What Mixer’s Shut Down Taught Me About Careers

Yesterday was a really bad day for many streamers on Mixer. Mixer posted a message on their website that the platform is shutting down on July 22 and selling all their ownership over to Facebook Gaming.

From what I seen most of the Mixer streamers don’t want to stream on Facebook and are going to stream on Twitch. So far I only seen one Mixer partner move to Facebook Gaming.

The problem with Twitch is that its the #1 streaming platform for gaming and is already overly crowded with streamers. The top streamers on Mixer have a good chance of rebuilding their career on Twitch but for the mid-level to fairly known streamers on Mixer will have a longer grind to find partnership again.

Mixer streamers feel hurt and angry that Mixer didn’t give them a heads up. It is messed up but sometimes businesses have no choice but to inform their employees at the last minute because most businesses try to find any resource to stay open until all  their resources are exhausted.

I’m not surprised that Mixer is shutting down. It was obvious that the viewership wasn’t there. Only Ninja and Shroud received thousands of viewers and they were the only streamers who received contracts to game on Mixer. Only JaredFPS and Spartakus received 1,000 average viewers. The majority of streamers on Mixer received between 100 to 400 views per stream. Mid-level Twitch streamers averaged more than 100 views per stream.

Especially when the report came out in May showing the viewer grow for YouTube, Twitch, Facebook Gaming, and Mixer, Mixer only grew by 0.2%. During a time of social distancing when many people have nothing better to do than to sit at home and watch video games, Mixer could only grow 0.2% while the other platforms saw significant growth.

It wasn’t a matter of if Mixer would shut down but when. And streamers on other platforms like Harris Heller posted a YouTube video a few months ago saying that he gives Mixer five years until they shut down. Sad to say they only needed five months.

When you have the worlds most famous streamer, Ninja, on your platform and it still does not show significant growth then there isn’t much else the platform can spend money on to help growth. Mixer spent 20 to 30 million dollars bringing Ninja to the platform and his presence wasn’t able to bring back that revenue.

Its especially hard for the streamers who used Mixer as a fulltime job. Its a dream to reach the point of success to be a “fulltime streamer” but as you see unless the streaming platform is offering you a contract then its best to not quit your day job. If you were able to find success while working a day job, then you can continue to grow by keeping your day job. I wouldn’t want to know my whole livelihood is relying on subscriptions, followers, and viewers. I much rather wait until I’m big enough to sign a contract so I’m financially protected whether the platform closes or viewers just get bored with me.   

The reality is many people have experienced success then failure and had to start over. I think the problem with video game streaming is that it’s a fantasy career. You don’t have to have a college degree or submit a resume to be successful. I think for some streamers once they achieve this fantasy career its a real shock when real world business problems come about.

The reason Mixer shot out the message out of the blue about shutting down is because they didn’t owe the streamers an advance warning. Mixer is a free platform to use. There is no contract to use the platform or to get paid from the platform. Although, Mixer had to be quite aware that many streamers chose to make Mixer their primary source of income, but that wasn’t their problem.

The fact is Mixer shutting down didn’t hurt most of the streamers on Mixer. Even most of the partnered streamers still had full time jobs or some sort of secondary income. For me I wouldn’t have chosen Mixer to be my primary source of income knowing how small the platform was.

So far JaredFPS is the only streamer from Mixer who has immediate partnership on Twitch and has at least half of the viewers he did on Mixer. And thats all because he was the top streamer on Mixer besides Ninja and Shroud.