Amidst all the havoc being caused across the world as a result of COVID-19, colloquially known as coronavirus, people living in areas that are currently on lockdown need a way to pass the time while simultaneously keeping themselves out of the clutches of boredom. This is where online platforms for entertainment such as Youtube, Dailymotion (if you’re into that), Netflix, and for those avid gamers, platforms like Twitch, come into play. Twitch mainly focuses on and promotes its large and ardent gaming communities, but this doesn’t mean they don’t cater to other industries as well as you can prefer to use Twitch to mp4 converter to automatically convert your file to the correct format online. In these challenging times, it is a no-brainer that site traffic for a platform like Twitch has been on a significant rise. This traffic does not mean only an increase in the number of streamers but a substantial increase in the viewership as well. Platforms like Twitch enable popular flags to use their viewership to raise awareness and start using the platform to kickstart the fight against this pandemic, and that is precisely what has been happening since the lockdown began. So here are five good things Twitch streamers are doing during these lockdowns in support of the fight against COVID-19. If raising around $2.8 million to help the World Health Organisation continue its efforts to tackle the problem of COVID-19 isn’t a good thing, then I don’t know what is. Enthusiast Gaming made sure they went all guns blazing on this event bringing in a lot of big names from various fields like NFL stars Richard Sherman and Darius Slay, Kevin De Bruyne, and Dele Alli from the English Premier League, and even pro-gamers like Tfue among various others. Stream Aid not only featured gaming but also showcased many big names from the music industry with the likes of John Legend, Joe Jonas, Jacob Collier, etc. This 12-hour extravaganza filled with games across a wide range of genres like Call of Duty, Fortnite, and even Uno was one of the biggest fundraisers on Twitch, which is not surprising considering the platform’s rich history of successful fundraisers for a good cause. In today’s age of ever-developing technology, ‘scamming’ people have become quite frequent. This is usually done online through email or social media or over the telephone too. Officially, a cure, be it temporary or permanent, is yet to be found for coronavirus, but there are a lot of scammers selling products claiming they will help cure coronavirus. We have seen many examples of this in the past too. In the now widespread and very relevant movie Contagion, there was a similar incident where a drug was being sold, which a lot of people claimed cured the epidemic in the film, but this was never confirmed to be an actual cure. Still, scammers targeted those who are most vulnerable and made a lot of money off them in the process. Profiting off of someone’s fear is a very vile thing to do, and there is a twitch stream that goes by the name of Kitboga, who is currently trying to seek out and bust such scammers, especially in this vulnerable time of lockdown and fear of catching the virus. There are now a lot of people claiming that certain essential oils, etc. have the healing properties to make sure a person is immune to the coronavirus. A lady who went by the name ‘Anne’ answered all of Kitboga’s questions expertly, and he then made a bulk order for the so-called ‘cure.’ Later on, he exposed the scammer as he does in a lot of his streams, which are watched by an average of 8000 viewers. Formula 1 has been very active during this period of lockdown by conducting various activities across all platforms to keep fans occupied and entertained since the coronavirus has halted the start of the long-awaited 2020 season of Formula 1. Lando Norris, one of the two drivers for the McLaren F1 Team, is a regular gamer and is quite popular across all platforms. As a pledge to raise money to fight COVID-19, Lando Norris, in front of almost 40000 viewers, shaved off his hair with a clipper because who doesn’t like famous people to stupid stuff to themselves on the internet. After his self-inflicted haircut, there was instant regret in his reaction, but it is a small price to pay compared to the $12000 he raised as a result of the stream. The World Health Organisation is the main body when it comes to devising plans to eradicate the current threat of coronavirus. This is not only through supporting the search to find a cure for the disease but also through creating awareness and raising funds while simultaneously involving as many people as they can. Staying indoors, for a lot of people, means a massive spike in people playing a plethora of video-games. One campaign devised by the WHO is the #PlayApartTogether campaign that encourages gamers to raise money as donations to the fight against COVID-19 using online esports platforms like Twitch and that is precisely what Twitch streamers have been doing. A lot of banners have raised thousands and thousands of dollars in support of this campaign and promoting the hashtag widely. The famous gaming collective known as the FaZe Clan partnered up with UMG Media and Torque ESports to conduct a Call of Duty: Warzone tournament that would be live-streamed on Twitch and pledged that all the money raised from the stream would be sent to local charities that are helping with the care of coronavirus victims. Through this tournament, they raised $35000 from the viewers, $10000 was donated by Activision and $5000 from the organizers themselves It is truly amazing to see that a platform like Twitch is being utilized for such useful purposes and has been pivotal in uniting people from all over the world in this fight against COVID-19. 1. Stream Aid 2020
2. Kitboga
3. ‘Baldo’ Norris
4. #playaparttogether
5. The FaZe Clan
