Getting Back Into Streaming Part 1

Hello there! It's been a while since I have written any blog posts here on the XSplit website, so what brings me back? Well, it's a whole theme of coming back for myself and the company as a whole. I suppose coming back is the wrong term, more of a refocus. I'm getting back into streaming, and XSplit are putting more focus on gamers and content creators. Seems like a great match!

It's something I've been thinking about for some time now. I used to stream pretty often, in fact for a while I had a schedule where I'd stream three times a week for hours on end. I used to really enjoy it but then something started to change. It wasn't a fast change, there was no real event that made the act of streaming less enjoyable. It was a gradual process brought on by “hustle culture”, which is a term given to the idea that you could always be doing more.

When it comes to streaming, hustle culture took a strong hold, and some would argue it still does. You should stream for the optimum amount of hours! Make sure you're streaming the right game for your audience and a broader audience as well! Make sure your alerts are right! Are you optimizing your content to be usable on different platforms? Have you been using TikTok?! All of these questions and more would swirl around my head and I'll be honest, it made my fun hobby less fun. It made it work, something I should dedicate my brain to, not something I should unwind it into.

So I ended up stopping, life also got in the way, but whenever I thought of getting back into streaming, those questions would run around my head and I'd wear myself out. That is, until recently. I was talking to the people here at XSplit and they mentioned refocusing back on content creators and how they'd like it to be a more focused but natural approach. This clicked something in my brain, that's what I want to do! I want to stream again but have it just done, for fun! We could work together on this! So, here I am!

I'm lucky in that I have still managed to keep a few people who watched my stuff back then around, so as I've trialed streaming again, a few folks have turned up. Just those tests were incredibly fun, talking, laughing and going off on tangents. I've already got ideas rolling around in my head but I intend to keep them grounded, focused and intentional. What does that mean? Well, I'm not going to worry about making streaming my full time job. It's a rare and lucky few who manage that, discoverability isn't the best on the big platforms so it does take a lot of work.

I mentioned hustle culture earlier, and no doubt that does work for some people. There are people whose brains can operate on that level and have seen success. I'm not one of them, sadly. And now, at the shocking age of 38, I'm less ready than ever to dedicate my free time to another job.

This will be a journey, and one I intend to document both here and on the XSplit YouTube channel. You can find me streaming on my Twitch channel every Friday at 3pm GMT, but I'll also be popping up on the XSplit channels as we progress to hang out and answer questions. Mostly, I just want to hang out on the internet, be silly and play video games I like.

I look forward to going on this journey together! Let me know if you're thinking about doing the same! It'd be fun to track how much we're all enjoying it!

See you on the internet!