Thread by @MultimediaJay

What #YouTubeGaming is doing to #ForzaHorizon5 right now represents many opportunities for improvement for YouTube as a streaming platform. 🤔

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@YouTube
@YouTubeGaming
@Chen
@nealmohan

@YouTube @YouTubeGaming @Chen @nealmohan Earlier in the week Forza Horizon 5 became unselectable as a game, but the DLC and other addons did. Videos previously in the Forza Horizon 5 category only showed up as "Gaming" and no longer listed the game name in the descriptions.

You also can't type just "Forza Horizon 5."

These are the autogenerated directory channels for these "games" but this is merely a symptom - not the problem. YouTube Gaming has traditionally allowed expansions to games, etc., to be their own category.

It's time for that to stop.

Meanwhile on Twitch, only the name of the game is usable as a directory label. World Of Warcraft for example includes multiple expansions of streams, plus multiple expansions in WoW Classic.

Too many options just divides the audience. Only game names should be used on YouTube.

YouTube Leadership is already on record for de-emphasizing kingmaker systems and game directories, but I think there's still a place for them. Twitch is pursuing a combination of the two, especially with the new stream browser they just launched. 🤔

Algorithms and Directories are becoming meta with this stuff. I think some of the "no discoverability" discussions out there are really about the weaknesses of livestreaming rather than any specific platform. 🤔

That's that with the thread. 🙂 Looking forward to real feature parity for YouTube Gaming vs. Twitch, and not just a few features that can be paraded around for publicity and good press. 🙂