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Indie retailer Utopia Computers has partnered with a new gaming charity called Charitystream to raise funds for orphanages in South Africa.
Charitystream was started by Daniel Matros, producer at DICE and Tim Kjell, game designer at Rovio, in February this year.
On a live video stream, Daniel, Tim and a wide array of guests, including world renowned gamers, play videogames and talk about everything and anything, whilst holding raffles to raise funds. In their first season they managed to raise over $2,700 in donations. They are now on season two, and have raised $5,754 USD so far, with a goal of reaching $6,500 USD by the end of the season.
Mark Laurie from Utopia Computers commented: "Daniel came to us looking for a gaming laptop that was to be used in the development for the new Battlefield 4 game. Having got talking, he then told us about the Charitystream project. He was clearly very passionate about it and within minutes I knew we needed to try and help.”
"We have supported local charities in the past, but noting to this scale. It’s a wonderful cause and the fact that we can raise money by playing games with some of the top gamers on the planet is a bonus I suppose!"
"In recent weeks we have worked closely with distributors and vendors to put together a £1,000 gaming PC that is going to be auctioned at the end of the season. I have to personally thank VIP Computers and Entatech, as well as Gigabyte, CoolerMaster, Seagate, Kingston and FSP for their extremely generous donations. They have all provided some really high end components for the computer which will be auctioned off at the end of this season, with all funds going directly to the charity. Without their support the project may not have been able to set such lofty goals."
Ryan Brown, Head System Builder at Utopia also noted: "If any distributors or vendors are interested in getting involved, then please don’t hesitate to get in touch with us. As well has helping a great cause in South Africa, the Stream is regularly viewed by over 1,000 viewers simultaneously daily, as well as 90,000+ twitter followers getting in on the action. So there are plenty of opportunities for some key exposure."
At the end of last season, the team at Charitystream personally paid for their own flights and accommodation and travelled to the orphanages in South Africa, and with the funds raised from last season, them bought them medication, school books, food and other much needed supplies – all the while filming a documentary highlighting the need for further support. You can watch the touching documentary on their official website at www.charitystream.eu.
