Will WWE Twitch Steaming Policy Hurt Them in the Long Term?

WWE in Sept 2020 notified their contracted talent that they would no longer be able to stream on Twitch and use any other 3rd party platforms. 

WWE informed talent that they would not be able to keep the revenue generated from Twitch or any other 3rd party and that this would be encapsulated into their contractual agreements and the money generated would go to WWE. 

WWE Contracted talent using Twitch do not use their WWE name and stream under their own names. WWE believe that they own the talent wrestling characters as well real names although talent is classed as independent contractors in America. 

An Official www.wwe.com statement read

“Much like Disney and Warner Bros., WWE creates, promotes and invests in its intellectual property, i.e. the stage names of performers like The Fiend Bray Wyatt, Roman Reigns, Big E and Braun Strowman," the statement read.

"It is the control and exploitation of these characters that allows WWE to drive revenue, which in turn enables the company to compensate performers at the highest levels in the sports entertainment industry.

"Notwithstanding the contractual language, it is imperative for the success of our company to protect our greatest assets and establish partnerships with third parties on a companywide basis, rather than at the individual level, which as a result will provide more value for all involved.”

Twitch is a huge revenue stream for talent according to pczone.co.uk

"Twitch brought in an estimated $1.54 billion in revenue in 2019. Of course, not all of that goes to the individual streamers, but successful streamers can make between $3,000 and $5,000 per month through subscriptions alone"

This change has reportedly not gone down well with majority of WWE talent with AJ Styles, Paige, Austin Creed and Cesaro having to say goodbye to their Twitch audiences and explaining that their accounts are currently suspended 

An statement from https://www.twitch.tv/stylesclash read 

“I want to thank you all for the great memories on Mixer and Twitch. I will cherish these memories and I love everyone of you that have made this possible and supported me. As many of you know, WWE is making some changes that involve streaming. We will see what the future holds in that regard. With that being said, I will be suspending the Stylesclash stream. This isn’t good bye, but this is see you sometime in the future … Again, this isn’t the end it’s just a pause. Thank you again for your support"

Andrew Yang US Politician has recently spoke to this and believes WWE are being very unfair to talent and does not believe that WWE can class  talent as independent contractors and then take away money from things they do away from WWE.

You can see a video below with Andrew Yang talking to Chris Van Vilet about this in depth and what he would like to do to address this and stop stop WWE going ahead with this policy.

In my opinion this could hurt WWE in the long term and could help other companies pick up talent once their contract with WWE has expired. 

Other companies such as AEW, Impact Wrestling, New Japan could become much more attractive option for WWE talent as these other companies allow their talents to use twitch and 3rd party platforms and they allow the individual to keep the revenue from those platforms. 

In addition talent would be able to sell their own merchandise for their streams and have their own agreements and sponsorship for those streams and be able to keep the revenue from all of this, something which WWE isnt allowing and is taking a huge percentage of. 

In addition in the case of WWE Superstar Paige (Saraya-Jade Bevis) its about being creative. Paige explained to her streamers in her final statement 

"I honestly have got to the point [where] I cannot deal with this company anymore," Now I have to make a very important decision. I'm f-ing tired, man. I broke my f-ing neck twice -- twice -- for this company, dude. Over-f-ing-worked. I broke my f-ing neck twice for this company.They don't realize that this community... isn't just about f-ing subs, dude. It isn't about that,We built such a wonderful community, a wonderful f-ing family where this is [an] escape for a lot of people, including myself. I can't wrestle anymore. I always worked so hard in WWE that I can't wrestle anymore. My neck is f***ed. My whole f-ing dreams got taken away from me, dude, and I had to have something that fulfilled... that huge f-ing void that I lost with wrestling."

https://www.pwinsider.com/ Reported on 30 Oct 2020 

"Wrestlers met with Vince McMahon this week to state why there should not be a Twitch ban. Given that names like AJ Styles,Aleister Black and Zelina Vega have announced that they are suspending their accounts, it looks like the talks with McMahon were not successful"

Andrew Yang has stated that if there is a change of president in USA that he will lobby for change and for what is right for WWE Wrestlers as he feels that no one company whether it is WWE or any other company should be able to own a person and that a person is free to do other things outside of their employment and make and keep the revenue generated from that. I hope Andrew Yang is able to help facilitate change and this situation gets resolved.

Thanks for Reading 

@jon422002

Jonathan Orchard