Twitch Inadvertently Solves Dota 2 Commentary Issues

Twitch.tv announced yesterday a plan to mute sections of VODs that contain copyrighted audio, and in doing so has unwittingly solved all long standing issues with competitive Dota 2 commentary.

“Since TI4 VODs have muted audio now, every match theoretically could’ve been cast by Tobi,” said one Dota 2 fan. “My favorite one is Starladder finals where Tobi casts with Morgan Freeman.”

The move to universally mute audio was so well received that a growing movement for all Twitch chat participants to manually mute their stream for broadcasts has appeared. With nothing other than the game itself to discuss, Twitch chat reverted to patient discussions and analysis of the streamers skill and item choices, including an 8000% decrease in copypastas and words ending in “ino”.

“We didn’t anticipate much dissatisfaction with our VOD audio being removed,” said one Twitch.tv representative. “The Dota 2 community overall is already accustomed to being muted for long periods of time.”

Dota 2 fans were particularly excited about the muted VOD of The International 4 after party, but were stunned to learn that Seattle-based artist Katie Kate’s performance was not flagged by the system as music.

When polled, 99% of respondents had a “strong preference” toward watching a VOD that had video over a VOD that only had audio, especially when the audio-only VOD was removed due to copyright.

“We are very happy about the positive response this policy has received,” said one Twitch.tv representative. “In fact, we’ve decided to (audio muted due to copyright).