In one of the biggest tech moves of 2014, reports went out on Sunday from Variety that popular video game streaming service Twitch.tv is being acquired by Google, specifically by their YouTube brand, to the purported price tag of $1 billion. This would be huge to the popular streaming service, which initially branched out from Justin.tv in 2011, and raised $35 million since its founding.
The service has proved to be so popular among gamers that the parents company of Justin.tv rebranded itself to Twitch Interactive, focusing primarily on the video game streaming service.
However, pending an official announcement, the Wall Street Journal has refuted Variety’s claim and reports that the acquisition is only in the “early stages” of development.
Still, it’s almost baffling that Twitch took off the way that it did, but it turns out that people just really enjoy watching other people play video games, whether they are looking for pro-tips in competitive games like League of Legends, or looking for some casual entertainment by watching Minecraft.
While the acquisition by Google would give Twitch the virtually unlimited resources of Google, it would also come with a price, and that is the price of competition between the recorded video of YouTube and the livestreaming of Twitch. If both were one, Forbes speculates that many problems would arise, including the livelihood of current professional Twtich streamers.
Pending an official announcement, it’s impossible to really tell what the fate of the company will be, but these acquisition talks are certainly raising the profile of Twitch outside of the gaming community as a real technology-based asset. We will update you when the latest information becomes available.
Daniel Horowitz
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