Emmett Shear

Emmett Shear
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Emmett Shear (born 1983) is an American internet entrepreneur, investor, and technology executive. He is best known as the co-founder of the live video platform Justin.tv and for serving as chief executive officer of Twitch, the video game livestreaming service that was spun off from Justin.tv, from 2011 until his departure in March 2023. In November 2023, Shear was thrust into one of the most dramatic corporate upheavals in recent Silicon Valley history when he was named interim CEO of OpenAI following the sudden firing of Sam Altman, making him the artificial intelligence company's third chief executive in the span of three days. Beyond his operational roles, Shear has been a part-time partner at the startup accelerator Y Combinator since 2011. He is the CEO of Softmax, a startup focused on AI alignment.

Early Life

Emmett Shear was born in 1983 in the United States. Details about his family background and upbringing are not extensively documented in public sources. He developed an early interest in technology and computing, which would shape his career trajectory in Silicon Valley.

Shear's interest in live video and online communities began to take form during his college years. While a student at Yale University, he formed a close friendship with Justin Kan, a relationship that would prove instrumental in the founding of Justin.tv and, eventually, Twitch. The two shared an interest in entrepreneurship and technology, and their collaboration at Yale laid the groundwork for multiple ventures in the years that followed.

Education

Shear attended Yale University, where he earned a Bachelor of Science degree. His time at Yale was significant not only for his academic development but also for the professional relationships he established there, most notably with Justin Kan, with whom he would go on to co-found Justin.tv. Shear has maintained connections with his alma mater; the Yale Daily News has covered his entrepreneurial career on multiple occasions.

Career

Justin.tv

In 2007, Shear co-founded Justin.tv alongside Justin Kan and other partners. The platform began as a lifecasting experiment — Justin Kan wore a camera on his head and streamed his daily life around the clock — but quickly evolved into a broader platform that allowed anyone to broadcast live video content. Justin.tv was part of the Y Combinator ecosystem, and the experience of building and scaling the platform gave Shear deep exposure to the challenges and opportunities of live streaming technology.

As Justin.tv grew, the team noticed that a significant and rapidly expanding portion of their traffic was driven by users who were broadcasting themselves playing video games. This observation would prove pivotal. The gaming content on Justin.tv attracted not just individual streamers but also organized esports events, drawing large audiences who wanted to watch competitive gaming in real time.

Justin.tv also spun off other products during this period, including Socialcam, described as "Instagram for video," which was separated from the main platform in 2011.

Twitch

In June 2011, the gaming-focused component of Justin.tv was formally spun off as TwitchTV (later simply Twitch), with Shear serving as its chief executive officer. Under Shear's leadership, Twitch grew from a niche esports streaming service into one of the largest live video platforms on the internet. The platform capitalized on the growing popularity of competitive gaming, game streaming, and online community building around gaming content.

Shear's strategy for Twitch focused on serving the gaming community with purpose-built features, including chat functionality, channel subscriptions, and tools for content creators to monetize their streams. He described the vision for Twitch in terms of creating "the ESPN of video games," a reference to the platform's ambition to become the primary destination for live gaming content. This analogy captured the way Twitch sought to professionalize and centralize the viewing of gaming content in much the same way ESPN had done for traditional sports.

The growth of Twitch was dramatic. The platform attracted millions of daily active users and became a cultural force within the gaming industry. Streamers built large followings, and the platform played a significant role in the growth of esports as a spectator phenomenon. By 2014, Twitch had become one of the largest sources of peak internet traffic in the United States.

Amazon Acquisition

In August 2014, Amazon acquired Twitch for approximately $970 million, outbidding Google and its subsidiary YouTube in what was described at the time as a surprisingly swift deal. The acquisition was seen as a major validation of the live streaming market and of Shear's leadership of the platform. Shear remained as CEO of Twitch following the acquisition, continuing to lead the company as a subsidiary of Amazon.

Under the Amazon umbrella, Twitch continued to expand its offerings. The platform diversified beyond gaming to include creative content, music, talk shows, and other forms of live entertainment, while maintaining its core identity as a gaming-first platform. Shear oversaw this expansion over the course of nearly a decade, during which Twitch became synonymous with live internet broadcasting.

Shear was recognized by the San Francisco Business Times as one of its "Young Leaders: 40 Under 40" in 2017, reflecting his prominence in the Bay Area technology community.

Departure from Twitch

In March 2023, Shear announced his departure as CEO of Twitch after more than sixteen years of involvement, dating back to the founding of Justin.tv. In a blog post reflecting on his tenure, Shear noted the length and significance of his time leading the platform. His departure marked the end of an era for a company he had helped build from its earliest days as a livestreaming experiment.

Y Combinator

In 2011, coinciding with the launch of Twitch, Shear was appointed as a part-time partner at Y Combinator, the prominent Silicon Valley startup accelerator that had backed Justin.tv in its early stages. In this role, Shear mentored and advised early-stage startups, drawing on his own experience scaling a consumer internet platform. His dual role as a tech CEO and Y Combinator partner gave him an unusual vantage point across the startup ecosystem.

OpenAI Interim CEO

On November 17, 2023, OpenAI's board of directors fired co-founder and CEO Sam Altman, triggering a leadership crisis at one of the most prominent artificial intelligence companies in the world. The initial appointment of former Twitch executive Mira Murati as interim CEO was short-lived, and on November 19, 2023, the board named Emmett Shear as OpenAI's interim chief executive — making him the company's third CEO in approximately three days.

The appointment of Shear was met with intense scrutiny and media attention. Sources described him in mixed terms, with WIRED characterizing him as "highly intelligent, socially awkward" based on accounts from people who had worked with him. The New York Times and the Washington Post profiled Shear's background extensively as observers tried to understand the board's rationale for the choice.

Shear's tenure as interim CEO of OpenAI was extraordinarily brief. His appointment came amid a counter-rebellion by OpenAI employees and investors who demanded the reinstatement of Altman. The Wall Street Journal reported that during the crisis, OpenAI's leadership "hung in the balance" as Altman's supporters gained steam. Within days, Sam Altman was reinstated as CEO of OpenAI, bringing Shear's interim role to an end.

Despite the brevity of his time at OpenAI, the episode underscored Shear's standing within the technology industry and his known interest in AI safety and alignment — concerns he had voiced publicly prior to his appointment.

Softmax

Following his time at OpenAI, Shear became the CEO of Softmax, a startup focused on AI alignment. The company's work centers on ensuring that artificial intelligence systems behave in accordance with human values and intentions, a subject area that Shear has expressed interest in for several years.

Views on Leadership and Career

In public appearances and interviews, Shear has shared his perspectives on leadership and career advice. In a March 2025 interview reported by Fortune, Shear warned young professionals and interns that prestigious jobs "on paper" are "mostly a trap" and that money should be viewed as a "constraint" rather than a primary goal. He also cautioned that starting a business would bring "economy-sized" pain, but suggested that the alternative paths in the workforce carried their own risks. Business Insider reported that Shear had a consistent piece of career advice that he shared with every batch of interns during his time at Twitch.

In September 2025, Shear discussed his views on delegation and decision-making in a Business Insider piece, stating that a CEO's job "is not only to delegate but also to discern" and emphasizing the importance of knowing when to override experts on critical decisions.

Personal Life

Shear is based in the San Francisco Bay Area. During the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020, he was featured in media coverage for his approach to the shelter-in-place orders in San Francisco.

Also during the early months of the pandemic, Shear was reported to have been involved as an angel investor in Three Babes Bakeshop, a San Francisco food business operated by Lenore Estrada. He was part of a group that contributed to a fundraising effort described as a "new deal" for the business during the economic disruptions caused by COVID-19.

Shear has published academic work in computer science; his publications are indexed in the DBLP computer science bibliography and the ACM Digital Library.

Recognition

Shear's work at Twitch brought him significant recognition within the technology industry. He was named to the San Francisco Business Times' "40 Under 40" list of young business leaders in 2017, highlighting his impact on the Bay Area's technology scene.

Forbes profiled Shear and Twitch in a 2013 feature article titled "The ESPN of Video Games," recognizing the platform's growth under his leadership and its potential to transform how audiences consumed gaming content.

His profile as a magazine feature subject continued with a profile in Hemispheres, United Airlines' in-flight magazine, which examined his journey from fandom to business leadership at Twitch.

The November 2023 OpenAI leadership crisis brought Shear to a level of mainstream public attention beyond the technology sector. Major outlets including The New York Times, The Washington Post, CNN, and WIRED ran profiles and analyses of his background and qualifications for the interim CEO role.

Legacy

Emmett Shear's primary legacy is in the creation and development of the live streaming industry. As the CEO who oversaw Twitch from its inception as a spin-off through its growth into a platform with millions of users and its acquisition by Amazon for nearly $1 billion, Shear played a central role in establishing live video game streaming as a mainstream form of entertainment.

Twitch under Shear's leadership helped catalyze the growth of esports as a spectator activity and created economic opportunities for individual streamers and content creators who built careers on the platform. The model Twitch pioneered — combining live video with real-time chat and subscription-based monetization — has been widely emulated across the technology industry.

Shear's brief stint as interim CEO of OpenAI, while lasting only days, placed him at the center of a defining moment in the development of the AI industry, during which questions about corporate governance, AI safety, and the relationship between nonprofit missions and commercial interests were debated intensely in public.

His subsequent work with Softmax on AI alignment reflects a continued engagement with questions about the responsible development of artificial intelligence, a subject that is expected to grow in significance as AI systems become more capable and widely deployed.