YouTube Phenom RayWJ: The Biggest Star You Never Heard Of…
By Rob Scott
February 3, 2012
February 3, 2012
- Ray William Johnson is YouTube’s biggest star. Five million viewers watch his show twice a week.
- “Known as RayWJ, the 30-year-old has morphed into an idol of the teen set at home and abroad by ranting about others’ viral YouTube videos on subjects ranging from a hippopotamus defecating to people who staple the heads of co-workers,” explains the Wall Street Journal.
- YouTube often attracts more viewers than traditional TV networks these days. According to comScore, the video site draws more than 780 million unique visitors every month. Of course, the audience is “fragmented among 30,000 channels and millions of videos,” points out WSJ.
- “This is a microcosm of what’s going on in the overall media landscape. We’re moving from a scaled mass media to a more hyper-local, niche media,” explains David Cohen of media-buying agency Universal McCann.
- RayWJ’s 1.5 billion views reportedly earn him an estimated $1 million a year from YouTube’s Partner Program. He also sells his own merchandise and mobile apps.
- “A Google spokeswoman says that ‘several hundred’ of its partners made more than $100,000 in 2011, up 80 percent from the ‘couple of hundred’ partners who made more than that in 2010,” reports WSJ, suggesting this may be the start of a larger shift in media consumption.
2 Comments
Another step toward the channelization of the Web? I’m hearing from college students that they are frustrated by inconsistent availability of network programming on-demand and via the Internet. Much like they have become track-based consumers of music rather than album-based, they are less likely to exhibit network or program loyalty and more likely to watch individual “shows” when they want — even if that means random online content.
Another step toward the channelization of the Web? I’m hearing from college students that they are frustrated by inconsistent availability of network programming on-demand and via the Internet. Much like they have become track-based consumers of music rather than album-based, they are less likely to exhibit network or program loyalty and more likely to watch individual “shows” when they want — even if that means random online content.
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