After raising $140,000 by pumping iron, OTK gets ‘Elevated’ with latest talent search

OTK is having a busy spring. The streamer organization based in Austin recently raised $140,601 by hosting a “lift-a-thon” on Twitch. Days later, OTK continued its content push by dropping season two of Elevated, a talent-search web series.

The lift-a-thon took place on the channel of OTK co-owner Esfand, who had a momentous month in April. On the 17th, he took a trip to Florida to cover the second edition of the Creator Clash, an influencer boxing event organized by Ian “iDubbbz” Jomha. Ten days later, Esfand celebrated the NFL Draft by inviting pro football players like Austin Ekeler and Boston Scott to join him on stream.

The OTK lift-a-thon hit Esfand’s Twitch hub two days after that. The stream’s host was joined by fellow OTK members Asmongold, Emiru, Myth, Cyr, ExtraEmily, Tectone, and Lacari, who got swole together in order to raise money for Games For Love. A VOD of the stream — which attracted more than 34,000 concurrent viewers at its peak — is available on Twitch.

Esfand is not the only OTK member staying busy as the calendar turns over to May. The second season of Elevated is sponsored by Progressive Insurance and hosted on the official account of streamer NMPLOL

. He’ll be joined by several other OTK members, including Asmongold, Emiru, and Sodapoppin.

Across ten episodes, unheralded streamers will compete against one another in a series of challenges presented by OTK. The last creator standing will ultimately take home a $50,000 grand prize.

Elevated premiered last year, with producer Allied Esports tapping chess streamers The Botez Sisters as hosts. Season two will give OTK a chance to spotlight streamers who are looking to make names for themselves.

“Elevated gives us the opportunity to build on something that so purely represents everything we’re about,” NMPLOL said in a statement. “We’ve always been focused on community engagement and building meaningful relationships with smaller creators to allow them to show what they’re made of. There’s no cookie-cutter formula to being a great creator. Through our many different personalities and styles at OTK, we hope to maximize showing the level of versatility in what could be the next generation of the internet’s favorite creators.”

These programming initiatives are just the tip of the iceberg for OTK. As the organization revealed in February, it has more than 15 pieces of original content on the docket for 2023.