In a rather surprising turn of events, live streaming platform Twitch has announced that it will officially be shutting down and leaving Korea. This information was revealed in a blog post by CEO, Dan Clancy, who stated that the cost to operate in the country was so "prohibitively expensive" that it is no longer financially viable for the platform to continue its operations in this specific Asian market.
Twitch has said that it has explored additional ways to avoid having to make this decision, including that of a peer-to-peer model and a lower maximum source quality resolution, but despite these helping to reduce costs, network fees are still said to be 10-times as much in Korea as they are in most other countries.
This has led to the streamer also stating that it intends to help streamers who have built communities in the country relocate elsewhere, even if that means heading to a different platform altogether.
The statement concludes by adding, "I want to reiterate that this was a very difficult decision and one we are very disappointed we had to make. Korea has always and will continue to play a special role in the international esports community and we are incredibly grateful for the communities they built on Twitch."
As for when the shutdown will kick into effect, we're told that on February 27, 2024, Korean streamers will lose monetisation features, and then on June 4, 2024, affiliates and partners in the country will be off-boarded too.