ArgentinianTwitchstreamer Spreen has finally revealed the reason for his October 19 ban from Twitch. Content creators get suspended from the streaming site all the time for a variety of behaviors that violate theTwitch community guidelines. However, sometimes the cause for a streamer being temporarily or even permanently removed from the platform is not entirely clear. This was the case with Spreen, at least apparently, who initially didn’t comment publicly on the situation.
Ivan Buhajeruk, known as Elspreen or just Spreen, is a Spanish-speakingMinecraftstreamer with nearly six million followers on Twitch. Lately, he has been one of thefastest growing content creatorson the platform. So when he was banned for 30 days, it took everyone by surprise, especially because Spreen hadn’t noticeably broken any of Twitch’s terms of service guidelines. He appealed, and ultimately the punishment was reduced to 14 days.
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Now, in a YouTube video, Spreen has revealed that he knew the reason for his ban all along but wanted to hold off on discussing it until he had appealed the decision. According to Spreen,Twitchpunished the streamer for offering VIP status and subscriptions in exchange for channel points. An email from the Amazon-owned platform clarified that Spreen had “set up a scheme where they offer various items of monetary value and/or Twitch features,” which was “artificially increasing their Twitch statistics.” Note that the video below is in Spanish.
Spreen stated that the platform had previously given him a warning, though it hadn’t specified that he needed to stop offering VIP status andTwitch channel subscriptionsin exchange for points. However, others think that Spreen may still be misunderstanding the real reason he was banned, because Twitch listed VIP status and subscriptions simply as an example of some of the rewards he was offering in his “scheme.” Yet other streamers also offer up VIP status in exchange for channel points and are not punished. Perhaps, therefore, the Argentinian violated the platform’s terms of service by, more specifically, offering PS5s and other valuable items for channel points.
The entire situation may be confusing to more than just Spreen and his viewers. After all, Twitch’s channel points system is intended for streamers to offer followers perks in exchange for their loyalty. However, the platform’s web page explaining the feature lists more simplistic rewards like allowing viewers to change the stream’s background music or choose which Twitch channel to raid next. Either way, Spreen’s Twitch ban comes to an end on November 3, and in the meantime, there are plenty of other entertainingMinecraftstreamers on Twitch, many of whom speak Spanish.
