Who We Are
Hi Steemit!
We’re LVLUP Dojo. We’re a small team of 4 people , and we create video courses and other content with some of the best video game streamers and eSports competitors; teaching the next generation how to follow in their footsteps.
Verification:
and some more verification, this is Lou Cesario (aka Garvonious) & myself (@RezaJates), we're 1/2 of the LVLUP Dojo team!
TL;DR You can check out this video for a little more background information on who we are, and what we do.
We genuinely believe that (almost) everyone has it in them to become the next big thing in whatever community their heart desires. As long as they’re willing to put in the time and effort to consistently grow their brand.
Before we get any further, let’s explain streaming and the eSports ecosystem.
Cryptocurrency and gaming often go hand in hand, so if you’re already familiar with streaming and such, feel free to skip ahead.
What is Live Streaming?
Streaming (at least when we refer to it) on sites like Twitch.tv and Mixer is when someone live streams a video game. Often with their webcam feed live at the same time. Viewers then go into the stream, and tpye in a chat box to the right of the game feed. Viewers can also donate money to their favorite streamers, and on some platforms- subscribe (pay a monthly fee to the streamer) to watch his or her stream without the interruption of ads.
Screenshot taken from our Twitch channel
Currently, the most popular streaming platform in the U.S. is Twitch.tv (receiving around 500 million hits a month). But there are several other good options to seek out such as Mixer (owned by Microsoft) and Hitbox.
In the past few years, streaming as an industry has blown up. Now, there are thousands of individuals who are streaming video games full time- living off the ad revenue from their channels, subscription fees, and donations from their loyal fans.
Tyler "Ninja" Blevins is a full-time streamer/ex-professional Halo player, and has been streaming for almost 6 years.
When someone is trying to start a Twitch channel, or get started as a streamer on any platform, there are a wealth of resources on the internet that can help them. However, there is also lack of credible education from people who have actually achieved the level of success that most want to achieve themselves.
The people at the top in this industry don’t send the elevator back down to bring the next generation up- so we decided to work with them to figure out the best way to share their knowledge.
What is eSports?
The term “eSports” refers to competitive gaming. Back in the day, eSports often just meant, “several guys in a trading card shop after hours playing Quake”. Not for money, just the glory of beating friends and local rivals.
Now, in 2017, eSports is an industry with $695 Million USD in revenue per year, and projected to hit over $1 Billion USD by 2020.
Demetrious Johnson (UFC Flyweight Champion & Twitch Streamer) playing a demo at PAX West 2017
Let me paint a picture for you.
Right now, all over the world, there are young men and women making hundreds of thousands of dollars a year to compete in select video game titles. But for every player making more than their weight in STEEM, there are thousands more out there that are struggling to figure out the correct path to competitive gaming.
Unlike football or basketball, there is no clear path to success.
There are no after school programs or summer camps that train people to progress into the big leagues, and that’s where we come in.
What You Can Expect From Us
LVLUP Dojo works with some of the best eSports competitors and streamers to distill their habits into best practices, and share them with people who aspire to make a name for themselves in the gaming community.
We’ve worked with streamers like Ninja
and TheZombiUnicorn
as well as professional gamers like ZeRo
and Justin Wong
to create eCourses, guides and tutorials to help people learn how to grow their stream, create quality content, or compete on the main stage.
There’s a lot that goes into making a name for yourself in the gaming community, no matter what path you pick.
We don’t tend to cover game mechanics and tactics for increasing your skills within a certain game, because we don’t believe there is a shortage of skilled players. We believe there is a shortage of skilled players who know how to garner attention from the people they need it from, and brand themselves so they’re primed to blow when their time comes.
In the content we’ll be posting you can expect the following:
Streaming
- Streaming Best Practices
- How to Start Streaming
- Growing Your Stream Community
- Engaging with Your Fans
- Networking with Other Streamers
- Getting Sponsorships
- How to Brand Yourself
- Marketing Your Stream
- Social Media Growth Hacking
eSports
- Dealing with Tournament Pressure
- How to Brand Yourself
- Finding an eSports Org (team)
- Figuring out the "Meta"
- Building an eSports Team
- Leading a Team
- Team Communication
- Running Your Own eSports Tournament
- Casting (Video Game Commentating)
Content Creation
- Productivity Hacks
- Equipment Guides
- Technical Guides on Streaming/Video Production
- Youtube Best Practices
And of course, every once in a while we just do some random stuff for the lolz.
At the end of the day, streaming and eSports all comes down to the community and micro communities that the individuals within the market build around themselves, and we take it upon ourselves to teach others how to do this.
Why Steemit?
As we mentioned before, cryptocurrency and video games often go hand in hand.
Many gamers have realized in the past couple of years that their powerful GPU's could be used for mining, and have transitioned into the crypto community (ourselves included, we've since upgraded to a few Antminer L3's we refer to as Drogon, Rhaegal, and Viserion)
Beyond that, we think that the crypto community and gaming community are eerily similar.
Let's be honest, if you're here, you're an early adopter.
You're someone willing to take a chance (although if you're like us, you don't think it's just a chance, it's the future) to invest your time into a new community and build a name for yourself. Unless your only here to consume (which is completely fine) you're a creator, just like us and the people we work with.
Our discord is filled with crypto and gaming servers, and we have tons of mutual friends across all of them.
I hope that through the content we share here, you guys can find inspiration to grow your own channels, brand yourself in this age of the internet, and create whatever the hell it is that you want to create. These best practices don't apply just to gaming, they apply to business, art, music, and even self-help.
At the end of the day, if you start something without a passion for it, you will fail. Because anything worth doing is hard af and most most rewarding end goals have the longest (and least financially rewarding) journey. One of the first things we tell our members is not to quit their day job, if you rely on streaming or competitive gaming for money right when you start off, you're putting an immense amount of pressure on yourself and setting yourself up for failure.
Anyways, my name is RezaJates, I'm one of the co-founders of LVLUP Dojo, and I hope you enjoyed this piece, and the many that will follow.