currently getting ready to go on my book tour.

My book comes out Tuesday, October 20th,

which is right around the corner,

depending on when you're watching this.

But it's so soon, so I'm a little bit busy right now

and I've been wanting to make a video for you guys.

And it just so happens that my buddy Ryder made a --

- (cellphone dings) - Who is texting me?

Like I was saying, my buddy Ryder made

a little video all about me. It's a brief history of

everything you could ever wanna know. Enjoy.

P.S. I did not force him to say

any of the nice things that he's about to say about me.

I feel really blushy even thinking about it.

Because I watched it and I was like

"Oh, God. You're very nice, Ryder, but..." (laughs)

So yeah. Enjoy.

- [Voiceover] Hello and welcome to another episode of

A Brief History. Today's episode: Tyler Oakley.

Ready? Set? Go!

September 18th, 2007: Having just moved into his dorm

preparing for his freshman year of college,

Michigan State student Tyler Oakley decides to set up

a YouTube channel for the purpose of keeping in touch

with his friends from high school.

The earliest videos uploaded to this self-titled channel,

which have since been made private, mainly featured Tyler

directly addressing his high school friends

for long stretches of time.

However, having been inspired by the likes of

Tessa Violet, Michael Buckley, and William Sledd,

it wasn't long before Tyler began creating videos intended

for mass consumption, with the oldest video currently

viewable on the channel having been uploaded

on October 1st, 2007. Tyler's early video blogging style

was quintessentially classic YouTube, with most uploads

being pretty short, simple vlogs about

whatever was on Tyler's mind, with very occasional lip sync

videos and sketch-style videos thrown in for good measure.

But while Tyler's genre of content was pretty standard

for YouTubers at the time, it was his energetic, sassy, and

incredibly likable personality that helped him to stand out.

Over the next year or so, Tyler continued uploading

these vlogs pretty consistently, and throughout 2008,

Tyler made quite a name for himself, releasing videos like

Pimp Cup, a 30-second long... "thing" that grew into

its own quasi meme, having been parodied by the likes of

charlieissocoollike and John Green, as well as a vlog

entitled "Why I Think Gay Marriage is Wrong,"

a sarcasm-heavy jab at those against legalizing gay marriage

which has since amassed over one million views.

But of all of these videos, perhaps the most important was

Project For Awesome Trevor Hotline, a vlog made to promote

The Trevor Project, a non-profit organization focused around

suicide prevention among LGBTQ youths.

Also in 2008, outside of his main channel, Tyler helped

launch a collab channel called "5 Awesome Gays"

with fellow YouTubers nanuboy, greyk2 AKA Korey Kuhl,

stevieproductions, and jesusismyboyfriend.

There is now an audio clip of me saying

"Jesus is my boyfriend." Now there's two. Huh.

Programming on this channel ran from February 3rd, 2008

all the way up to May 28th, 2011, although it did come back

for a reunion month in October of 2014, sans Tyler.

Returning to Tyler Oakley's main channel for a bit,

as the years went on, Tyler's content continued to

grow naturally but incredibly quickly. While he never had

the one big viral hit that launched his career, some of his

videos did occasionally garner more attention than others,

especially those in which Tyler talked about Darren Criss,

One Direction, and lip synced to Nicki Minaj. Roll Clip!

- ♫ Yo I'm a bad bitch, I'm a -- I'm a bad bitch

♫ Now I'm a bad bitch, I'm a -- I'm a bad bitch

♫ I'm a bad bitch, I'm a -- I'm a bad bitch

♫ I'm a bad girl, I'm a -- I'm a bad bitch. wow. ♫

- By 2012, Cah -- Conker? I'm not talking about Conker.

I'm talking about Tyler Oakley.

Oh, man. I'm a Dumbo head.

By 2012, Tyler's presence online was really

beginning to pick up steam, which then prompted him to quit

his day job and go full time on YouTube.

And Tyler's dedication to his content was reflected

in its success, having hit one million subscribers

by June of 2013 and celebrating this milestone

with a draw-my-life video. Following this achievement,

in August of 2013, Tyler launched a project called

Special Auguest, a month-long, 20 video collabfest

that featured all of your favorite YouTubers, such as

Grace Helbig, Mamrie Hart, Zoella, Troye Sivan, and One --

Whoa, wait...

One Direction?

Huh... Impressive.

Collaborations had always been a major component

of Tyler's content, and they continue to be to this day.

So the choice to do Special Auguest just seemed like

a natural next step for his channel,

having since become an annual event.

So 2013 was a pretty insane year for Tyler,

but if you can believe it, 2013 was like child's play

compared to 2014. Throughout this year, Tyler got the chance

to work with the likes of Jessie J, Darren Criss, Julie Chen

and even Barack and Michelle Obama, among others.

But most significantly, 2014 saw the launch of

two very different projects from Tyler.

The first of these projects was a weekly half hour podcast

known as Psycho Babble. Hosted by Tyler with his best friend

and frequent collaborator, Korey Kuhl,

Psycho Babble launched on August 31st, 2014

and debuted at #1 on iTunes.

In addition to Psycho Babble, in 2014, Tyler announced

that he will be going on a tour of the United States.

This tour, known as Tyler Oakley's Slumber Party Tour,

aimed to recreate the feeling of hanging out

in Tyler's living room and just having a sleepover,

complete with games, gossip, and onesies --

Which I'm noticing are a strangely common trend

among YouTube shows.

This tour was a massive success and has stretched out

to include dates in Australia, Canada, and the UK.

And I bet you thought that things couldn't get any bigger

than all of this, but 2015 has turned out to be,

you guessed it, even bigger, with more touring,

more collabs, more Psycho Babble,

and one very big announcement.

On May 8th, 2015, Tyler Oakley released a video entitled

"I'm Ready To Tell The Truth," in which he announced

that he will be releasing his first ever book, Binge.

Scheduled for release in October of 2015, Binge,

in true Tyler fashion, is a tell-all book three years

in the making that dives into behind-the-scenes aspects

of Tyler's life that he has never, ever discussed before.

In fact, he has gone so far as to say that

even if you have seen every single one of his videos,

you will still know nothing of what's in Binge.

On top of Binge, in early October 2015,

Tyler also announced a documentary film called Snervous.

Set for a limited theatrical release in December 2015,

followed by a digital release, Snervous follows Tyler

throughout his Slumber Party Tour,

recounting his life and career in the process.

You know, kinda like this video.

But, longer. And almost certainly better.

Outside of his main channel, podcast, tours, and book,

Tyler is still one of the busiest people on YouTube.

Between his second channel, extratyler,

his merchandise line, countless hosting gigs,

and various television appearances on shows like The Talk,

Catfish, Ellen, and The Late Late Show,

there are very few vloggers as prolific as Tyler Oakley.

But all of that aside, perhaps Tyler's greatest achievement

is his work with the aformentioned Trevor Project.

Following his Project For Awesome video on the foundation,

Tyler began to work for Trevor as an intern.

Soon after, he began hosting their red carpet events,

and eventually became a member of their Board of Directors.

In addition to all of this, ever since 2013,

Tyler has put on an annual fund raiser

for The Trevor Project on his birthday.

In 2013, Tyler and his fans were able to raise $29,000

for Trevor, which then increased to $500,000 in 2014,

and another $500,000 in 2015. In fact, Tyler's work

with Trevor has been so substantial that in 2014,

he was named the foundation's largest individual donor

and was awarded the Trevor Youth Innovator Award,

an achievement that Tyler cites as the highlight

of his career so far. Tyler Oakley is without a doubt

one of the most successful video bloggers

in YouTube history. To put this into perspective,

two years ago in October of 2013, Tyler attended

a One Direction concert and this happened:

- Tyler! Tyler! Tyler! Tyler! Tyler!

That's nearly the entire Staples Center Arena cheering

for someone who's just in the crowd.

And he's only gotten bigger since then.

On top of continuing to make consistent

and high-quality content, he has also become

somewhat of a full-fledged mainstream celebrity,

which is something very few YouTubers have accomplished.

From his multiple TV spots, magazine photo shoots, awards,

and now a book, Tyler Oakley really is far more than just

your average video blogger, opening up doors and

breaking down barriers of what YouTube creators can achieve.

Even with nearly eight million subscribers and more than

half a billion total video views and counting

on just his main channel, Tyler is still a modest,

down-to-earth guy, whose biggest priority is doing

what he loves and helping others with the platform

he was given by doing so. And whether that involves raising

thousands of dollars for charity or simply

brightening up someone's day with a single video, Tyler has

accomplished these goals in spades and plans to simply

keep getting better and better at what he does

as the years go on. And considering how successful he's been

over just the last eight years, i think it's safe to say

that Tyler is going to continue helping make the world

a better place for a long time.

Thanks for watching, guys. DFTBA

- Can we talk about how amazing that was?

I mean, i was blushing the whole time, but that was amazing.

Ryder has a YouTube channel where there are

plenty of other Brief Histories that you can watch,

whether it's Hannah Hart, or Dan and Phil,

or Rhett and Link, or other things in pop culture,

not just YouTubers. If you wanna check that out, I would say

you should definitely go subscribe and send him my love.

And if you liked this video, give it a thumbs up and there's

gonna be links below if you wanna check out Ryder's channel.

If you wanna see my latest video, click right there.

If you wanna listen to the latest podcast episode,

click right there.

If you would like to be my person of the week,

click right there.

And be sure to get my book. It comes out next week,

and I hope that you get it, it would mean the world to me

if you got it next week. If you go into a store

and you find it, take a selfie with it and send it to me.

I'm going to be posting and retweeting and all that stuff

and giving love to people that go into stores

and find the book.

That would be the coolest thing ever.

I can't believe my book is gonna be in stores.

Anyways, do that, I love you, you are the best,

I am obsessed with all of you. That's all.

Go subscribe to Ryder's channel. Okay, gotta go, bye!