Twitch viewers have elected a new PogChamp. On Friday, KomodoHype, a meme-worthy Komodo dragon, became the new face of the PogChamp emote after a monthlong tryout period. The streaming company announced the results of the election on Twitter.
Twitch got rid of the original PogChamp emote after the face of it, Ryan “Gootecks” Gutierrez, used his social media accounts to encourage civil unrest during the riot at the U.S. Capitol Building on Jan. 6. Twitch dropped Gootecks’ emote and since then, there hasn’t been a standard PogChamp emote for the website.
People responded with all kinds of ideas to replace the emote. In the end, Twitch settled on a rotating PogChamp — a new face each day — and then an election for a new, permanent one at the end. The PogChamp of the day was meant to celebrate the diversity of streamers on Twitch, but ended up resulting in harassment for many streamers.
The community has spoken!
— Twitch (@Twitch) February 12, 2021
Let's fire up the PogChamp Machine and activate the new face of Pog. pic.twitter.com/idQ2cNtMiH
The voting happened on Feb. 12 via an official Twitch stream. Whether or not it catches on is up to fans, but from now on, the lizard will be the default face of the emote on Twitch.