Twitch announces termination of service in Korea, reasons why service must be terminated in Korea & summary of reactions of streamers who are also active in Japan



Live streaming platform Twitch has announced its withdrawal from South Korea. The timing of service termination in South Korea is February 27, 2024 (Korean and Japan time), and the reason for service termination is explained as ``operating costs have become extremely high.''

Notice regarding Twitch in Korea

https://blog.twitch.tv/ja-jp/2023/12/05/an-update-on-twitch-in-korea/



Supporting Users in Korea Through the Shutdown of Twitch in Korea
https://help.twitch.tv/s/article/korea-update-kr

It seems that Twitch's operating costs in South Korea were extremely high, and Twitch has been working on cost reduction in various ways so far. Specifically, in order to protect the quality of videos, we have attempted to distribute videos using a P2P model and have taken steps to reduce costs, such as limiting the image quality of videos distributed within South Korea to a maximum of 720p (HD quality). However, Twitch explains, ``Network fees in South Korea were still approximately 10 times higher than in other countries.'' As a result, Twitch has recorded a large amount of losses in South Korea, and it seems that they have decided that there is no way to continue the business any longer.

Twitch said, ``For the Korean Twitch streamers who have spent so much time and effort building their communities, we would like to help them find a new place to keep their communities alive.'' We will support Twitch streamers in Korea to smoothly transition to other live streaming services in Korea.''We will help Korean Twitch streamers migrate to other streaming platforms.''

In terms of information for users outside of South Korea, Twitch writes, ``For streamers who reside outside of South Korea and who have a large number of viewers from South Korea, we would like to inform you of the possibility of a decrease in revenue on Twitch.'' . In fact, Twitch seems to be sending email notifications to streamers who receive a large amount of revenue from South Korea and may see a decrease in revenue in the future.

Additionally, on February 27, 2024, streamers who selected South Korea as their country of residence when registering their accounts will no longer be able to monetize the Twitch service. The final payment for streamers who have selected South Korea as their country of residence will be made on March 16th, and their affiliate partner registrations will be deleted on June 4th. In addition, for cases where you entered your country of residence incorrectly, or cases where you previously resided in South Korea but currently reside outside of South Korea, Twitch will issue a message saying, ``If you accidentally selected South Korea as your country of residence during registration, If you think this is the case, please promptly re-register as a partner/affiliate and correct your country of residence.Re-registration can be done from the settings menu on the Creator Dashboard.'



In addition, there are many Korean professional gamers and Korean streamers active in Japan. As a result, there were many posts on X expressing concern about the end of Twitch's service in South Korea.



















Korean streamer yummy_2, following Twitch's withdrawal from South Korea, exclaimed in his stream, ``My career, everything I've created, everything I've created with my partner streamers, everything will be gone.'' .


Some say that professional gamers and streamers will also be affected by the inability to stream on Twitch from South Korea.







Since the announcement of Twitch's withdrawal from South Korea, the stock price of Africa TV, one of the potential destinations for Korean streamers, has soared by nearly 20%.



The reason why Twitch withdrew from South Korea was that ``network charges are 10 times more expensive than in other countries.'' In South Korea, ISPs that provide Internet connection services This is because providers that provide services such as Internet services over the Internet must pay network usage fees to the ISP.

To use overseas services, you need to directly access the country's Internet network. For example, to watch Netflix in South Korea, you need to connect to the American Internet network that is connected to the Korean Internet network and import the video. . Network usage fees are incurred at this time. ISPs are hierarchically determined based on several criteria, and ISPs in lower tiers pay data transfer costs to ISPs in higher tiers, which is called transit, and sending and receiving data between ISPs in the same tier is called peering. However, as OTT providers such as Netflix have become more popular in South Korea, the transit costs that Korean ISPs have to bear have increased. Therefore, Korean ISPs are demanding that overseas OTT providers pay network usage fees.

In South Korea, ISPs and OTT provider Netflix were engaged in a muddy legal battle over the payment of network usage fees, but the lawsuit ultimately ended with the two parties forming a strategic partnership. Masu.

ISP claims that ``Netflix, which accounts for the majority of Internet traffic, should pay network usage fees'' - GIGAZINE



In addition, similar to South Korea, there is an accelerating movement in India and the UK to require OTT providers to pay network usage fees.

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