We are in the midst of a great war to end all wars. Pewdiepie, or Felix Kjellberg, has had the channel with the top subscribers for nearly all time and his throne is being threatened by T-Series, an Indian corporation that has exploded out of obscurity in an attempt to defeat the reigning champion. Recently, it seemed as though the war was lost, with the gap closing to 15,000 subscribers, but in his hour of need popular Youtubers Markiplier and Jacksepticeye as well as many others sallied out from their channels and threw their support behind Felix’s channel, who has now accrued over 5 million subscribers in the last 60 days. However, T-Series has been keeping pace with Pewdiepie’s growth and. T-Series has their supporters however, with many Indian Youtubers mistakenly believing that Pewdiepie has said something negative about the entire country. However, past experiences has taught Pewdiepie that it is very easy to have his words misunderstood on the Internet and launched a charity drive for children in India. As a controversial Youtuber, who has learned from his past mistakes, Felix was prepared to face his greatest challenge.

However this struggle is greater than just two channels feuding for first place, it is a battle between independent creators and corporations. Pewdiepie is an independent producer without any company telling him what to do, but T-Series is an Indian music and film production company, known for making Bollywood films. We have seen the gradual take over of Youtube, from a platform where anyone can create anything they want for people to see, to a media platform dominated by well-funded corporations. One of the first big channels on Youtube Smosh, has had their parent company file for bankruptcy, abruptly firing all of their employees without any notice. This year’s Youtube Rewind put on a facade of allowing the creators to choose who and what was in the rewind this year, but chose to put in cringe-worthy clips of late-night hosts doing Fortnite dances and left out many of the largest, but controversial channels on Youtube.

Whether or not you like Pewdiepie it’s worth considering subscribing to his channel and fighting back against corporations. A live subscriber count can be found here.