18 Oct 2015

You might have seen recently that Forbes published a list of the 10 highest paid Youtubers, with PewDiePie topping the list after having made $12 million in the last year alone. You might be thinking “holy shit!” or you might be thinking “who the hell is that?” Either way, it’s definitely something to take note of, because soon Youtubers will probably have taken over the world.

Just a few short years ago, the thought of your regular average person becoming a global superstar just by switching on their webcam and having a little chat was completely ridiculous. These days, though, Youtubers are household names (especially to households with teenagers or young adults), and they’ve redefined the boundaries of regular “celebrity.”

They’re earning bucketloads of money and racking up the fans with each video, tweet and snapchat. They’re able to venture into more traditional forms of media and be incredibly successful there too; with books, movies and music to their name as well as their Youtube channels, they might become unstoppable.

But how has this happened? Slowly, then all at once. PewDiePie (a popular gaming channel, why am I explaining this to you, you know who PewDiePie is) started his channel in 2010, reached one million subscribers in 2012, and he’s now got over 39 million, racking up over 10 billion video views. Zoella (a beauty and lifestyle – what’s that? You know? Of course you do) posted her first video in 2009. It took her four years to gain a million subscribers, but in the two years since then, she’s reached over 9 million.

The popularity of Youtubers is based on the premise that they’re accessible, relatable, just normal people making little videos in their bedroom. They talk about things that we, as normal people just like them, are interested in, and they offer advice and comfort when we need it. We can pick and choose the creators we want to see content from with the Youtube subscription function, and we can watch whenever or wherever we are. They become familiar, their cheerful greetings are like coming home (that got deep).

Because of this immediacy, we trust the people we watch on Youtube and over time we feel like we know them. We develop loyalties to certain people that keep us coming back week after week, month after month, year after year. We follow them on all our social media platforms and anticipate new content with bated breath (especially when you’re subscribed to notorious never-poster danisnotonfire).

It’s this loyalty that allows the personalities to branch out and create other products, because they have a built in audience and a built in way to advertise. They sit at the head of a fanbase the like of which was once reserved for mega pop stars, people who will support them in all their endeavours. They’ve become influencers: we take what they say to heart, and maybe it’ll make us run out and buy a new lipstick, or a new game, or maybe it’ll help us to be comfortable with who we are, come out with our sexuality, help to overcome our anxieties.

Bookshop shelves are filling up with Youtuber books, some of them pointless (ha), some of them novels or memoirs, all of them reflections of their world, the growing popularity of Youtube and the rapidly changing pop culture landscape we live in. Australian Youtuber Troye Sivan has been able to pursue his dream of music, Smosh have their own movie, and Dan and Phil have a radio show on the Actual BBC. Zoe and Alfie (PointlessBlog) have wax figures in Actual Madam Tussauds. If that doesn’t scream SUPER FAMOUS then what does???

A bit creepy, honestly.

Like mainstream celebrities, though, Youtubers aren’t without their fair share of drama. You might remember Nicole Arbour’s fat shaming video that went viral a few months ago for her scathing and offensive remarks. It lost her a lot of respect, but it certainly gained her a lot of views, which is what she was after.

A few years ago Sam Pepper was embroiled in a sexual harassment scandal, and it came out that an old fan favourite Nerimon (Alex Day) had been manipulating his viewers into having sex with him. Since then, he’s all but fallen off the face of the earth and good riddance, but it was clearly an abuse of his newfound celebrity status and it shows that Youtubers are able to create an image of themselves online that may or may not reflect their real lives. It was great that so many Youtubers made videos and wrote blog posts about these scandals, because it shows how self-aware and intelligent most of them really are about the position they hold and the expectations that come with it, especially since most of their audience is quite young.

While they may seem accessible, and though maybe they once really were, the reality is that these days we don’t know them beyond the persona they create for their channels. The same way that we will never know what really goes on in One Direction’s life, we will never really know what goes on in Youtubers’ lives either. It’s devastating, I know, and I’ve spent a long time being lowkey annoyed about it (I just want to know, damnit!), but like with celebrities, it’s important to know that we are not entitled to anything from another person, famous or not.

Zoella and her Britpack of friends are all closely managed by a talent company now and almost all Youtubers have lucrative product placement deals that earn them the big bucks, so they’ll keep showing us only what they want us to see. And you know what? I’m cool with that. I never feel used by my favourite Youtubers, so I continue to trust them, watch their content and support them outside of Youtube, because it’s fun, and it’s something I enjoy.

The thing about writing articles like this is that the stats will be out of date in a matter of hours and that’s a reflection of how incredible this phenomenon truly is, and how many of our generation are getting involved, whether they just watch, get involved in the conversation or start making videos themselves. They let us into their homes, and we let them into ours – it’s a system that definitely seems to be working!

Mainstream media and adults alike continue to bemoan the rise of social networks and new media stars, but they best pay attention: it’s not going to stop. The real reason these people are making so much goddamn cash is because they’ve clever about what they do, they have strategies and book placements and take the best of the opportunities that come their way.