Thousands of people are attending TwitchCon, which began Friday, the highly anticipated convention hosted by the live-streaming platform to bring together content creators, gamers, DJs and fans from across the world to celebrate gaming esports and more.
Twitch, an Amazon-owned digital platform, is considered the benchmark for live streaming, one of the fastest-growing sectors within digital media and entertainment. The platform serves as one of the internet’s major hubs where content creators broadcast real-time video to viewers who, in turn, can watch, chat and interact with livestreamers.
Although creators of color, such as Kai Cenat, Twitch’s most-followed streamer, have risen to prominence in recent years, both gaming and streaming have historically been a predominantly white, male-dominated industry.
Data show that in 2026, the majority of Twitch’s most prominent and top-earning streamers are white and male. The statistic also represents a majority of the platform’s smaller content creators and audience. While Twitch doesn’t routinely release demographic data, independent studies from research groups such as Statista estimate that 63% of platform users are men.
Another survey by Statista found that 68% of video gamers surveyed in the U.S. identified as white. However, things are starting to change. People of color and women have made immense gains in representation on the platform and are building robust audiences online.
Local content creators include Verrell Joseph, 23, a business major who graduated from UC San Diego, and a woman known as CurlyWurdy online. The 30-year-old Pakistani-American Twitch partner/content creator moved to San Diego from the Bay Area six years ago.
For Joseph, streaming represents the future in entertainment for a growing number of young people.
“I really do firmly believe that streaming is the next step in mainstream media,” said Joseph, who goes by the name notverrell online. “TV and cable are kind of dying out. I feel like a lot of people who are my age and younger don’t really care for TV because it feels manufactured.”
Joseph’s views closely align with observable trends from experts. According to a survey conducted by Deloitte, younger generations strongly prefer livestreaming and social video over traditional television and scripted streaming content. Nearly half of Gen Z (47%) and one-third of millennials prefer to watch livestreams and social video over traditional television shows and movies.
Joseph boasts a 73,000-strong following on Instagram, which he leverages to funnel people from his content into his livestreams on Twitch. Joseph says his streams typically fall into Twitch’s “Just Chatting” category. The non-gaming, catch-all space frequently ranks as one of the platform’s most-watched and highest-viewed categories, where streamers can talk directly to audiences.
Joseph often plays video games, like Roblox, with viewers, shares music in a tournament-style event called ‘Song Wars,’ and discusses anime, such as “Attack on Titan,” “Golden Time” and “Naruto”.
Despite an increase in visibility, streamers of color on Twitch and other platforms still face unique and systemic challenges that impact their growth, long-term career viability on platforms and even their mental health. Streamers of color, particularly Black, Indigenous and women, often experience higher rates of targeted hate speech, racial slurs, cyberbullying, doxxing and coordinated raid attacks in their chat rooms.
Joseph says the trend is the unfortunate reality for creators of color and comes with the territory of being a prominent online personality.
“I deal with it all the time, but I’ve kind of gotten used to it – I don’t know if that’s good or bad,” Joseph said. “It’s something that you kind of start to just understand that as a Black man, some people are going to act negatively.”
Joseph says that harassment will often peak after videos go viral or when collaborating with fellow content creators who are women. “When I do feature a woman in my videos, it can be met with misogyny from people online,” Joseph said. “It’s because you’re able to be anonymous and when there are no repercussions for your actions, people will say whatever.”
Studies have found that female streamers face significant harassment online. The hyper-scrutiny includes a focus on things such as their appearance, tone of voice, hair, or cultural background rather than their actual content.
It’s worse for women of color. Amnesty International found that they are 34% more likely to be subjected to abusive language online than white women.
In spite of the challenges, Joseph believes that livestreaming isn’t just becoming more popular; it is filling a void currently being felt by young people who are looking to find community and places of belonging in an increasingly isolated society.
Joseph, who plans on attending TwitchCon at the San Diego Convention Center, hopes to network with other like-minded creators.
“I feel like nowadays, for people my age, their third space now is on the internet,”Joseph said of young people. “There’s a big subsection of people my age that don’t really connect with people in real life anymore. I basically use my platform, identity and humor to bring people together from all over the world who don’t have that space.”
