About a month ago, we saw news about WWE looking to shut down the Twitch Streams of various talents, on top of other third party ventures talent had taken. Most felt this was all talk, until it wasn’t. Over the past few days, we’ve seen just about anyone outside of NXT have their streams put on hold until further notice.
AJ Styles, Mia Yim, Cesaro, Dio Maddin and More, All Shut Down
On October 29th, talent such as AJ Styles, Mia Yim and Cesaro all held their last streams before dishing out the news to their fans. AJ Styles would take to the Discord server he maintained for his streams, and say the following.
“Everyone, I want to thank you all for the great memories on Mixer & Twitch. I will cherish these memories and 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 goodbye, this is ‘see you sometime in the future’.”
He’d go on to discuss changes to the server, and again thank everyone and assure them it wasn’t the end of him streaming. Others such as Mia Yim & Cesaro sent out similar messages all at the same time, all staying respectful and not taking shots at their employer. They’re working behind the scenes to make everything work.
Paige Is Ready To Go To War
While AJ and the others would talk to their audience and assure them it’s not the end, Paige was not as happy. She hasn’t been active within WWE for almost a year now, since she split from the now defunct Kabuki Warriors. Despite this, her stream was one of those that was taken down.
During the final one for now, she’d start talking about looking into joining a union and gaining more rights. “You know what, I’m gonna start looking into unionization. I’ve been learning about it by talking about it with a unionization lawyer. This is bigger than Twitch, it’s about taking control over your own life, and not being controlled by anyone.”
Paige is the one with the least to lose by WWE cutting ties with her, as she was making somewhere between 30k to 60k a month with her streams. She’s not active in the ring, and WWE likely is only keeping her around to prevent her from popping up elsewhere in wrestling if she ever gets cleared to re-enter the ring.
NXT Talent Are Still Streaming
At this time, it’s not company wide. Talent from the NXT roster have been streaming like usual, with names like Adam Cole and Jessamyn Duke having streamed since everything started to shut down. Either WWE simply doesn’t care about what they perceive as a smaller brand, or Triple H being their boss might give them more wiggle room. It could be only a matter of time before this happens to them as well.
This whole situation stretches the limits of WWE’s independent contractor status. While something like Xia Li being pulled from a kickboxing fight has some level of understanding in it, no one is getting hurt from a Twitch Stream (unless you’re Dakota Kai being attacked by Shayna Baszler). WWE likely has something planned here, and fans won’t like it.
Do you think WWE is going too far in this situation? Let us know what you think in the comment section down below.
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