Sony announced today that from August 1st there'll no longer be the option to stream PS4 content via uStream. While it's not surprising, it kind of sucks because uStream didn't give a damn about what went on. After Twitch banned all the Playroom stuff uStream kept it going (because what else could it offer?). It was a gold mine of terrible public access like chat based shows, people trying to host talk radio style shows, lads in English suburbs getting a few cans in before a night on the town, friends sitting around drinking and vaping in Holland and if I'm not mistaken, Cig66 was on uStream in his basement shredding it up on the guitar.

I'd drop into the uStream channels once every few months just to see what was up. Nobody was ever playing video games.

One of my favourites was this guy in the craziest looking apartment ever. Neon coloured walls and carpets, hanging chairs, ride on micro motor-bikes. He was just taking questions and had a bunch of people telling him he ain't shit, so his response was to take a new pair of jeans and cut the price tag off them to show how baller he was.

Anyone else any fond memories?

I remember watching those streams made me feel like I was in 1984. Not because of lack of privacy, but because the people doing them totally remind me of the proles. Uncaring, immodest, senses dulled, and most importantly "free".

It's just not as fun when there isn't a bunch of friends with you to laugh along with, and to acknowledge that you aren't a rotting husk in the middle of a psychotic episode brought on by your brain slowly dying.

Because that's what browsing those streams felt like.

There are plenty of ways to see terrible public access.

Cigs66 will be missed. Literally haven't seen any streams of him since GB discovered the gem that was the basement rocker, but god damn I remember that fondly

Weirdly Cigs66 might be okay on Twitch these days because of their Creative category.

I hope that dude always has a place to shred on the internet, should he want to.

I will dedicate the rest of my life to Cigs66.

Bit of a shame, there was some nice weird stuff on there, but at this point I'm sure it's mostly just people vaping.

It was a fun curiosity the first few months when the only games I had real interest in were inFamous and NBA 2K but at this point I haven't even thought to check the streaming side of PS4 in months let alone the weird underbelly of it.

Bit of a bummer. but couldn't most of those people go to youtube?

There is always the "gaming talk show" category on twitch for any stream that occationaly mentions the existence of video games

Daily Motion will have to pick up the slack I suppose.

Ustream and The Playroom were always great whenever I needed to be reminded that people are gross.

Sony is trying to ruin the great dark zone of the PS4. I will miss the weird streams of people telling chatters to EAD, smoke crack, have sex, prank call, perform domestic abuse, etc.

Inadvertently, the people who actually stream PS4 games on Ustream are mostly Japanese players and now they will have to migrate over to Twitch or possibly YouTube (if streaming works on that).

@colossalghost said:

Will there be sex and drugs?

Every one in a while you'd see some odd weirdness, but mostly it was boring. Nothing against uStream, but I think that part of the market is super volatile. If you make one business decision that doesn't work out you can get creamed by the competition fast.

Every once in a while, I'll watch some Twitch now, but ist not something I find enjoyable on a regular basis. Maybe, I'm too old.

It's more likely because the content tends to be terrible and the community is fucking awful.

Or maybe I'm just too old too.