We’ve been hard at work making a number of changes to younow to make it better! Here are the highlights of what we’ve launched so far in January, and what’s coming for the rest of the month:
New portrait mode on iOS and Android
Our previous portrait mode on iOS and Android made it really difficult for broadcasters and viewers to actually see someone who was broadcasting in portrait mode. We’ve now changed this so that portrait mode is full-screen on both iOS and Android. This change is designed to help keep viewers engaged in content from our portrait-mode broadcasters, since most new broadcasters on our platform start out in portrait mode. If you’re curious about watching portrait mode broadcasters, you can see a lot of them in the “New to younow” section on our home screen.
We understand that there are a few bugs in iOS, and that some of you are getting used to the new swipe mechanics. We’re working on fixing those bugs in the first week of February, and we’re going to be adding to the features you’ll see in this new portrait mode by mid-February (when some of the new swiping mechanics will make a bit more sense).
New hangout mode on web
We added a hangout mode that will allow you to let anyone jump up on stage with you without having to pull them up. This is meant for two main subsets of our users: those people who have subs-only chats and love talking to all of their subs, as well as people who really just want to meet new people on the platform.
We know that some of you are worried about people exposing themselves if you try out hangout mode. We use one of the most sophisticated nudity detection models on the internet to stop this from happening. Your flags help us tweak that model to make sure we catch everything, so please flag nudity if you see it so we can continue to train our model on what to look for.
We will be adding more to hangout mode on the web by mid-February, and aim to bring it to mobile by the end of March.
More consistent earnings for broadcasters
At the end of January, we will be making a minor change to our Platinum Producer program that will affect a very small number of our Platinum Producers: we will be adding a small spending requirement to Plats 1-5 per cycle. Almost all Platinum Producers at these crown levels already spend this amount, and so most will not be affected. The spending requirement is significantly lower than it used to be, and is designed to make sure that the people who are getting Platinum rewards are actually spending money, because that is how we pay our broadcasters – when people use only free rewards, it creates unfair expectations for earnings from our broadcasters. The spending requirements are:
Plat 1 | $25 |
Plat 2 | $50 |
Plat 3 | $100 |
Plat 4 | $250 |
Plat 5 | $500 |
This change will take effect February 1, 2025. Again, almost all of our Platinum Producers who have achieved these crown levels spend this much already; the purpose of this change is to make sure everyone who has status is actually supporting broadcasters rather than finding loopholes to give lots of likes without providing financial support to the creators who make this platform amazing.
Streamnow
We know that Streamnow has been down for about a month. This is due to a number of server-side changes that we made that had an unintended effect on Streamnow. However, we believe that we’ve pinpointed the issue, and we are optimistic that Streamnow will be up and running soon.
Your sophisticated nudity detection does not work. the "new section" you mention often has nudity, even in the thumbnails. And those spending requirements make no sense to me. The unfair expectations are due to all the gifts being x28 when the streamer earns x1. Also you state in your "become a partner" post that we have partner managers and the chat says we get 24 hour responses. This is not true. I have gone a couple of months as a partner with 0 responses. As have some of your biggest (none-afk) partners. Good luck.
"Platinum Producer program that will affect a very small number of our Platinum Producers" Since it's a very small number you should just leave it along. The loophole broadcasters still earn their diamonds from people spending money on bars which is how YN makes most their $ (I think). A loophole broadcaster that has spenders in their stream should still get the benefits.