After breaking platform records with the most watch Twitch stream of all time, Fortnite streamer Grefg has been chosen to be Twitch's latest PogChamp of the Day. Over 2.4 million concurrent viewers tuned in to watch Grefg unveil his official Fortnite skin, and this monumental stream broke various Twitch records leaving all previous records miles behind.
On January 11th, Grefg went live on Twitch to reveal his official Fortnite skin which would be the game's latest installment in the Icon Series. Grefg is a Hispanic streamer and one of the largest creators on the platform who has mainly played Fortnite for the majority of his career. In fact, Grefg held two Twitch viewership records prior to the skin reveal but was able to triple the number of concurrent viewers of his previous record. During the reveal, Grefg hit 2.4 million concurrent viewers which single-handedly broke three Twitch records and helped the platform as a whole surpass its previous concurrent viewer record with 6.46 million viewers.
In honor of Grefg's groundbreaking achievements, Twitch has made his mug the daily PogChamp emote. This is a new initiative Twitch has put in place to spotlight a different streamer every 24-hours. While Grefg doesn't need the spotlight to shine as bright as he has recently, it's nice to see the platform acknowledge his accomplishments. However, the past two daily PogChamp selectees have faced severe harassment including racist and homophobic comments. Twitch has since taken a stand against this type of conduct, and hopefully, these instances can be avoided in the future.
Twitch implemented the daily PogChamp emote after making the decision to removed David "Gootecks" Gutierrez's original PogChamp emote from the platform. The OG emote was removed after Gutierrez used his social media to encourage further violence during the attempted insurrection of the U.S. Capitol on January 6th. Wanting to continue to tradition of PogChamp moments, Twitch adopted a community member's idea to have an ever-changing PogChamp emote instead of one Pog icon. Despite the controversy surrounding the emote, the daily PogChamp is meant to highlight creators and communities that share the same platform.
While Grefg may seem like a "safe choice" following two days where creators were harassed for their personal identities, Grefg is more than deserving of a daily PogChamp emote. Twitch is a sea of smaller creators that could stand to grow substantially from a daily PogChamp spotlight, but it is also a respectable move on Twitch's behalf to shine a light on it's larger creator's achievements.
Source: Twitch