Twitch is seemingly in more than just a little hot water after it’s been revealed the streaming platform is being sued for nearly $3 billion.
According to a report from Dexerto, Russian media company Rambler Group is taking legal action against Twitch, and is seeking over $2.8 billion in damages for what it claims is “a violation of exclusive distribution rights.”
The filing comes after Twitch shared a broadcast of the English Premier League on its platform – despite Rambler Group reportedly having exclusive distribution rights in Russia.
Rambler Group purchased the rights to the exclusive digital distribution of the English Premier League in 2019, with a duration of three seasons. The company is claiming to have forked out €7 million (approximately $7,807,345 USD) to ensure that Russian citizens wishing to watch the matches would only be able to do so via a Rambler-owned streaming platform.
The Russian company has provided screenshots as evidence for its claims that 36,000 viewers watched various games of the English Premier League on a number of Twitch streams.
The lawsuit sees Rambler Group seek roughly around $2.84 billion in damages, citing copyright infringement.
Twitch, which is owned by Amazon, and Rambler Group will see the next steps of the lawsuit taken on December 20, when we should get a better idea of what’s going to happen between the companies.
Even for a company as large as Amazon, $3 billion is a hit that’s surely going to tough to recover from.
Twitch is often under fire for its content creators, community guidelines, terms of service and other controversies. Here’s hoping this legal matter can get solved quickly and painlessly!
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Featured Image Credit: Twitch