Twitch had a rush of popularity in China last month, but now reports indicate that the live streaming video platform is no longer available in the country.
Twitch had a rush of popularity in China last month, but now reports indicate that the live streaming video platform is no longer available in the country.
Abacas, a Hong Kong-based China tech news site, noticed that Twitch’s website was not accessible in parts of China as of earlier this week, and then found that the app was no longer listed on Apple’s App Store in the country. This led Abacus to believe the removal was deliberate and not a glitch.
As the Verge points out, many Twitch users posted on Weibo on Monday trying to determine whether the removal was happening across the country or just in certain provinces.
Twitch recently peaked in China as the third most popular free app in the App Store, as many people began using the platform to watch e-sports in the Asian Games—the first time the sport was included in the sporting event. State-run media did not broadcast the Asian Games, so many people in the country turned to other channels.
Amazon, Twitch’s parent company, did not immediately respond to a Gizmodo request for comment.
Twitch, it appears, is just one of the latest US-based social media platforms to be banned in China, as a part of the country’s internet censorship efforts known as the Great Firewall. WhatsApp, Skype, YouTube, Instagram, Twitter, and Facebook are just some of the apps and sites censored in China.
[ Abacus, the Verge]
