The Intersection of Twitch, Big Tech, and Politics (ft. Anna Makris)

Welcome back to Let's Talk Media! In this episode, host Vedant Akhauri connects with Anna Makris, his former supervisor on the Bernie Sanders 2020 presidential campaign. Outside of the political sphere, Anna is also a Twitch affiliate who streams under the name, TheHypnoticGamer1. This episode is a fascinating exploration of the sudden intersection of gaming, massive tech monopolies, and the 2020 election. In this episode, we discuss:Politicians on Twitch: A breakdown of why candidates like Bernie Sanders and Donald Trump suddenly started broadcasting their campaign rallies to gamers.Amazon's 80% Cut: In a perfect blending of gaming and Bernie Sanders' talking points, Anna reveals that Amazon (which owns Twitch) takes a massive 80% cut of her affiliate earnings, leaving her with only 20%.Finding Love in Small Communities: Stepping away from heavy politics, Anna shares why she prefers the tight-knit communities of Twitch over massive platforms like YouTube.The 2020 Race Prediction: Vedant asks Anna to make a wild prediction about who will win the 2020 U.S Presidential Election.If you like what you hear, please subscribe and leave a rating to be notified of future episodes. You can subscribe wherever you get your podcasts and follow the show on Instagram @letstalkmediava. New episodes every week.Date of Recording: March 8, 2020Audio Remastered: June 7, 2026"Dirt Rhodes" Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 4.0 Licensehttp://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/