Twitch Streamers Need To Unionise

thegamer.com:

It’s been a hell of a week for Twitch, hasn’t it? First, gambling streamer ItsSliker admitted to scamming followers and other streamers out of $200,000 to fund his gambling addiction. Predictably, but hypocritically, a bunch of big streamers called on Twitch to ban gambling streams, which it dutifully did. Well, some of them.

Other streamers, including xQc, Ludwig, and Mizkif worked to pay back scammed fans, before it all descended into grave accusations that seemed to be more about points-scoring than justice. Then, Twitch announced it was reducing the revenue split for big streamers, meaning they’ll earn less money and the platform will make more profit.

Related: Neeko Interview - "My Existence Is Political"

Now you’re all caught up, I’ll explain why this last part is particularly bad. I’m not comparing it to any of the other issues this week, but they’ve all been discussed plenty by now, and you can click any of the links above for a bunch more context.

Twitch is reducing the revenue split for its top creators, the creme de la creme who helped “build the Twitch we know today,” to borrow Twitch president Dan Clancy’s words. These are streamers who have premium agreements with the service, and therefore receive a more generous 70/30 split on subscriptions. The vast majority of streamers share their subscription income 50/50. But when the top streamers sign their next agreement with the company after June 2023, their share will drop to the regular rate for any earnings over $100,000 annually.

$100,000 is a lot of money, but this change is inherently anti-creator. Twitch is just taking away up to 33 percent of streamers’ earnings after a certain point, 33 percent that they previously would have earned. The company