Here's The Reason Behind Amazon's Twitch Quick 'Artistic Nudity' Reversal

Amazon.com Inc's AMNZ Twitch recently revised its content policies to allow certain forms of artistic nudity.

Digital depictions like drawings and sculptures, if appropriately labeled, were allowed to have nudity.

However, within a few days of implementing these changes, Twitch faced backlash and swiftly reversed its decision.

The alteration in policy followed a trend where some female streamers utilized camera angles to simulate toplessness, sparking controversy and drawing criticism.

See Also: Twitch Strengthens User Controls With Real-Time Ban Blocking For Streamers

In response, on Dec. 13, Twitch updated its sexual content policies to better regulate adult content while permitting digital and fictionalized nudity. However, just two days later, the platform expressed regret over this specific adjustment.

Twitch CEO Dan Clancy acknowledged that while the change led to some compliant artistic nudity, it also resulted in an increase in rule-breaking content.

Consequently, Twitch decided to roll back the artistic nudity policy, prohibiting both real and fictional nudity across all media, except for Mature-rated games.

"Effective today, we are rolling back the artistic nudity changes,” Clancy said. "Moving forward, depictions of real or fictional nudity won’t be allowed on Twitch, regardless of the medium. This restriction does not apply to Mature-rated games. You can find emote-specific standards for nudity and sexual content in the Emote Guidelines."

Moreover, the platform acknowledged going "too far" with this change, recognizing the unique challenge posed by digital depictions of nudity. Clancy highlighted the difficulty in distinguishing between AI-generated realistic images and actual photography.

As Twitch reverses the artistic nudity guidelines, the company specified that other alterations concerning activities like exotic dancing, body painting, or content centered on specific clothed body parts will remain unchanged.

Read Next: Twitch's New Branding Policy: No Marijuana Promotion, But Alcohol Gets A Pass

Image credits: Diego Thomazini on Shutterstock.