Twitch is Mining Peoples' Streams to Train Amazon's AI

Twitch is utilizing streamers' content to train Amazon's AI models, unless streamers actively disable the feature through their settings. The announcement was made on Wednesday, following rumors that have been circulating over the past week. The toggle, titled "Allow your channel content to train generative AI content models at Amazon," is located at the bottom of the user's security settings page, with all users set to opt-in by default.

If opted out, streamers' streams, VODs, clips, chats, and channel visuals will not be used for Amazon's future training of a model designed to generate or synthesize text, audio, images, or video.

Twitch maintains that opting out of training does not exempt users from all AI or machine learning uses on the platform. For example, AutoMod, which helps maintain a safe community, will continue to operate without retaining data to produce content. Similarly, Twitch may still employ data for AI-supported features like auto-generated captions for Clips, without storing the stream or clips to train a model capable of producing new content.

The platform is positioning this setting as a benefit to users, announcing the new feature on X (formerly Twitter). In reality, Twitch decides this for users unless they discover and disable the new option themselves. This was evident on the reporter's own account and echoed across social media. Twitch executives have been discussing the use of streamers' content for AI training for years.

In 2024, Twitch's Chief Monetization Officer, Mike Minton, stated that Twitch has a "role to play" in training Amazon's generative AI models, noting that content was already being used "in a prototyping, not in any kind of production scale, capacity." However, Amazon did not respond to requests for comment.