The Twitch channel BeesOnMyHeadTV has been suspended by the streaming platform after an alleged carjacking and shooting took place on a livestream.
One of Twitch’s latest, but an ever-growing additions, has been the phenomenon of “in real life streaming.” It’s pretty much what it says on the box – basically an internet-native version of reality TV – only, one would hope, that which is unscripted and an effort carried out by individual Twitch streamers looking for ways to carve out their slice of this very lucrative pie, by broadcasting their everyday lives.
This is where the story of Twitch’s newest monetizing niche meets that of the growing trend of people documenting and broadcasting their private lives on the internet – and the more controversial and outright gory subset of it, that sees creators come in harm’s way, physically.
Twitch viewers have been left stunned after witnessing what appears to be IRL broadcaster BeesOnMyHeadTV being shot at and having his vehicle stolen live on the stream.
Jonny Zeta, who goes by the name of “BeesOnMyHeadTV” on Twitch, describes himself on his Twitter profile as somebody wasting his time “trying to be funny on the internet, and other stuff.”
Zeta’s latest broadcast on his “real life” Twitch stream surely qualifies more as that “other stuff” than “funny”: it’s video footage showing him apparently carjacked and shot at.
During the September 14th livestream, Zeta had stopped riding around in his car and stopped in a parking lot when he saw a car approaching in the distance. The streamer got out of his car to investigate, muttering “what the f*ck!” as a man jumped out of a white car and began firing shots. This prompted Zeta to run and drop his camera on the ground. Going to black, the stream turned into an audio broadcast, the sounds of a screaming woman heard in the background.
“im ok. everyone is ok,” the streamer tweeted out, appearing to not have been physically harmed or hit by any of the gun shots.
It should be noted that some of the reactions on the web went for the tried and tested “trust, but verify” approach – namely, expressing skepticism as to whether the incident was real, or staged.
Whether for that reason, or for some terms of service violation – or, perhaps, just to be on the safe side of deploying random censorship – Twitch has, in the meantime, suspended the streamer’s account.
If you're tired of censorship and dystopian threats against civil liberties, subscribe to Reclaim The Net.
