree that a general mature tag is *very* important to streamers like me, who want to maintain a level of maturity regardless of the vibe being more comfy/SFW, and I do not have the extra energy (nor do I want the responsibility!) to babysit children in my stream. It is also in the children's best interest, for their safety, to have a general maturity warning that is more obvious to parents and guardians.
Please bring it back. (But keep the new tags as well!! It's a good addition, but we don't need to take one step forward, one step back each time!!)
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LeShanDoge commented
Very well put! The general mature stream tag is so important for stream safety and moderation, and it would be a huge oversight to not allow creators to fully utilise these tools!
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DrekiOrmur commented
Thank you for organizing this and laying out the concerns.
Allowing the general mature tag helps cover so many gaps that could crop up from an explicit tag system. If a new wave of content rolls through but no rules cover it clearly, general blanket tags can help a lot.