A man, a van, a plan: Twitch CEO seeks to charm angry streamers

As he throws himself headlong into Twitch’s creative habitat, Clancy is overhauling how the company compensates its talent. — Photo by Caspar Camille Rubin on Unsplash

In recent years, as Twitch fended off territorial incursions from YouTube, the livestreaming service did whatever it could to hang on to top performers: signing them to exorbitant, exclusive contracts, offering them favourable cuts of subscription revenue and even handing out free tickets to the Super Bowl.

Now under mounting pressure from its owner Amazon.com Inc to cut costs, the company’s new chief executive officer is testing out a less expensive way of strengthening its bond with the creative community – a cross-country, listening tour.