YouTube has revealed that Felix "PewDiePie" Kjellberg was the most watched content creator of 2019. This comes as little surprise to those who follow Youtubers, as PewDiePie has been at the top of the list of content creators for more than a few years. Although PewDiePie has his detractors, the Chinese government for example, his legion of fans continue to him to this day.
PewDiePie rose to fame in 2014, leap-frogging his way to the top of the YouTube charts. It was reported that using a racial epithet while livestreaming. For what it's worth, PewDiePie accepted full responsibility for his actions and unequivocally condemned hate speech in his community. The popular YouTuber is also widely known as philanthropic with his considerable wealth. Still, his repentance has done little to gain the trust back from either Disney or YouTube.
The announcement that PewDiePie was the most watched content creator of 2019 comes by way of YouTube themselves in the just-released YouTube Rewind 2019. In addition, YouTube also shares that PewDiePie's videos were watched a whopping four billion times. That viewership beats out the second place Felipe Neto by a margin of 1.2 billion, (Neto's max viewership was 2.8 billion.) PewDiePie was also featured in Rewind 2019 as having the second most liked video of the year. That video was of his recent wedding to former YouTuber and current fashion designer/entrepreneur Marzia Bisognin (now Kjellberg.)
Aside from those two features, there's no other mention of PewDiePie in the YouTube Rewind 2019. Despite being YouTube's most popular content creator for six years, PewDiePie hasn't been invited to participate in Rewind for the past several years. Just last year, he made a parody of Rewind 2018, which garnered 8.6 million likes, while YouTube's had only 2.6 million. The 2019 Rewind marks a decided change in direction for YouTube, as the company itself states that they essentially don't know how to create content for its consumers. At the beginning of the video, they say that they're simply going to recount the most popular videos and channels on the platform, in saying "you're better at this than we are."
It's no secret that many content creators have been upset at YouTube's monetization policy for a long time. Recently, YouTube updated its of service with vague language that effectively gives the company unprecedented termination power over creators. This was met with an immediate call for YouTubers to unionize. It seems unlikely that YouTube will its most popular creator, PewDiePie, due to his past misdeeds. However, with their or not, PewDiePie will almost certainly continue to draw viewers in record numbers.
Source: YouTube