"I can see people abusing this": Community divided as Twitch launches "Knock" feature to allow collaborations between streamers

The Twitch community on X has been left divided after the platform announced a new "Drop Ins" feature for Streamer Together. This will allow content creators to seamlessly collaborate with other streamers on the platform. As per a post on Twitch's official website by its CEO Dan Clancy, a content creator can request a collaboration by finding fellow creators donning the "collaboration icon," which indicates that the streamer is open to the same.

Subsequently, the content creator wanting to initiate the collaboration can click on the "Knock" icon on the other streamer's profile. This sends a notification to the other streamer's chat, which is visible only to them.

If the other streamer is willing to collaborate as well, they can accept the "Knock" and subsequently allow the two parties to stream together. The audio and video-related specifications can be preconfigured or set up at the time.

However, this update has concerned some netizens and raised questions about the level of control one has over the feature and its potential for being misused.

X user @JaedumGaming voiced their concern regarding individuals "abusing" this feature:

"I can see people abusing this already."

Meanwhile, Twitch streamer and game journalist Zach Bussey (@zachbussey) also expressed his dissatisfaction with the update and pointed out that the platform does not allow streamers to disable it entirely. He wrote:

"Sorry, I cannot approach Guest Star with neutrality. This update is awful. They're forcing it on everyone, and its permission structure, by default, allows anyone to call. You can't turn it off; you can only pause for '1 Hour' OR 'This Stream.' Turns back on every stream."

@NaniRue requested Twitch to allow content creators to opt out of the new feature:

"Let us please fully opt out of this."

However, some Twitch users have welcomed the new update. @VassagoCult wrote:

"Finally a good decision by Twitch."

Meanwhile, user @FireTavernMage wrote:

"Wow that’s awesome."

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What are the ways for a content creator to control the new Drop In feature on Twitch?

Information provided on the Twitch blog on how to control the feature (Image via blog.twitch.tv)

As per the information provided by Twitch CEO Dan Clancy in the blog post regarding the Drop Ins update, certain provisions have been made to give content creators a degree of control over the feature.

Firstly, only active live streamers can collaborate with others, and not viewers. Secondly, a content creator can set preferences on who they would like to receive "knocks" from. The options are All Streamers, Affiliates and Partners, Partners only, People Followed, or one's Favorites list. Lastly, this feature can be "paused" on any stream.

As suggested by Zach Bussey, one can also set no favorites, and then change the Drop Ins to Favorites Only. This will disable the feature by proxy.

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This is not the only update by Twitch to recently face flak from the community. A revamp of the platform's mobile app, announced on July 29, 2024, which was implemented thereafter, has raised eyebrows among Twitch users. Many netizens have called for the changes to be reverted, as they compared the new design to that of short-form content app TikTok.