Tom Cassell

Thomas George Cassell (born 23 June 1993), known online as Syndicate, is an English YouTuber and Twitch streamer.

Regarded as one of the earlier known gaming personalities, his videography consists of Let's Play videos on Call of Duty and Minecraft.

Born in Manchester, Cassell had passion for a career in the gaming industry, which he started by purchasing gaming equipment using his money from McDonald's.

Thomas George Cassell was born on 23 June 1993 in Manchester, England, and is the brother of Alice Cassell.

His father worked in construction as a project manager and his mother, Karen Cassell, worked as a children's day care worker.

Cassell was educated at the Blue Coat school in nearby Oldham, and sold drinks at school to purchase a 42-inch plasma TV at the age of 15, as his father wanted him to work and pay for the items he wanted to get during the time.

He then acquired a capture card in 2008 to record his gameplay, in which he was inspired by video compilations of no-scope sniper kills on Call of Duty from a friend.

In regards to limited advances in technology, Cassell elaborated that video capturing content for YouTube was expensive.

He admired the use of both commentary and gameplay in videos, as he was inspired by YouTuber Shaun Hutchinson.

He came to prominence with his videos on Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 (2009) and the Call of Duty: Black Ops (2010) Zombies mode.

Cassell had amassed around 300,000 views on his Call of Duty gameplays when he received a contract offer from multi-channel network (MCN) Machinima.

He described this offer as the start of his full-time career as a gaming YouTuber.

After passing 500,000 subscribers, his content featured Minecraft gameplay for the first time.

His Minecraft Let's Play series included The Minecraft Project, Trinity Island, and Mianite, where Cassell forms a storyline through the game with fellow streamers on Twitch, such as Jordan Maron and Sonja Reid.

On 3 September 2010, Cassell registered his gaming channel "TheSyndicateProject", where he found success and an online community.

His prominence online was recognized by Call of Duty publisher Activision and multi-channel network (MCN) Machinima, where he signed to the network to monetize his content.

He attended Hyde Clarendon Sixth Form College in Ashton-under-Lyne and studied software development and video game design in 2010.

After leaving college, he briefly worked at McDonald's to purchase gaming equipment to record YouTube videos.

Before the start of his YouTube career, Cassell uploaded commentary videos on various channels for three years.

He started filming his gaming commentaries with his father's camera, and fashioned it with video game cases to point it at the TV.

Cassell registered his gaming YouTube channel under the name "TheSyndicateProject" (renamed as "Syndicate") on 3 September 2010.

On YouTube, he uploaded Let's Play videos on the video game franchises Halo, Grand Theft Auto, and Call of Duty.

Cassell's channel achieved substantial growth, passing one million subscribers in June 2012 and one billion views in late 2013.

He further expanded his career into livestreaming on Twitch, hosting the same commentary over his gameplays.

Cassell was nominated for "YouTube Gamer" in 2012 at the Golden Joystick Awards and was nominated as best in "Gaming" at the 9th Shorty Awards.

In October 2012, Eurogamer reported that Cassell had attracted the attention Call of Duty publisher Activision during a 2011 GameCity convention.

At the convention, Cassell drew video game journalists' attention to the YouTube gaming community and said that endorsement from a prominent company "is the best thing ever".

His channel reached one million subscribers and over 370 million views in June 2012.

Kevin Dowling of The Sunday Times recognized him as the UK's most popular gamer and estimated that he earned £700,000 a year, or £60,000 a month.

Dowling said that the engagement Cassell attracted was "because he led [an exciting life] beyond his gaming videos".

Cassell co-founded the entertainment company 3BlackDot with YouTubers Evan Fong and Adam Montoya in 2013, along with former Machinima executives Angelo Pullen and Luke Stepleton.

Cassell reached one billion views on his gaming channel in late 2013.

Rob Waugh of Yahoo! News commented on Cassell's viewership as having "more viewers than hit TV shows such as EastEnders".

His Twitch channel became the first to reach one million followers in August 2014.

Cassell's YouTube content began to shift into vlogging, where his prominence in the genre took place from his life between Los Angeles and the UK.

Back in England, Cassell and his father designed his own home, purchasing a nearby property and renovating it into an extensive gaming area.

Cassell has co-founded a range of businesses, one of which failed to comply with Federal Trade Commission (FTC) advertising guidelines.

He co-founded the entertainment company 3BlackDot along with Evan Fong and Adam Montoya, and became featured in other media, spanning from a mobile game to a 12-track compilation album.

He was also nominated as "Best British Vlogger" in 2014 at the BBC Radio 1's Teen Awards, and in 2017, was recognized by Forbes as one of the top gaming influencers.

, his gaming YouTube channel has over nine million subscribers and 2.1 billion views, and his Twitch channel has over three million followers.