After Twitch began taking 20% more revenue from partner streamers, it promised to make up for that lost income by doing things like relaxing its longtime exclusivity clause and improving discoverability.
Now its latest change is walking back its simulcasting policy.
For those who aren’t familiar with the ins and outs of Twitch’s contracts, its exclusivity clause used to ban partners from streaming on any other platforms. When it relaxed that clause, it began allowing creators to stream elsewhere—but they still weren’t allowed to simulcast, aka stream on one home platform and broadcast that same stream simultaneously acrossother platforms.
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That policy is in the process of being adjusted, CEO Dan Clancy said in a broadcast today.
“We’re still working through the right way to handle in terms of permission to multistreaming,” he said, adding that there’s “a lot to figure out a way to thread the needle on that.”
Ninja is the first publicly confirmed streamer that has the “written permission from Twitch” carve out in the Terms of Service to be able to multistream to more than just ‘mobile-first’ platforms.#TwitchNews #TOSgg pic.twitter.com/cE0yx0piOc
— Zach Bussey (@zachbussey) August 24, 2023
Ninja (who, you probably remember, left Twitch for Mixer back in the day, then returned after Mixer shut down) is reportedly the first streamer to get official permission to try simulcasting. His core platform is Twitch, but in recent months he’s also streamed on YouTube and TikTok.
Per Dot Esports, Ninja has required written simulcasting permission from Twitch in the past. But with this rule adjustment, it seems he’s free to simulcast wherever he wants, whenever he wants, without Twitch’s oversight.
Whether and when this will become a broader policy affecting all streamers isn’t clear. What is clear is that Twitch knows some streamers aren’t happy with its policies—and now that those streamers have competitors like Kick to go to, it’s actively trying to avoid losing them.
