Affiliate vs. Partner

This is not a complaint paste.  This is not to say I don't like the regulars I've got, they're great people and I love them a lot.  This paste is because there are people out there who think I don't understand a few things about becoming a Partner, and how unlikely I personally am to get it.  So I'm going to clear that up.

I do have dreams.  I would love to be a Partner one day.  Yes, firstly, I realize getting Partner is a thing that takes a long time.  I've known that for years.  And even once you qualify number-wise, some streamers still have to apply multiple times before they're told yes.

The problem with me personally getting Partner is, I have multiple habits and other things going on that I know are, or likely are, actively preventing me from achieving that goal in any reasonable timeframe that might match how long-ish it took other streamers who are otherwise similar to me to get Partnered.  If you want to be a Partner, you have to have 75 viewers regularly, and I'm unlikely to achieve that kind of regular viewercount for the following reasons:

> I don't stream any game with consistency.  Even the stuff I love.  I'm a variety streamer, is what this one comes down to.
> I don't stream on a schedule.  My stream start times and durations are inconsistent.  People don't know when to expect me to stream.
> I don't stream any super-popular games.  (Mario 3 is a popular retro game, but it isn't Fortnite or League of Legends.)
> I hold no important world records, and the games I do run, though I'm good, I'm not godlike at.
> I don't have an active focus on doing/achieving above things that would increase my viewercount in the first place.

So with those things in mind, although people usually tend to enjoy my personality and content (I'm a pretty animated guy), I just generally can't garner long-term viewers.  I rarely break about 8 to 12ish people during any typical session (unless we're playing KTANE, part of my Interactive Weekends, and let's be real here, there are people who don't like that I do that every other Friday).  You need to keep in mind that people on Twitch will typically follow you because you played a game they like (instead of, y'know, following the *game* in the Twitch Directory, they follow *you*).  Some of 'em assume you're going to just keep playing that game more or less consistently forever, others know you'll play other stuff, but fact of matter, you get most of your viewers for playing a game, and that's unlikely to change.  My game designation changes all the time.  I don't even stick with one genre.  Platformers, metroidvanias, rhythm games, creative (I'm a stepartist), Twitch Plays, I do all manner of different stuff.  People follow because I did decently in a Mario 3 tournament and don't show up for anything but Mario 3.  I'm not even given a chance on other things.  I've got a 4-digit follower count and don't see much evidence of it in my viewer list, and I'm well-aware of why.

So Ace, if you want Partner, why not just do one or more of those things you talked about earlier?  Even just one would be easy enough, right?  You don't have to do ALL of them.  Naw mang.  Let's talk about *why* I *don't* do these things, since it isn't often I mention why.

> Game Consistency
I am a person who can experience burnout, but more importantly, once I achieve a time I'm happy with when speedrunning (which happened with all 3 major categories of Mario 3 for over a year), I don't feel much reason to run the category anymore, because I'm satisfied with the time I have.

> Schedule
My body clock generally thinks there's about 25 or 26 hours in a day.  (Not quite so much lately, but I've recently had surgery and am currently experiencing other problems that make me feel kinda lethargic all day some days; once that's fixed, this will probably be the case once again.)  That, plus the fact that I don't work (I do make an income though) means I don't set my alarm pretty much ever, and my sleep cycle goes around and around.  That's how I'm as energetic as I am for you guys when I stream, and why I don't stream on a schedule.  If my body clock knew there's 24 hours in a day, this'd probably be the one thing I'd do to some extent.

> Super-Popular Games
I don't go out of my way to stream anything that's hot just because it's hot.  Never have.  There are very rare occasions where I'll want to play an upcoming game that ends up really popular, but for the most part, my lack of doing this comes from my disinterest in streaming anything the Twitch viewerbase at large wants to see.  Sorry, I don't care about Fortnite or PUBG as I don't care for first- or third-person shooters, I don't care about League of Legends as I don't care about MOBAs, I don't care about Hearthstone because card games generally just aren't my cup of tea.  However, if something I actually want to play *happens* to be something the viewerbase is rabid about, I'll gladly play it, because I ACTUALLY LIKE IT.  I'm sure when Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night comes out, I'll get a bunch of viewers as I play through it; many people are looking forward to the game's release with bated breath.  Also, people can tell when you're playing something just to get viewers; they can tell when you aren't genuine.  That's never been part of who I am.

> World Records
This has never been a focus on my stream.  I'm a reasonable guy who knows that with his current strats, he is not a Mario 3 WR contender.  I hold the WR for Teleroboxer, but being real again, nobody cares about that.  And on top of lack of currently holding WRs, I don't really care much to achieve any notable WR.  It just doesn't matter to me.  This isn't what I stream for.

> Active Focus on Increasing Viewers
I TRIED this in Season 5 (insofar as I knew how at the time), generally by doing things I already knew I got increased viewers for in the past, more often.  It didn't work out very well, and my regulars became worried about my shift in focus - they could tell I wasn't my usual self.  Numbers became too important to me, and it showed.  Season 6 happened because there was a major focus shift from garnering viewers, back to where my focus SHOULD be - fun.  Therefore, this has not been a primary focus of my stream for a long while.

I'm a for-fun kinda guy for the most part.  I stream what I want when I want, I do Follower Specials when we hit milestones, and because I have no real consistency and cannot *achieve* said consistency due to how I operate, I may never hit Partner status.  Affiliate may have to be good enough forever.  Granted, Affiliate means more now than it did at inception, and the only complaint that I have about it currently is that you still only get one base emote for subscribing to an Affiliate channel (even if they changed that, my sub count is still so low at present that I'd still only have one anyway, so it's not like that even matters right now), and I historically do not make the best decisions as to which emote that should be.  Either way, Affiliates have the same major sources of income available to them as a Partner (Subs and Cheers), so certainly I am making more from playing video games now than I did before I became an Affiliate, and it's up to me to make subbing to me worth someone's money, but that's neither here nor there for the mere concept of becoming a Partner.  So, maybe being an Affiliate in the long term is *already* worth it, and I just don't fully realize it yet, or if it isn't already, it could *become* worth it through further changes Twitch makes to the Affiliate program in the future.

What it comes down to is, the concept that I'm a variety streamer who streams inconsistent games at inconsistent times just isn't the kind of thing that's in the profile of those who are Partners, and I don't have the desire to exclusively or almost-exclusively cherry-pick doing things that would actively go grab me new viewers.  I'd rather just have fun.

So, I'd love to be a Partner, but I realize it's either going to be a long time, or it may just straight-up never happen.

The only thing that I'm currently sure of is that I'm going to keep streaming what I want, when I want, how I want, and continue trying not to worry too much about the numbers.  If that becomes good enough for others in the future, great.  If not, oh well.  The only thing that matters is that it's good enough for me, right now, and as long as I'm happy with doing things that way, I'm going to keep doing things that way.