Twitch has lost two big streamers in the last month — TimTheTatman and Dr Lupo — and part of the reason might be because the platform’s not offering as lucrative of deals as it once did.
Tim and Lupo jumping ship from Twitch was some of the biggest news in streaming over the last month. According to a new report from the Washington Post, it could be because the streaming site isn’t offering the types of deals it once did.
According to the Post, Tim and Lupo leaving the site are because of “intentional changes” to how the company goes after exclusive contracts and deals with famous streamers.
A number of former Twitch employees were quoted as saying that the site has “started to offer big streamers less money for similar amounts of work” and doesn’t offer the same types of contracts that it used to in the past.
Several employees also claimed this was the reason for Dr Lupo’s departure, who got “lowballed” by the site during his most recent contract negotiations. This underwhelming offer is apparently what made the move to YouTube even more appealing.
This was in relation to Lupo’s previous contract, which the streaming star inked back around the time that Tyler ‘Ninja’ Blevins and Michael ‘shroud’ Grzesiek left for exclusive deals with Mixer.
According to the anonymous Twitch sources, losing those two prompted Twitch to offer lucrative contracts to their remaining stars at the time. Now that Mixer is dead and gone, and the purple giant continues to reign supreme in the world of streaming, it seems they don’t feel the need to continue doing so.
One unnamed former Twitch employee claimed “The public has a very uninformed perspective on Twitch’s economics.”
Subscribe to our newsletter for the latest updates on Esports, Gaming and more.
“Anytime [a streamer’s] been paid a ton, it’s been a lot more about brand than [the company’s return on investment],” the employee said. “The commerce business on big channels tends to flatline at some point, and streamers don’t want to play ads — when that’s Twitch’s big upside potential.”
Furthermore, attorney Ryan Morrison, who runs the Evolved talent agency representing stars such as Felix ‘xQc’ Lengyel, confirmed Twitch is offering fewer and fewer contracts, and the ones they do are worth less than those that came before.
“And outside of [North America], it’s just about none at all — at least in my experience,” Morrison told the Post. “That is not to say there are not some very lucrative and amazing deals coming down the pipes still, but it’s not where it once was.”
Twitch obviously doesn’t think losing a couple big name streamers every now and then to other sites is a big deal, and their total hours watched compared to YouTube and Facebook Gaming seem to back this up. Twitch streamers also have a variety of ways to make money outside of just contracts, too, so how this new approach by the site to lock content creators down will work out remains to be seen.
