OpenAI, the company responsible for ChatGPT, named Twitch founder and former CEO Emmett Shear as its interim CEO after many people seem to be perplexed by the company’s decision to get rid of its previous CEO Sam Altman over the weekend.
Altman was “unexpectedly fired” by OpenAI on Friday, Nov. 17, according to a Bloomberg report, and since then, there’s been a bit of drama surrounding the startup company’s most important position.
Following the announcement that Shear would be taking over for the time being, there’s been some amount of social media buzz about the former Twitch boss’ credentials, especially from Ludwig, who is one of streaming’s most influential personalities.
“Emmett shear might be the greatest interviewer of all time,” Ludwig said. “How he went from losing millions at twitch and turning users/creators against him into CEO of the most important AI company in the world is insane.”
Ludwig, who gained his popularity as a streamer on Twitch from 2018-2021, has since moved to YouTube, and he regularly shares his opinions about the streaming industry on his Mogul Mail YouTube channel. In well-researched videos, Ludwig isn’t afraid to express critical analysis of Twitch and other streaming platforms.
That criticism isn’t limited to competing platforms, either, as Ludwig has frequently spoken out about elements and features of YouTube’s streaming platform that he feels could be improved.
Shear was one of the founders of Twitch when it was called Justin.tv in 2007, and served as the platform’s CEO from 2011 until March 2023. Ludwig’s criticism of Shear is in line with the sentiment of many streamers and viewers that have found themselves frustrated with several changes that happened on Twitch as the platform became more integrated with Amazon in the past five years or so. Amazon originally acquired Twitch in 2014.
