Twitch usage motivations of digital players according to uses and satisfaction theory: The case of Sakarya University Faculty of Communication

"Game" can be described as the actions a human-being (not only) does at every age of its life. Its not possible to restrict the games to certain rules that are played in order to meet many requirements from entertainment to education. So, with new media, gaming are now got rid of place restrictions. With the strengthening of new technologies such as virtual reality, smart phones and common computer applications, new gaming activities have emerged. It is therefore important to investigate the reasons why people interact with new technologies for entertainment. In the research, based from the awareness of gaming being a serious action, its move to virtual environments, as a result of the irresistible rise of the digital game sector and the use of mass media in the light of the concept of digital game, Twitch.tv has become the social network of the digital game culture. Thus it is a essential issue to be researched. Twitch.tv is the most well-known social network in the digital gaming industry due to its large user base. The reasons underlying this acceleration are being wondered. In the research, firstly digital gaming, with the concept of digital gaming, its genre and player are mentioned. Then Twitch.tv as social network and as the third place has been examined in depth. The concepts of streamer, his/her audience/followers, chat and streaming are also explained. Twitch.tv, which was handled within the framework of Uses Satisfaction Theory, was evaluated by applying a questionnaire to 327 randomly selected students from Sakarya University Faculty of Communication. The survey was divided into factors such as usage, monitoring, publishing, paying and not using factors, and the reasons behind the variables were examined. The results of the survey were interpreted in detail and the motivations of using the social network were explained.