Hasan Piker, known as “HasanAbi” on Twitch, has just become Twitch’s most-watched streamer. Piker was formerly a host and producer at The Young Turks and columnist for The Huffington Post, and now streams video games and shares political commentary on Twitch.
Piker often streams in the Just Chatting section ofTwitchor plays games likeAmong Us. Piker was recently involved with theAmong Usstream featuring a mix of streamers like Pokimane and DrLupo, and politicians including Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Ilhan Omar.AOC’s Twitch streampulled in over 4.5 million views and 435,000 concurrent viewers. While a single one of Piker’s streams have not reached that many concurrent viewers, the political Twitch streamer has been the most watched streamer since Election Day.
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For the last seven days, Piker has been streaming often and his channel has been watched for a total of 6.8 million hours, according to Twitch stat site Sully Gnome. His 6.8 million hours watched is nearly double the hours watched of the next highest watchedEnglish channel xQc. During the week, the Portuguese stream Gaules took second place overall with just over six million hours watched, but more than double the stream time.
Piker’s political commentary during the election has pulled in over 200,000 concurrent viewers and an average of almost 75,000 average viewers for the last given week. Since ballots are still being counted sinceElection Day, Piker’s channel has maintained viewers tuning in for updates instead of mainstream networks like Fox or CNN. While Piker’s stream numbers may fall after the election, the streamer’s updates and commentary have been enjoyed by many viewers.
Throughout the election, politics has meshed with video games and streaming more than ever before. Politicians like AOC and Andrew Yang have gotten positive feedback for being involved in the video game community. AOC has shared herLeague of Legendsaccomplishments andAndrew Yang even hosted aDungeons and Dragonsgamefor a political fundraiser. The presidential candidates have also used video games and Twitch to campaign to their supporters.
Both Joe Biden and Donald Trump have campaigned in different ways using video games as an outlet. TheBiden campaign recently created anAnimal Crossingislandfeaturing voting information and Biden’s favorites like an ice cream stand and a model train room. While Trump does not have anAnimal Crossingisland, the campaign took to Twitch, but was suspended due to “hateful conduct.” While the use of Twitch is a good way to reach supporters, streamers like Hasan Piker have greatly benefitted from covering political events.
