After 16 years at Twitch, company co-founder Emmett Shear is stepping down as CEO. Shear was there from the very beginning, back when the popular entertainment platform was still called Justin.tv, a live video site designed to host a 24/7 reality show about the life of the co-founder Justin Kan. When the company spun the growing platform gaming category into its own brand, Twitch was born. Shear guided the company through that transition, through Amazon’s $970 million acquisition of the company in 2014 and beyond. Now, he says that he says fatherhood has inspired him to relinquish the leadership role from him. “I want to be fully there for my son when he enters this world,” he wrote in a farewell blog. “I will continue to work at Twitch as a consultant.”
In October 2006 we started working on live video for the internet. That became Twitch. Over 16 years later, I am now a father and ready to move on to the next stage of my life. I wrote a blog post, but the short version is: thank you so much to everyone who built this with me.
—Emmett Shear (@eshear) March 16, 2023
Dan Clancy will assume the role of CEO. Originally hired in 2019 as Executive Vice President of Creators and Community Experience, Clancy soon rose to the role of President at Twitch. When broadcast partners raised concerns about Twitch’s revenue split with creators, Clancy was the one to iron out the issue, explaining in a letter to streamers that stake would remain at 50/50 and 70/30 premium splits awarded. to the biggest stars on the platform. would be subject to new limitations. As the face of this decision, Clancy bore the brunt of much of the backlash.
As for Shear, his exit letter exudes confidence for the new CEO. “He cares deeply about the Twitch community, its streamers and our staff and understands what makes Twitch Twitch,” he wrote. Dan Clancy will assume his role as CEO effective immediately.
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