Twitch Says It Will Reduce Payments for Many Popular Streamers
Twitch is the most popular game streaming service on the internet, but it may face challenges in trying to keep the most popular streamers.
On Wednesday, the company said it would reduce the subscription revenue it shared with some of the biggest streamers on its service, shrinking their cut to 50 percent from 70 percent in certain situations.
Twitch, which has lost several popular streamers to exclusive deals with YouTube, previously lifted its own exclusivity agreement that prevented big-revenue streamers from streaming on rival services.
Eight years after Amazon acquired it, the company is still struggling to find the right balance between the enormous cost of streaming video across the internet and the importance of the big personalities who bring the most eyeballs — and the most revenue — to the service. Well-known creators are the main attraction on Twitch, much like movie stars.
“I know they have to make money somewhere, but this just seems like a bad business decision,” said Kaitlyn Siragusa, a Twitch streamer known as Amouranth, who has almost six million followers and almost 15,000 subscribers and is likely to be affected by the change. “They are just making the platform less appealing to streamers.”
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