X announced an updated live-streaming command center within its Creator Studio platform, which will make it easier for creators to schedule and run their live broadcasts in the app.
The updated live composer will give creators a streamlined launch process for their livestreams, including simplified setup on desktop PCs, with chat control options, thumbnail uploads, etc.
Once the stream is live, the dashboard will also provide creators with audience insights, including viewer and comment peaks and audience demographics.
It looks like a pretty sleek package for desktop-originated streams, though it is only available to users that pay for X Premium or higher, which includes access to Media Studio.
So you’re going to have to pay to use it, but for those who are using X to communicate with their audience, it could be another engagement consideration, and with X still leading the way on live event engagement, having the capacity to operate livestreams quickly and easily could be a valuable element.
X is looking to raise awareness of its new live broadcast options by offering an additional $1 million in creator funding for livestreamers this month.
Though how that funding will be allocated isn’t entirely clear.
As explained by X’s head of product Nikita Bier: “To kick things off, we’ll also be rewarding creators who livestream by allocating $1 million in the upcoming cycle – so start building your streaming audience now.”
Whether that means that livestream creators will split an extra million, or that X will give one creator $1 million for their stream, like it did with Articles, is not clarified, while X also makes it increasingly difficult to get any such clarity, given owner Elon Musk’s disdain for journalists.
But either way, X is trying to get more people livestreaming with cash incentives. Which have never, and will never work in terms of guiding longer-term user behavior, but presumably X just wants to juice its numbers to make this a splashy launch.
It’s difficult to project the actual value of this update, because while X is still used by hundreds of millions of people, its actual audience reach is questionable, while Threads continues to rise, and is now eating into X’s dominance of live event discussion.
The true value, then, will be relative to each creator or brand’s audience, and where they interact. If that happens to be X, then this could be a valuable complement to video strategies.
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