Published , by Donovan Erskine
Published , by Donovan Erskine
There’s an endless list of events that were either postponed, held digitally, or outright canceled over the last year and a half as we continue to navigate the pandemic. On that list was TwitchCon, the convention revolving around the livestreaming platform and its roster of creators. After getting canceled two years in a row, TwitchCon is finally set to return next year. Both TwitchCon Amsterdam and TwitchCon San Diego have been given dates for 2022.
Twitch announced the return of TwitchCon in a blog post shared on its website. TwitchCon Amsterdam will take place in July 2022, with TwitchCon San Diego going down in October 2022. “Of course, these are still uncertain times and our plans will remain flexible as needed. Our top priority while planning TwitchCon is safety, and we will closely follow local health guidelines and recommendations,” the post reads. Several events have tried to return as vaccines began to go out and cases subsided, but it still proved to be too unsafe. TwitchCon 2022 is roughly a year out, and it’s impossible to predict what the state of the pandemic will be by then.
Ironically, Twitch has had some of its highest viewership ever during the pandemic, as being indoors for an increased amount of time has led many to watching more content on the platform. Twitch hopes that this will bolster the turnout at TwitchCon 2022.
A big draw of TwitchCon over the years has been the opportunity for fans to meet their favorite creators face-to-face. Since the last TwitchCon was held in 2019, Twitch has lost a lot of its top talent to YouTube and other platforms. Timthetatman, DrLupo, CouRage, Valkyrae, and several others are now longer affiliated with Twitch following signing deals to stream elsewhere. It will be interesting to see if that has any visible impact on TwitchCon 2022’s performance.