Right now in WWE, seemingly everyone has a side hustle. Xavier Woods has the very popular Up Up Down Down Youtube channel, Big E has been making bank on Cameo, AJ Styles has been streaming on Twitch, and that’s just the tip of the iceberg. It gives them a way to interact with fans outside of the sphere of WWE, and is usually based on something they enjoy doing at the same time. This all might be coming to an end, thanks to Vince McMahon.
Vince McMahon Threatens Punishment For Working With Third Party Companies
While something as big as Up Up Down Down might be safe, as it’s been drawn into WWE since its creation, others might not be so lucky. In a recent letter to talent by the owner of the company, the following would be told to talents. This was first reported by WrestleInc.
WWE started this by stating during a call that WWE owns the real names of talent, not just their character names. UPDATE: Multiple reports to Fightful indicate this was a false report, unlike the following. “Some of you are engaged with outside third parties using your name and likeness in ways that are detrimental to our company,” McMahon wrote. “It is imperative that these activities be terminated within the next 30 days (by Friday October 2). Continued violations will result in fines, suspension, or termination at WWE’s discretion.”
It’s unclear at this time if it would include platforms like Cameo & Twitch, but it does seem likely.
This Will Cause Some Issues Backstage With Morale
It’s a thinly veiled secret that Vince McMahon is a control freak, but this is one of their worst moves yet. WWE employees are deemed independent contractors, yet WWE also wants to control their every move. This is just another step towards this, and might cross some lines.
WWE superstars are real people behind the scenes, and for WWE to claim they own their real names and to force them off platforms is bizarre at best. This is going to shut down a lot of personal projects from their talent, and while it’s fine for a company to not want to be harmed by their employees being inappropriate, is Big E giving out paid birthday wishes or AJ Styles streaming video games giving WWE a bad name?
The intial reaction from talent has been to remove WWE branding from their accounts, such as Paige going from OfficialPaigeWWE to SarayaOfficial on twitch.
Do you think WWE is going too far in this situation? Will some look to get out of their contracts following this? Could removing WWE from their twitch names solve this issue? Let us know what you think in the comment section down below.
SUBSCRIBE NOW: Get TheOvertimer’s Hottest Stories, Breaking News and Special Features in your email, CLICK HERE!
