Follow/unfollow channel API endpoints have been removed by Twitch on 2021-07-27

Checklist

• I understand that Streamlink Twitch GUI is just a launcher for Streamlink
• I have read the contribution guidelines
• I have checked the list of open and recently closed issues
• I have checked the commit log of the master branch

Streamlink Twitch GUI version

v1.9.1

Streamlink version

v1.7.0

Operating system, environment and configuration details

Ubuntu 18.04

Description

according to Chatty /follow reports: Note: Twitch planned to remove follow/unfollow functionality from their API on July 27, 2021.

i know im using an old streamlink & streamlink-twitch-gui but now it seems clicking Follow in streamlink-twitch-gui does not work

i did a quick issues search for “follow” to see if any bugs were reported about this i dont see anything recent in commits about “follow” if nothing else, to bring it to attention otherwise disreguard, and my apology for using an old version…

thanks!

Debug log

No response

[bastimeyer]

https://dev.twitch.tv/docs/change-log

Date	Documentation Changes
2021‑07‑27	The Create and Delete Follows API endpoints have been removed. See the Deprecation of Create and Delete Follows API Endpoints announcement for more information.

Announcement thread here: https://discuss.dev.twitch.tv/t/deprecation-of-create-and-delete-follows-api-endpoints/32351

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Twitch has killed the follow users/channels endpoints on both public APIs, kraken and helix, because of abusive/harrassing “follow-bots”.

There is no way for legitimate 3rd party applications to fix or work around that other than trying to use the private GQL API from their website, similar to what abusive bot developers will now have to do, or making the user visit Twitch’s website to follow/unfollow channels manually in their web browser.

Unfortunately, I have not heard of this removal until just now, otherwise I would’ve reacted to this sooner. I’ve commented on the announcement thread, and as you can see on there, someone already opened a suggestion thread on Twitch’s feedback tracker which suggests an implementation of developer approvals and restoring the removed API endpoints for approved developers.

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As an end-user of Streamlink Twitch GUI, voting on this suggestion thread is probably all you can do for now to help with this situation.

https://twitch.uservoice.com/forums/310213-developers/suggestions/43871391-twitch-approved-developer-program-reinstate-foll

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In the mean time, I will have to think what I can do until this has been resolved by Twitch. I am not sure if it will though, because it is Twitch after all. This is really sad.

[bastimeyer]

402cab14f30fb43692420288ae43487fe0d7f24d has been merged into master. See the commit message for the details.

There will be a new release within the next couple of days. I’m not yet sure whether I want to add a message to the app that clarifies the situation, because most people won’t read the changelog, but I also don’t want to be too annoying with it.

I’ll leave this issue open and pinned for a while, so that there won’t be any duplicates.

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if you can use the GQL api

Not possible for auth related stuff like following channels or games. I only mentioned it because of channel panels, which were removed in the past when Twitch shut down their old private API where this data could be retrieved from.

considering kraken v5 is going away

I am aware of this. Switching to helix will be a lot of work and that needs to be done as the next step after the next release. I’ve already started working on that a few months ago, but only a bit.