Gaming streams are often condemned. In the past, children were reproached for not spending more time outside and instead watching too much television or worse playing too many video games. Now, there are concerns about children not even playing these games anymore. They watch YouTube videos by (often young adult) gamers who play those games for them! Watching game streams is then a passive activity, and thus problematic.
In reality it’s not that simple. These game streams are part of a larger development of ‘streaming’ that mediates an ever-larger part of our societal interactions. And it’s not just children who watch these streams. No, we are dealing with the emergence of a truly 21st century practice. The question that arises is: what are we dealing with then? What happens in the game stream? And does it indeed produce an active player and a passive viewer? Or is something else the case?
In this philosophical blogpost, Jamie van der Klaauw analyzes the phenomenon of gaming streams through thinkers such as Slavoj Žižek and Robert Pfaller to come to a different understanding – with its own accidental benefits and unforeseen consequences.
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