A bit of a fuss has been kicked up over on /r/poker in a thread titled "Gripsed is a FRAUD on Twitch" wherein accusations are unleashed with regard to popular Twitch poker streamer "Gripsed" being accused of employing bots in order to be the number one streamer (this puts you at the top of the list on Twitch.tv). At first it appeared to be a mindless rant, but then some data was posted that seems to have some merit...

A normal stream looks like this:





Gripsed streams last week:






Note the seemingly unnatural rapid increase in viewership.



Other suspicious things of note included the "viewer to chatter ratio" which is abnormally high. i.e. there appears to a very large number of viewers, but very few actually speaking. It doesn't seem to follow the norm in other popular Twitch poker streams like that of JCarver or Tonka or Staples.

It was noted how few donations Gripsed gets on a daily basis verses that of other popular streamers with similar player counts and the ratios appeared to be far off.


I'm sure some of you will ask, who cares? Good point. Is it abnormal for Twitch stars to use bots, or is that just what it takes to get to the top and stay there? It appears that even Jamie Staples used some sort of bot package to help his stream grow initially, according to another streamer BTCBlade.


Discuss?

EDIT: Original information came from another forum post: "Gripsed is a FRAUD on Twitch"

EDIT #2: Evidently since the original post in Edit #1, his viewer count has been about 1,000 subs less than last week (and this is the busy weekend viewing times when viewer counts peak).

Who cares?

I don't care.

edit title so that its not confusing with using poker bots, as i presume most people will initially think when they see it

who cares?

What is to be gained from botting? Getting a pokersite sponsorship? Does Twitch pay more for viewership or just click through advertising?

When a thread is this rubbish OP is usually Chainsaw

I've watched a lot of non poker streams and the viewer to chatter ration can be extremely high or extremely low. That point doesn't seem hugely relevant to me.

Most of Staples, Kevin Martin and even Jcarvers viewers are gibbering morons. The sycophantic crap they come off with, I kind of hope they are bots programmed to say that ****. And the donations, I don't really understand how Staples and Martin get as much as they do. It is largely the same stream.

As for the viewer figures, I don't think that is conclusive either, I also don't see why he would do it. It doesn't move him that far up the listing and he is already partnered, has been from the start, based on his YT subs. From what other streamers have said the ad revenue isn't that significant, so that doesnt seem like a compelling reason to inflate viewers.

The way Twitch lays out things when you click the "Poker" category lists streamers from largest viewer count to smallest. Thus, if you tack on 1,000+ viewers the odds are more people will see your stream. If more people see your stream, more people will buy your products. At least, that's the logic I presume is used.

I just looked, even the 2+2 streaming forum is listed this way. So there are number of benefits on multiple websites it'd seem.

people here must be clueless about how twitch works because this is sort of a big deal

+1

As someone who watches a decent amount of twitch poker streams, I've never watched the Gripsed stream. 95% of my twitch viewing has been either AJFenixx or JNandez. I'd rather sleep than watch almost anyone play an mtt. Pretty sure that ruperte is the only mtt stream I've ever watched for more than 2 minutes. So I'm not a Gripsed fan, but as for the viewership botting...

Is there a twitch rule against it?

If not, then well played Gripsed.

If there is a twitch rule against it, what is the penalty?

If the penalty is a joke, then well played Gripsed.

Admittedly I am clueless about how twitch works, in fact, I simply do not care how twitch works, but I promise that this isn't a big deal in my world.

I feel sorry for the bots.

not really inherently more fraudulent than twitching is to begin with.

I hear that companies hire actors to play the part of satisfied users in commercials.

I also heard that talk show audiences are often paid to fill seats.

I've heard about these Twitch ViewBots before and it just kind of makes me sad that people are that desperate for "fake followers" (a bit like fake twitter followers) in order to increase their "marketability". Does Twitch itself have a policy that prohibits the use of viewbots?

I heard that reality TV is not an accurate depiction of reality.

/Have watched his stream. He is a notch below JCarver and at about the same level as Staples for conveying information (but probably more "entertaining.")

Hello Fayth,

If this is considered "a big deal" - it may be time to turn off the computer and go outside. It is great that you consider self in the know when it comes to twitch, but may I remind you that this is a poker forum, specifically, the News Video Gossip section, not a twitch complaint thread. Just in case my point did not come across clearly, I am going to be quite blunt: you need to shut the **** up.

Tarantula G

This sounds really interesting OP,because...

OP arent you a poker site affiliate? Are you annoyed that Gripsed is getting alot of exposure thus getting alot of sign ups?

I'm not trying to be smart. Im just genuinely curious.

player bot,watcher bot.What is matrix ?

TarantulaGargantu is the new PasswordGotHacked.

Yep you have to bot to get yourself viewed by the masses(ie top 2 rows), but the people with personality tend to succeed which is why jaime does well etc compared to gripsed

so you are telling me to shut the **** up about something you know nothing about because this thread was mistakenly put in NVG?

you are so very cute

lets be real OP, how is this real evidence?? He was the only streamer at one point that is known on twitch (that was why he had so many views at that time)

This is a ****** joke.