#550: Andrew Chen — Metaverse, Metrics, and Meerkats

Twitch started as ‘JustinTV’ named after the founder, Justin Kan

The market wasn’t huge for gaming at the time but the engagement and participation was extremely high within the niche

Incentives to create content change when there are clear economic opportunities

All day, every day he would live to stream his life

The principles of marketing durably persist over time, they just use different mediums and technologies

Pivoted towards gaming and a creator-supported model rather than a viewership model

You never know who your writing will reach, writing today is extremely scalable

“[Twitch] solves the original sin of the internet, which is having an advertising-based system…We decided to go with banner ads over paying each other online” – Andrew Chen

For startups, you learn a lot more from direct marketing to acquire one unique customer at a time