Why we said no to Twitch raids on Streamr
Three weeks after launch, a creator named Marcus messaged us. He'd been on Twitch for six years. 'When do we get raids?' he asked. I sat with that question longer than I should have.
The request that made us stop
Marcus wasn't alone. We heard it again. And again. Raids, for anyone unfamiliar, are a Twitch feature that lets a streamer instantly send their entire audience to another streamer's channel mid-broadcast. It's a clever mechanic. It drives traffic. It feels generous. Twitch built it, it works, so why wouldn't a new streaming platform copy it?
Because we're not building Twitch for Christians. We're building Streamr for them. Those aren't the same thing.
When a raid happens on a platform like Twitch, you're handing your audience to someone else's broadcast with zero context. You don't know what they're streaming. You don't know who's in the chat. You don't know what's about to happen. That works fine on Twitch because the implicit contract is 'expect anything.' That's not the contract on Streamr.
What a raid actually means here
I called Marcus back. I asked him why he wanted raids. His answer surprised me. It wasn't about moving audience numbers around. It was about community. He wanted to send his viewers to other Christian creators he trusted. He wanted that transfer to feel natural, not like clicking a random portal.
That's when I realised the feature wasn't broken. The framing was.
Raids assume the streamer and audience are strangers playing a traffic game. In faith communities, especially churches and family channels, the relationship is different. You're not raiding to farm views. You're introducing people you trust to people you trust. The stakes are different. The responsibility is different.
We could have built raids. Built them well, even. But we would have built them wrong, because the word itself carries baggage we don't want Streamr to carry.
What we built instead
Instead of raids, we looked at what Marcus actually needed: a way to recommend other creators and streams to his audience in a way that felt deliberate and safe.
That's harder to build than a raid button. A raid button is a reflex. A real recommendation system requires you to think about trust, curation, and context. It requires moderation. It requires friction in the right places.
For creators on Streamr, discovery happens through the platform directory. For churches running events, it happens through calendar integration and follow-up emails to your congregation. For families in Streamr Kids, the curated content area means a child isn't one click away from an unknown livestream.
Are these as frictionless as a raid? No. That's the point. We're solving for safety first and discoverability second. Twitch solves it the other way round.
Why this matters more than it sounds
I think a lot about what happens when you copy features without copying context. A feature that's neutral on one platform becomes a problem on another. Raids are neutral on Twitch. On a platform built for families and faith communities, they're a liability.
A parent watching alongside their child. A church leader broadcasting a service. A youth pastor streaming Bible study. None of them want surprise traffic from an unknown source. None of them want to explain why their chat suddenly filled with strangers.
We've had to say no to a lot of things that 'work' elsewhere. Algorithmic feed recommendations that optimise for engagement over safety. Recommendation systems that treat all creators equally regardless of moderation standards. Anonymous comments. Viral mechanic games designed to be addictive.
Each time, we ask the same question: does this serve the people we're building for, or does it serve growth at their expense?
What we're building toward instead
Phase 1 of Streamr is about live streaming done right for Christian creators and churches. That's where we are now. Creators can go live on mobile or multi-camera setups with live chat and Seedr tipping integrated. Churches get giving integration and automated follow-up emails through Givr. Viewers get ad-free content and Streamr Kids, a genuinely moderated space for family-safe streams.
What comes in Phase 2, when we expand into a full Christian family social platform, will be built on the same foundation. Recommendation systems that prioritise safety. Connection tools that assume trust. Growth that doesn't require compromising on who we serve.
Marcus asked about raids because he wanted his community to grow. We're building ways for that to happen. Just not that way.
When a feature request comes in, the easiest answer is 'yes, we'll add it.' The harder answer, and usually the right one, is to ask why. What problem are we actually solving? And is this the way to solve it that makes Streamr something worth building? Marcus eventually understood. He's been with us since.
Ready to try Streamr by MRVL?
One tap to download. No sign-up wall.