March 12, 2019
T-series surpassing PewDiePie is inevitable (it has already happened 4 times) but that isn’t stopping YouTube’s community from taking the Indian music channel to war. For over 5 years, PewDiePie whos real name is Felix Kjellberg has held the position as the most-subscribed-to person on YouTube. He was the first to reach 50 million, and his fans had hoped to see him reach 100 million, but T-series threatens to reach it first.
8 years ago, Kjellberg started his channel in a humble manner uploading Minecraft and Call of Duty videos. His excessive energy and swearing made his content honest and raw and attracted gamers to his channel. His horror game videos gained him a niche following, and he soon established himself as one of the most prominent gamers on YouTube.
It wasn’t the games Kjellberg played that lifted him to stardom, it was his personality. To this day, his most popular videos are compilations of his funniest moments and his series Fridays with PewDiePie where Kjellberg interacted with his audience without playing video games. While many initially labeled him annoying, his genuine character easily dominated YouTube’s gaming scene. PewDiePie is the ultimate icon of the content creators dream; a single person growing their channel to stardom.
On the other hand, T-Series is the ultimate icon of YouTube’s dream: customers!
This battle between channels isn’t about subscribers, it’s about identity. YouTube is so willing to forget everything that it stood for in its youth in order to build a system that values money over content. Longtime users want nothing more than for the individual creator to reign, not the corporation.
T-Series will eventually permanently pass PewDiePie, possibly by several millions in the coming years. When it happens it will mark the end of YouTube’s transition from a creative platform to a money-making monster.
Disclaimer: Articles designated as “Editorial” represent the views and opinions of the author, not the 2018-2019 Periscope staff, CHS/CASD administration, or the CHS student body.
Want to help the Herd? Please consider supporting the Periscope program. Your donation will support the student journalists of CHS and allow us to purchase equipment, send students to workshops/camps, and cover our annual website hosting costs.