In the cozy Kendall bedroom, Natasha Walsh is surrounded by a bustling gaming computer and two computer screens.
The neon sign spelling out Walsh’s stage name, “Barefoot Tasha,” fills the room with soft, pink lighting. Every night, thousands of people around the world watch her play video games.
“This is my purpose,” Walsh told the Miami Herald. “This is what I’m trying to do. I’ve also always been passionate about entertaining people.”
At 32, she found a way to monetize that passion and reach people all over the world. Walsh makes a living by streaming on Twitch, a social media platform where gamers can play against each other and broadcast screens for others to see. She has over 40,000 followers on Twitch, with some paying as much as $25 a month to watch her stream without ads. She also posts videos on YouTube and earns revenue live.
It’s been five years since she did a “normal” job.
Walsh grew up in a close Jamaican family and started with the first Nintendo entertainment system and always loved video games and anime. But before she became a professional streamer, cooking was a passion she wanted to be a career.
After graduating from Felix Barrera High School in Kendall in 2010, Walsh studied the art of culinary arts at Miami-Dade College, studying the dream of becoming a chef on television one day. For the next few years, Walsh worked as a server and a hostess, playing video games whenever he had the time.
She learned more about the hospitality industry and decided that the pressure at the restaurant wasn’t for her.
“The kitchen is a stressful environment run by men and I didn’t want to be stressed out in a kitchen pumping 150 steaks by the end of the night at a restaurant,” she said.
After becoming a fan of female streamers like Pokimane, Walsh began building her own set-up for streaming and in 2019 began monetizing her own convulsions.
In early 2020, Walsh worked as a server at the Ritz-Carlton in Key Biscayne when the pandemic began and the hotel was forced to temporarily close. Walsh began streaming full-time and refused to fill her old job when she was called back to work that summer.
“I wasn’t going to work, getting sick, going home, maybe trying to get my family sick,” she said. “So I just told them, no, I’m not coming back.”
The moments clouded by uncertainty led Walsh to a new level.
Walsh spent more time streaming, her online continued, and she began making more money. Much of the world is lockdown, and Twitch’s paid subscribers have grown to 2,000. She found a community of black female gamers like her that she is still friends today.
“I feel like women, especially black women, have space here,” she said. “I met many women in this space (black women and women of color), and many of them became the closest friends I’ve ever had in my life.”
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The business side of streaming was soon revealed to Walsh as a creator. She pitches nearly $5,000 a month as a Twitch partner, splitting half of that across streaming platforms. Nearly all of her 800 paid subscribers pay $5.99 a month, with just a handful paying $25 a month.
On YouTube, Walsh has nearly 30,000 subscribers, uploading about five videos a week. Platform revenue split creators focus on the time they spend viewing the video and the ads they can place within it.
Walsh had the biggest month ever on YouTube last month, earning $800. “I’ve been posting more consistently,” she said.
Full-time streaming taught Walsh about the ups and downs of self-employed. Some months may feature paid brand sponsorships and exclusive opportunities, while others do not. Working from a place of love for the game, she stays on the course and doesn’t look for shortcuts that will make her viral.
“It’s cool to go viral, but it doesn’t necessarily mean you’re building a community out of it,” she said.
Working as a woman in games also has challenges. Walsh saw herself as a free spirit and came up with the name Barefoot Tasha to represent her carefree personality. At the time, she didn’t think of any unintended meaning. However, some male viewers regularly ask her what the name means and whether they can see her feet. She always declines.
Walsh makes her a living as a streamer, but she quickly points out that she is in a certain niche on the internet. People she vaguely knew in high school sometimes reach out after seeing her massive amounts of online followers and being able to ask for advice on creating lifestyle content.
“I feel like the culture in Miami is very different, so for a while I felt it was weird, especially in Miami,” she said. “In Miami, when you create content, you can find that “often) rich people’s content, “I drive a Lamborghini. I live on a high-rise beach. I’m on the beach.”
With over 100,000 followers on Twitch, YouTube and Instagram, Walsh has come a long way in the gaming space from the tiny grey Nintendo controller she played as a little girl.
“I will be one of the bigger black female content creators in this field,” she said. “If I keep working hard and doing what I’m doing, I’m on the right path.”
