Mogul Moves: how ASU’s Ludwig Ahgren “accidentally” became the biggest Twitch streamer of all time
By Matthew Legere/Cronkite News
“Harvard of the Southwest”
LOS ANGELES – “Boys,” long before being named 2022 Streamer of the Year, Ludwig Ahgren was uploading YouTube videos from the editing bays at Arizona State University.
Ahgren double-majored in English Literature and Journalism and Mass Communications from the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences and the Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communications, a decision that he hoped would help him to fulfill his childhood dreams of one day becoming a late-night talk show host a la Jimmy Fallon or Jimmy Kimmel.
In his first few months on campus – after many well-documented attempts at joining Greek life and the “TEMPEtations” a cappella club – Ahgren eventually found a home with Tempe Late Night, a variety comedy club that would help him to prepare for the necessary improvisation and crowd-working associated with live streaming later on in life.
Before making the illustrious transition into the world of streaming, though – in addition to his time spent on stage – Ahgren also joined the “Smash” club at Arizona State University and began playing Super Smash Bros. Melee, which he says may have been the start of it all.
“[My] entire stream only exists because I joined a club in college,” Ahgren said in a YouTube video titled, What NO ONE Tells You About College. “I joined the Smash club at Arizona State University and that’s the reason I got into melee and started playing it more. I stream, I do ‘The Yard,’ all of my friends, this all happened because I joined one club in college.”
Though Ahgren – or “TheZanySidekick” as he was known back then – had already been posting Call of Duty commentary videos to YouTube since he was just 16 years old, it was at this time that the double major began to take more of an editor’s approach and started uploading Smash compilation videos from the sixth-floor editing bays at the Cronkite School.
To this day, these are still some of the most watched videos on Ahgren’s channel, including one particular clip titled, Top 10 Salty Ice Climber Moments in Smash, which is the third most viewed on his channel and has over 4.1M views to date.
Ahgren would continue this trend until graduating Cum Laude from Arizona State University – or the “Harvard of the Southwest” as he would call it – in the Spring of 2017 with a 3.43 cumulative GPA.
“Bigger number, better person”
After graduating – and now hoping to turn this newfound passion for content creation into a career – Ahgren began his search for employment in the top two designated market areas in the U.S., Los Angeles and New York.
Over three hundred job applications later and a “bombed” interview in New York, Ahgren pushed his chips to the center of the table and went “all-in” on a possible future in Los Angeles.
The Hollis, N.H. native packed his bags and headed for the City of Angels in a rented Toyota Camry now hoping to fulfill what is every Gen Z childhood dream of becoming a YouTuber or “actor in a Juicy Fruit commercial”.
While in Los Angeles, Ahgren began working as an online editor for Wine and Spirits Magazine but was quickly fired after just six weeks of employment, a precursor to his eventual firing from head of marketing at IQ Vapes and content moderator at Snapchat, as well.
Three jobs down, and no clear sense of direction at that time, the “unemployable” Ahgren stuck to his roots as a content creator and committed to full-time streaming in February of 2019 – a decision that would change the ASU grad's life forever.
“Employment wasn’t exactly ripe for fresh graduates with an English degree,” Ahgren said in a YouTube video titled, Ludwig Reacts to The Story of Ludwig by theScore esports. “It’s how it fucking works, god damn it.”
“I had been wanting to go full-time but I was scared because in the past it had failed and I thought that I needed some reason to stream. In reality, all I needed to do was just start streaming and get good at it, because you’re never going to be good unless you keep doing it.”
Though Ahgren was enjoying immediate, steady success as a full-time streamer on Twitch – growing from less than 200 average viewers to over 4,000 average viewers within his first 12 months – he recognized early on that growth was not going to occur within the platform and that he would have to do something else to stand out and make a name for himself, a sentiment that was later described while appearing on the Colin and Samir Show.
“You don’t grow on Twitch,” Ahgren said. “That’s not how it works. What you do is you grow on another platform and then you bring them to Twitch.”
At this point, Ahgren began posting condensed versions of each stream to YouTube and after a little bit of cheating in Among Us mixed with his hunger for gold-ranked status in GeoGuesser, the model was finally beginning to pay off.
After posting every day for two years straight on YouTube, mixed in with a near-80% increase in online viewership during the pandemic, Ahgren began building a social media empire that now boasts 3.3M subscribers on YouTube and more than 6.6M followers on Instagram, TikTok, Twitch, and Twitter combined.
Along with Ahgren’s typical day-to-day content on Twitch and YouTube, the 27-year-old social media mogul – who draws inspiration from Spanish streaming sensation Ibai and his large-scale production and events – has now also become the face of A Very Mogul Christmas, Fortnite Monday’s, Shitcamp Kickball World Series, The Yard Podcast, $1,000,000 Poker Tournament and, of course, a record-breaking “subathon".
Though he prides himself on consistency and never missing an upload, Ahgren’s subathon – perhaps his most notable accomplishment as a streamer – was the result of his first-ever vacation and the inability to go live on Twitch.
In March of 2021 – after his appendix burst during a skiing trip in Maine and he was forced to miss nearly a month of streaming – Ahgren agreed and promised to make up the lost time to his viewers by going live for 24 hours straight.
To add a twist, Ahgren decided that rather than simply streaming for 24 hours, each new subscription would extend the length of his stream by 20 seconds. This seemed reasonable at the time, as matching his previous record for new subscriptions in a day would likely have kept the stream to around 20-24 hours.
That was not at all the case.
Instead – though he never expected it to last more than 48 hours – Ahgren remained live for 31 days uninterrupted and “accidentally” became the biggest Twitch streamer of all time along the way.
With 283,066 subscribers for the month, Ahgren broke the record on Twitch for most all-time peak active subscriptions on the site, beating Ninja's previous record of 269,154 set back in 2018.
Ahgren’s record-breaking subathon raised approximately $1.5 million, donating $200,000 to No Kid Hungry, $57,000 each to the Humane Society and St. Jude’s Children’s Research Hospital, $40,000 to a charity of his roommates' choosing, and $10,000 to Free Food UD.
Later that calendar year, Ahgren was recognized for his contributions to the streaming community and took home the Streamer of the Year award at the 2022 Streamer Awards.
“I had one good month and I think that’s why I’m standing here,” Ahgren said in his acceptance speech. “I just hope that I can have a year that is as good as that month and I hope that I can be a fraction of what Ibai is to Spain because I think he’s really pushing it right now.”
“Not in this car”
Though it seemed as if Ahgren – or “No. 6” as chat might now refer to him – had fully cemented himself as one of the “Golden Boys” of Twitch and would be streaming on the platform forever, that simply was not the case.
In November of 2021, just seven months after breaking the all-time sub record on Twitch, Ahgren made the biggest announcement of his streaming career and signed an exclusivity deal with YouTube Gaming, a decision that was made by an offline coin-flip and later explained in greater detail during a video which he titled, Why I Left Twitch, on his second YouTube channel, Mogul Mail.
“It’s weird to say but the hardest decision I ever made was picking between YouTube and Twitch,” Ahgren said. “It doesn’t seem like it should be. It feels like there should’ve been harder things. There were breakups, I had to choose what college I went to, what job I had, and where I moved. Those were scary too but this feels like I’m giving up the most.”
One of the major benefits of joining YouTube was the freedom to put on more large scale, live events, including his most recent event, Mogul Money Live, a not-so-Jeopardy-like game show where top content creators get to compete head-to-head for their chance to win top prizes such as $5,000 in cash, a custom Mogul Moves bidet, or three used AA batteries
“I love streaming but what actually makes me the happiest is just making dope shit,” Ahgren said. “Making things that I think are cool and hopefully some other people out there think they’re cool too. Things like Mogul Money, the Christmas album, the kickball tournament.”
Mogul Money Live was streamed centerstage from YouTube Theater at SoFi Stadium in Los Angeles, California and hosted a sold-out crowd of more than 5,000 people. The event also consisted of an online “chat” featuring upwards of 150,000 concurrent viewers at any given time.
Though “Lud Buds” came from all over the world to show support for their favorite internet scammer, this event served as a healthy reminder that Ludwig is – in fact – still not our friend.
Among Ahgren’s friends in attendance, however, were special guest contestants such as ConnorEatsPants, Fuslie, Mizkif, Nick Envy, Pokimane, Sodapoppin, Sykkuno, Will Neff, and xQc. The event also welcomed many other impromptu “phone-a-friend” appearances from HasanAbi, Myth, and Valkyrae.
“I’m just really proud of Ludwig,” Valkyrae said. “I didn’t realize Mogul Money was actually going to be that massive. Like, I knew there were tickets but I didn’t realize it was going to be a stadium of people – it was crazy.”
Valkyrae was not at all alone in her beliefs, as many other content creators – whether in attendance or watching from home – continued to voice their respect and admiration for Ahgren following the event.
“This is a huge moment for Ludwig and beyond that, it’s a huge moment for streamers,” Neff said in a recent live stream on Twitch. “The energy in that building was fucking crazy. Everyone who came to see that event was stoked and I hope it leads to more people doing stuff like that – more live events for us.”
Just seven months into his contract with YouTube, Ahgren's move has already proven to have paid major dividends for the once late-night talk show host hopeful. Not only does Ahgren continue to push boundaries and revolutionize the world of streaming, but he has also helped to pave the way for other streamers to follow suit, including Sykkuno, LilyPichu, and, most recently, Myth, who have all since made the switch from Twitch to YouTube, as well.
“I think being successful at streaming is preparing yourself the best way possible for when luck hits,” Ahgren said. “Because it can strike at any time and if you’re not ready, that might be your only chance.”