Dan Clancy has officially taken over as the CEO of Twitch after his predecessor Emmett Shear resigned after spending 16 years in the top job.
With a BA in Computer Science and a Ph.D. in artificial intelligence, Dan Clancy joined NASA in the late 1990s, where he worked in various roles, before moving to Google and becoming the engineering director for Google Books.
Dan Clancy also played an active role as a Google spokesperson during the tech giant’s lawsuit with the ‘Authors Guild’ before joining video live-streaming provider Twitch in 2019 as president.
Twitch recently came under scrutiny for a September 2022 blog post, where Dan Clancy announced and defended the video streaming platform’s 50/50 revenue split from subscriptions for streamers. The move faced earned the wrath of content creators and industry professionals alike.
With Dan Clancy becoming the new Twitch CEO, the platform now faces a renewed wave of social media outbursts against its new revenue policy.
Twitch’s competitors, such as YouTube, continue to provide a 70/30 revenue split, and the fledgling Stake-owned streamer platform Kick promises an astonishing 95/5 split in favour of the streamers.
Emmett Shear Bids Goodbye
“He knows what makes Twitch, Twitch. He cares intensely about the Twitch community, its streamers, and our staff,” stated Emmett Shear in a blog post.
He began streaming on Twitch in October 2006.
“I’ve never set up direct deposit a second time after sixteen years and four months,” Emmett Shear wrote on the blog.
Since becoming an entirely owned subsidiary of Amazon, Twitch Inc. has added more than 8 million streamers each month, according to the former CEO.
“With the birth of my first child, I’ve been considering my future with Twitch. But, unfortunately, Twitch often feels like a child I’ve also been parenting. And even though I’ll always want to be there for Twitch, at 16, he’s ready to leave the house and be on his own,” Emmett Shear wrote further.
“Thus it is with considerable sadness that I announce my decision to step down as CEO of Twitch. I want to be completely present for my baby as he enters this world, and I feel prepared to face new obstacles because of this transition. I’ll continue to serve as an advisor at Twitch,” he added.
To enhance the platform, Twitch has released new moderation and safety measures.
While Emmett Shear’s departure was welcomed by stakeholders in the streaming community, who have been critical of Twitch’s recent policies, such as the new 50/50 revenue split system.
However, some have pointed out that the blog post that defended the new revenue split was actually penned by the new CEO Dan Clancy during the latter’s stint as the president of the video streaming platform.