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Athene (gamer)

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Bachir Boumaaza
Born (1980-06-09) 9 June 1980 (age 44)
Borgerhout, Antwerp, Belgium
Other namesChiren, Athene
Occupation(s)YouTube personality
Activist
Ex-Razer USA representative
Years active2007–present
Twitch information
Channel
Followers221K
Last updated: July 2021
Websitegamingforgood.net singularitygroup.net givingworks.io mobileminigames.com

Bachir Boumaaza (born 9 June 1980), known by the online pseudonym Athene, is a Belgian internet personality, Twitch streamer and YouTuber. He is best known as a World of Warcraft content creator. He is the founder of Gaming for Good and has been involved in numerous charity gaming events to raise money for charities such as Save the Children. Currently his main focus is working on a philanthropic mobile game called "Mobile MiniGames" and contributing to other projects with the Singularity Group.

Early life

Born in Borgerhout, Antwerp, Belgium, Boumaaza is the son of a Moroccan-Belgian couple. Both his parents worked in the Justice Department. Boumaaza claimed, in his book Mijn egotrip, that his childhood was chaotic due to the cultural differences between his mother and father. Being confronted with social issues, including racism and poverty, he says he was instilled with a sense of responsibility to change these conditions.[1] Boumaaza was introduced to video games at a young age.[2]

Political Activities

Boumaaza entered politics in 2000, and joined the progressive party, Young Green.[3] The party was the youth organization of Groen, formerly known as Agalev. He was, at the age of 20, chosen as a political candidate for Agalev and participated in the Belgian local elections, 2000.[4]

In 2005, Boumaaza co-founded the Belgian political organization, NEE[5]. Boumaaza operated as the official spokesperson and led the organization. NEE was a political movement aimed at voters who felt dissatisfied with the political climate.[6] As voting is mandatory in Belgium, NEE provided people with the ability to cast blank votes in dissatisfaction. NEE would therefore not occupy their seat in case of election.[7] NEE participated in both the Belgian local elections, 2006 and in the Belgian federal election, 2007 but did not receive enough votes to earn a seat in the city council or senate.

Boumaaza spear-headed protests against Net Neutrality in 2014 during events such as DreamHack to raise awareness about this censorship and corporate power.[8] [5] [9]

YouTube career

Boumaaza began making YouTube videos in 2007. He initially focused on World of Warcraft videos. In his earliest video, he played a character called Athene, an arrogant, conceited gamer. Boumaaza has also supplemented his online video presence by broadcasting himself live on Twitch.[10]

The original Athene series was created in 2007. Boumaaza played the role of a conceited World of Warcraft player named Athene. His YouTube video "Best Paladin of The World pwning nubs on My Heart Will Go On from Celine Dion" marked the beginning of the series. The original series revolved around the strange and fictional character, Athene, and included in-game commentary of World of Warcraft as well as a personal storyline that followed Athene's everyday life.[11]

During his time playing World of Warcraft, Boumaaza attained four world records for reaching the game's level cap, and was the first person to reach levels 80 and 85.[12][13] By 2013, Boumaaza's YouTube videos had been watched more than 382 million times, and his channel had reached nearly 600,000 subscribers.[14]

The series also featured a mockumentary named Wrath of the 1337 King which followed Athene's everyday life.[15] In 2008, Athene created videos with a group called iPower, primarily focused on his World of Warcraft character. The videos made frequent use of misleading titles such as "Sex and Porn is fun" and "Get free sex". Boumaaza's then girlfriend Tania appears in many of the videos and their corresponding thumbnails. Spokesman Reese Leysen said "The way to get lots of views on YouTube is to have a mix of sexiness and total absurdity." The channel's first 20 videos were viewed more than 20 million times.[6]

Boumaaza had been making some videos as part of a contract with Machinima. In 2013, Boumaaza posted a video to YouTube announcing that he would be leaving Machinima in response to its treatment of YouTube creators.[14]

Self Development

Some of Boumaaza's activists ventures focus on self development, to "inspire people through action and raise awareness around important issues".[16][9] He regularly streams on Twitch, doing "Real Talk" and informing viewers about his latest projects.[10] His Real Talk focuses on challenging ideas surrounding science, activism, lifestyle, philosophy, culture, self-development, self-actualization and other socio-political topics. [17] [5]

He has created a series of Real Talk Podcasts, regularly uploaded to SoundCloud[17] According to the podcast introductions, they are "a condensed version of the live Real Talk from the AtheneLive Twitch streams" that "explore controversial ideas to stimulate debate and active thinking".

In 2016 he released a book titled "Real Answers" which condenses a lot of the insights he talks about in his Real talk Podcasts.[18] [19]

Boumaaza and his team have also created several documentaries listed on IMDb [20] and available on YouTube[21]. They focus on educational topics, such as neuroscience, quantum mechanics, relativity, critical thinking about humanity's purpose or Ebola. [22] [21] [23]

He held a TEDx Talk about philosophy, consciousness, neuroscience and his charity fundraising.[24][25]

Charity Work & Philanthropy

As part of the Sharecraft 2012 Save the Children Challenge, Boumaaza partnered with Razer[26] and DC Entertainment[27] to raise more than US$1 million for charity organization Save The Children.[28][29] In 2013, Boumaaza created the charitable project "Gaming for Good" to raise money for Save The Children.[30] The project partnered with video game publishers and developers to offer games in exchange for donations to the charity. [31] [32][33] Through streams on his Twitch account, Boumaaza raised more than US$10 million.[34] By March 2015 the project had raised more than US$20 million in total, and Boumaaza was an official ambassador for Save The Children.[30]

In September 2013, Gaming for Good coordinated a fundraising event called "The Siege". The Siege was a World of Warcraft event where two top guilds, Midwinter and Method raced to complete a raid. The campaign raised over U$2 million over the weekend, quadrupling the initial goal of $500,000.[35] Boumaaza travelled to Liberia to film a documentary on the Ebola crisis.[36] In 2015, Boumaaza assembled a team of livestreamers called The Avengers - a reference to the Marvel superhero team The Avengers - who, over the course of 10 days, raised more than 320,000 euros.[37]

Boumaaza's charity efforts were supported by various other celebrities, examples include:

In 2016 Boumaaza received the Save The Children "Next Generation Award for inspiring young gamers to make a positive impact on the world." [48]. By 2019 Bachir Boumaaza and his team have raised a total of $25 million for Save The Children.[49][50]

In 2018, Bouumaza and his team registered the international NGO Giving Works.[51]

Gaming For Good, the donation platform used for most of the charity fundraising, is free to use and all money goes directly to the recipient - in the charity's case, straight to Save the Children's PayPal.[27] Save The Children, the main beneficiary of their charity activities, confirmed in a personal video that "you are a legitimate fundraiser, a 100% of your revenue comes to Save The Children" and that Boumaaza and his team did not get paid for fundraising.[52] They appointed Boumaaza as an official ambassador for Save The Children, giving him a dedicated page on their website.[49]

Gaming For Good

In 2013, Boumaaza created the charitable project "Gaming for Good" to raise money for Save The Children.[30] The project partnered with video game publishers and developers to offer games in exchange for donations to the charity.[32][33]

A lot of Boumaaza's fundraising was done via Gaming For Good, a donation platform, which several volunteers of the Singularity Group have contributed towards.[53] The donation platform "Gaming For Good" allows viewers to donate directly to specific users or to charity.[53]

It has been used by several internet celebrities, examples include:

Singularity Group

Boumaaza is currently a member of a group of activists called "Singularity Group" and involved in most projects there, such as Gaming For Good.[16] As of 2021, the biggest project the group contributes towards, is the philanthropic mobile game called "Mobile Minigames".[60]

According to the website, the group has several projects, but their main vision is to implement Universal Basic Income.[16][50] The group consists of volunteers who join via formal application.[16]

Boumaaza created the cryptocurrencies "Purpose" (PRPS) and "Decentralized Universal Basic Income" (DUBI).[61][62] These cryptocurrencies are used in, and supported by, the team's projects, such as their mobile game "Mobile MiniGames".[63]

In response to the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine, volunteers at the Singularity Group started focusing their humanitarian efforts on supporting refugees from Ukraine.[64] They have hosted many refugees, providing a safe place to stay among peers and helped dozens more with valuable information and resources.[65] Accommodation and food is provided for completely free for refugees, including possibility to learn new skills such as Twitch Live streaming or Web development to become independent.[66] Their support also included fundraising thousands of dollars in private donations directly for the hosted refugees and their families. Fundraising was done using Gaming For Good donation platform, via the AtheneLive twitch Stream and refugees' personal Twitch profiles.

In 2019, video game journalist Chris Bratt published the disputed result of a year-long investigation into Boumaaza, following an anonymous person's false claims that Boumaaza was responsible for emotional abuse and manipulation of volunteers that work with him.[67] However, according to a member of the volunteer group, the source of these claims was "someone with a personal vendetta who even went as far as to steal money" from the team. He stated that the journalist had been invited to visit the place and conduct thorough research, but never accepted this offer.[68]

One of the female members mentioned in the video tweeted that the journalist did not have any right to use her information or continuously contact her family members and friends.[69] She also published a response YouTube video stating that Bratt's video was based on unsubstantial allegations surrounding her and not factually correct.[70] Other members were interviewed in September 2018 by Bratt, but none of their content was used in the published video.[71] One interviewed member thinks information from his 45 Minute long interview wasn't used because he had positive experiences with Boumaaza, indicating that the video published might not show all sides. The same member was contacted again by Bratt in 2019, but Bratt lost interest shortly after he learned that the member was still working with Athene.[72] Similarly, female members of the group that had positive experiences with Boumaaza were either not interviewed at all, or Bratt broke contact after telling him they still volunteer with the group. Several other members of the group tweeted in support of Boumaaza, further debunking Bratt's report and highlighting that their positive experiences were not included in the video.[73][74][75]

Mobile MiniGames

Boumaaza is one of the main contributors to Mobile MiniGames, a philanthropic mobile game with blockchain and social media streaming integration.[60][76][77][78] The game was formerly known as "Clash of Streamers" and got renamed in July 2022, along with a complete rebranding and new Trailer.[79] The mobile game is free to play and translated into 40 languages.[80]

The game is a Play To Earn blockchain game that allows players to earn cryptocurrency.[81][82][83] As of July 2022 it is the first and only game of its kind approved on most popular mobile App stores. The game has already helped dozens of players earn money to pay for basic needs,[84] such as food [85] or expensive medical supplies [86]

Players can also create NFTs that can be traded and used in the game, being the first game to allow playable and interactive 3D NFTs in both the mobile game itself and directly in the browser.[50] These NFTs are integrated on OpenSea, a popular NFT marketplace, with dedicated collections for Pet NFTs [87] and Hero NFTs.[88] On September 4, 2021, a player successfully sold a season 3 hero NFT for 2.9 ETH - $12K USD at the time of the sale.[89] On September 27, 2021, a player sold a season 2 pet NFT for 1.5 ETH - $4.5K USD at the time of the sale.[90][91]

During it's release year, the game reached more than 1 Million downloads on the Google Play Store [80] and is also available on the iOS Appstore.[92] The game reached Rank 1 for free top grossing Adventure Games on the Google PlayStore, based on Philippine Users in November 2021.[93] It was still the top grossing game in January 2022.[94] Until July 2022 it never fell below rank 5 top grossing in the same category.[95]

The cryptocurrencies PRPS[96] & DUBI,[97] created by Boumaaza, are integrated in this game.[98][99] Initially the Tokens were on the Ethereum Network,[100] but functionality was impacted by high gas fees and slow transactions.[101] In March 2022 they finished the transition to Polygon Blockchain.[102][103]

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  1. ^ "Athene (Bachir "Chiren" Boumaaza) track record". Docs.Google.com. Retrieved 15 August 2022.
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