Behind-the-Song: Honestly pt.1 (Patreon)

The Twitch song!

The song that began because of the process of applying to be a Partnered streamer 😅 I've talked about this a few times on streams, but this is the section I wrote for that. This is the part of the song that started "Honestly" and I wrote because I was frustrated with emails 😂

I'm tired of the empty words & unkept promises / I'm so sick of heartfelt messages to string me along again / Could you be honest? / Do you know what is honest?

From streams, you may know this already, but I applied to be Partnered three times before I was accepted. I met the requirements in November 2020, but figured I'd wait until things were more consistent before applying. So I applied in January 2021.

They responded with, basically, "Thanks for applying, we see you meet all the requirements, but we want to make sure you can maintain them. Also, meeting the requirements doesn't guarantee you'll be accepted as there are other factors we look at. Apply again in 3 weeks." So, okay, I've already maintained them and grown for the past 2 months, but sure, nobody gets accepted first try, so I'll try again in 3 weeks.

3 weeks later, I applied and got *the same email* in response minus "we want to make sure you can maintain them". So this time it was: Thanks for applying, you meet all the requirements. Still no. There's other factors that go into the decision. Apply again in two weeks.

So I saw that and immediately was confused as to what they thought would change in just two weeks. And also the fact that they provide requirements, but don't tell you what these "other factors" are had me frustrated and literally saying to my computer 😅 "What do you want, then?? Just tell me what you want! Could you just be honest about what you want from me?" And so was born, "could you be honest? Do you know what is honest?"

The empty words and heartfelt messages were the "thank yous" and the "just want to make sure you maintain it! Apply again is this time frame!" Like...why give a time frame the first time if that time frame isn't long enough for you to make a decision? Give me the full time frame you want, the first time?

Unkept promises being "here are the requirements *but we have secret requirements and we're not going to tell you what they are" 😅

Was the song dramatic? Yes. But sometimes you gotta blow something out of proportion to make light of the situation (or write a banger song 😎"

But your Patreon exclusive insight for this is that I have actually very often felt almost ostracized by Twitch. There have been tons of opportunities I qualify for, but have been passed up for, and many instances where I have not been communicated with.

And, this was after I was Partnered, but when I was given the opportunity to be on he front page, they literally ex-communicated me after I said I was interested. Any time I reached out - to communicate things they specifically asked me to communicate - nobody ever responded and I couldn't get in contact with them when something went wrong (because, clearly, they had ignored my communication). In those instances, I was told by someone else in the same front page opportunity to reach out to a specific Twitch person who had been super helpful and responsive with them... It was the same person I was reaching out to.

So when the partner applications were denied with no explanation and short timelines for reapplying, it felt very targeted. It felt like the reason they have "additional, undisclosed factors" that they considered for each application was basically so they could just exclude people without cause 🤷‍♀️ A lot of my experience with Twitch as a company has felt personal and like, for some reason, they just don't like me 🫠 But the platform, and moreso, my community, keep me there ❤️