PewDiePie and Anita Sarkeesian have been listed in TIME‘s 30 most influential people on the internet.
PewDiePie, real name Felix Kjellberg, and Sarkeesian, host of Feminist Frequency, are both prominent within the YouTube gaming community, though for very different reasons. PewDiePie produces Let’s Plays of video games and animated shorts on his YouTube channel, where he has over 35 million subscribers and over 8 billion views, making him the most popular YouTube personality on the internet. On the other hand, Sarkeesian’s Feminist Frequency channel produces critiques of games and the gaming industry, most notably in her divisive ‘Tropes vs. Women in Video Games’ series.
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Discussing PewDiePie’s inclusion in the list, TIME wrote about how the 25-year-old has given “indie game-makers invaluable exposure and how he has raised hundreds of thousands of dollars for charity, while Sarkeesian was praised for being “the most public critic of sexism in the gaming community.”
Both PewDiePie and Anita Sarkeesian have received ample amounts of criticism due to the content of their YouTube channels, though it’s impossible to argue the influence they have had on the platform. Kjellberg is a big part of the reason why traditional games media is moving more towards the production of video content, while Sarkeesian has invigorated the discussion regarding sexism in video games.
Elsewhere on the list the likes of Taylor Swift, Barack Obama and Beyonce were also featured.
