Emmett Shear was at Twitch when it was still called Justin.tv. As a co-founder, he accompanied the streaming platform for 16 years, nearly 12 of which as CEO. Now the CEO is stepping down and the new one is already in the wings.
What is the story of Emmett Shear and Twitch? Shear was one of the co-founders of Twitch and the last remaining founding member in the company. In October 2006, he launched a reality TV show together with Justin Kan, which was broadcast around the clock on the website of the same name:
Justin.tv showed Kan’s life using a webcam attached to his head and was, as Shear writes in his farewell post, a pretty bad idea. After about 8 months, it evolved into a streaming platform where anyone could create a channel and stream.
In 2011, the gaming sector of justin.tv was spun off and went online as a standalone website, with Shear as CEO: TwitchTV. In August 2014, justin.tv finally went offline and Amazon reportedly bought Twitch for 970 million US dollars.
CEO says Twitch is old enough to manage on its own
Why is Shear stepping down now? In a blog post that he shared as a farewell on Twitch, Shear names the birth of his first child as the reason. He wants to be fully present when his son explores the world. Twitch, which has been almost like a child to him, is now old enough to move out and doesn’t need him anymore.
Shear writes that he is ready for this new phase of his life and wants to take on new challenges. He, however, thanks all the streamers who have entrusted their content to the platform.
What happens now? Shear is apparently not completely turning his back on Twitch but will remain involved in a consulting role.
Dan Clancy, the current president of Twitch, is to replace Shear as CEO effective immediately. The change is already being discussed on Twitter. Many users are dissatisfied with Shear’s leadership in recent years and are now hoping for change (via Twitter).
Twitch users hope for a new era
What have been the problems lately? Under Shear’s leadership, Twitch became huge, recording more than 8 million active streamers monthly. However, towards the end of his tenure, user dissatisfaction grew:
- The sub-split is significantly lower at Twitch at 50/50 compared to competitors like YouTube (70/30) and the controversial platform Kick (95/5). This means Twitch keeps 50% of the revenue from paid subscriptions. In 2022, Twitch revised the sub-system, but not in the way that streamers wanted.
- Besides subs, streamers can also monetize their channels through ads. But the changes introduced in 2022 caused a lot of frustration for both streamers and viewers: too much advertising for too little money.
- The opaque banning policy: Twitch has always reserved the right not to publicly comment on bans. The perma-ban of former star streamer DrDisrespect still remains a puzzle today. In addition, the lengths of bans have increasingly been perceived as arbitrary: this escalated when a female streamer was banned for only 7 days after having sex during a stream in September 2022 (via dexerto).
- Some users also criticize that Shear has been little present. In some comments, the question arises about what he has actually been doing in recent years (via Twitter).
Content creators and viewers have thus become increasingly dissatisfied with Twitch’s performance and lack of transparency. It remains unclear how things will change under Dan Clancy’s leadership.
The new CEO was criticized in October 2022 by an IRL streamer for having no understanding of the needs of content creators. After meeting Clancy, the streamer said he had no trust in the platform (dexerto).
The German Twitch streamer Staiy is among the platform’s critics. In a stream, he reflected on 2022 and the changes that are planned for the current year. He was far from enthusiastic about it.
German streamer criticizes Twitch – “It’s good, but still bad”
