Ray William Johnson – Faded & Failed Comedian Who Once Ruled : Review 2024
Ray William Johnson, formerly known online as Fat Damon and born on August 14, 1981 (age 40), is an American YouTuber, comedian, actor, singer, and internet personality. His YouTube programme Equals Three, in which he offered amusing analysis of trending videos, helped him become well-known. From 2009 to 2016, the show aired. In addition, he was credited with founding the band Your Favorite Martian, which, while it was active on YouTube, amassed the most subscribers. Even though his material might be dark and obscene at times, he was nevertheless able to attract followers of all ages from around the globe.
History
The channel Johnson started on May 25, 2008. He began his well-known web series at the beginning of 2009. From June 25, 2011, to January 12, 2013, when Smosh overtook it, Johnson’s channel had the most subscribers thanks to his webseries Equals Three. Numerous famous people attended the performance, including Gabriel Iglesias, Snoop Dogg, and Robin Williams. Johnson met up with other well-known YouTubers as a result of the show’s appreciation on social media, both favourable and negative, including his former competitor Smosh.
Johnson became the first YouTuber with a $1 million USD net worth in early 2012, becoming a YouTube millionaire.
The show received criticism from the YouTube community despite having the largest and, at one time, the fastest expanding fan base. Some found it vulgar, lowbrow, and juvenile, while others believed Johnson did not deserve the recognition. Others claimed that Johnson’s method of making comments on popular videos was not only unoriginal but also slack and open to copyright violations.
Did You Know?
Copyright Protection act protects the legit content creators and the ‘original contents’. Where, An ‘original article’ is the article, song, poem, art piece or theory protected by the copyright law. As, solely the copyright law can differentiate between an original article and a copied one.
Many claim that his YouTube channel’s demise started in November 2012 when his then-partner Maker Studios demanded a bigger income share from his Equals Three show. Johnson’s contract was terminated along with the most recent record of the animated musical comedy group he was in charge of, Yourfavoritemartian, as a result of his refusal.
The Equals Three channel has over 10 million subscribers by August 2013 and 3 billion video views by early 2017. It had reached one billion views in late 2011 and was once the most subscribed to and most seen music channel on YouTube. Maker Studios shut down the music channel. Without any advertising or record label support, it had generated over 1.2 million dollars in sales.
Now autonomous, the channel was controlled solely by Johnson and his team, afterwards known as “Equal Three Studios.” When compared to earlier videos, which received an average of roughly 5 million views, the channel was losing viewers, obtaining only 1-2 million views per video.
Additionally, by the end of 2013, his channel had lost its position among the top 10 most-subscribed channels on YouTube as a result of platform updates, including algorithm tweaks and the inclusion of the Trending tab.
His initial YouTube channel, RunawayPlanet, was the predecessor to his current vlog channel, BreakingNYC. Johnson no longer maintains the channel and has subsequently removed all of the videos from it, but he continues to publish his Instagram stories to his YouTube channel, is active on Facebook, and performs stand-up comedy shows on the road.
Anna Akana, a fellow YouTuber and Johnson’s then-girlfriend, appeared in the critically praised five-part video series “Riley Rewind,” which Johnson filmed in late 2013. At about the same time, he and Akana created “Runaway Thoughts,” a podcast show with Derek Shelby that not only explored various topics but also answered listener queries (which frequently veered off subject, hence the name “Runaway Thoughts”) and engaged the audience. The podcast garnered positive reviews, and Variety listed it among the top 10% of podcasts of 2013.
Ray Johnson departed Equals Three in March 2014 because he wanted to work on bigger projects and didn’t have the desire to finish the show. Since then, the channel has experienced a sharp decline in daily views and subscriptions. Initially, he posted vlogs to his channel and intended for the show to terminate permanently in the middle of 2014.
However, in response to fan requests for the series to continue, he held a private audition, with Robby Motz emerging as the victor. He was 20 years old at the time and initially received mixed reviews before being acknowledged as a suitable substitute by the majority.
Only one year after his debut, in July 2015, Motz would likewise depart. He had similar justifications to Johnson. Kaja Martin took charge later that month. She was hated by the audience as a host, with every video featuring her receiving an average like rate of about 50% or less. The Equals Three crew would implore their followers to cease, with little to no success, even if she pretended not to be bothered by the criticism.
Carlos Santos took over as host of Equals Three after Martin, who had only hosted the programme for five months, stepped down in December 2015. Although Santos garnered more positive reviews than Martin and even Motz, and viewers compared his humour and commentary style to Johnson’s the most, the series came to an unfavourable end when the final episode,
“Friday THE 13TH,” aired on May 13, 2016. Since then, no new episodes have shown without a clear justification. Johnson has been invited to return to Equals Three by numerous admirers, but he has now gone on to other social media platforms and found newfound success there by mostly doing vlogs and Storytime videos.
The show has not attracted as many viewers and subscribers as it previously did after Johnson’s departure. The number of subscribers would change over the years and with each new host, slightly increasing under Motz’s leadership, sharply declining under Martin’s, and fluctuating between the two under Santos. The number of subscribers continues to decline as a result of Equals
Three and all other video series being abruptly cancelled. In November 2015, he reached a peak subscriber count of over 10.8 million, and by June 2018, the channel had fallen to slightly under 10 million.
Johnson announced his comeback to YouTube on December 25, 2019, in a video titled “Guess what I did?” He described the new show, “SUPERHVMAN,” as “a combination between a TED Talk and Equals Three.” More videos from this new series would be uploaded by him, to favourable reviews. However, his final episode of SUPERHVMAN, “How to Live a Happier Life,” which aired on February 26, 2020, would turn out to be his first. He began a new series based on roasting TikTokers on September 13 of that same year, and with each new video, the number of dislikes increased.
The RayWilliamJohnson channel kept losing subscribers up until mid-August 2021. With the publication of some Daily TikTok shorts, the channel experienced a startling turnaround that month, with many of them receiving millions of views. For the first time since mid-2015, this resulted in Ray’s subscription growth moving back into the positives, which suggests that he may have lost subscribers back. After an 8-year break starting in August 2013, Ray’s channel managed to re-pass 10 million subscribers on September 17 at 21:19:38 in 2021.
Musical Projects Fatty Spins
Johnson’s first band, Fatty Spins, was created in 2009. He, Nicholas “Micfri” Smith, and “Breeze the Beat Machine” made up the band. Doin’ Your Mom, by Fatty Spins, is their most well-known song (2009). However, due to disagreements over royalties between Smith and Breeze, the group would break up in 2010.
Your Favorite Martian 2010
Johnson founded the animation group Your Favorite Martian in 2010. (often abbreviated to YFM). Every two weeks on Wednesdays, new animated music videos were posted. The first song, “My Balls,” debuted on streaming sites in December 2010, and on January 26, 2011, a music video for it was made available on the YFM channel. Axel Chains, the drummer who never sang in the music videos but did speak in the spin-off series, “YFM:TS,” was the fifth fictional member of the animated band, joining Puff Puff Humbert, the main vocalist voiced by Ray William Johnson,
Benatar, the guitarist and vocalist voiced by Jesse Cale, DeeJay, the disc jockey and former vocalist voiced by Rick Carter, and Benatar. Yourfavoritemartian peaked as the most subscribed music channel on YouTube, but it started to drop in the middle of 2012 when their music videos’ themes shifted from comedy to seriousness and they began performing covers of songs that already existed. Due to a disagreement between Ray Johnson and Maker Studios, the band was disbanded in late 2012.
The Downsides
To exhibit his rapping, Ray founded a brand-new cartoon musical ensemble named “The Upside Downs” in October 2020. Eggward, the primary vocalist voiced by Ray, Stevi the Demon, a second vocalist voiced by Ray’s fiancée Kelly Farrell, and DOS, who lacks a voice but serves as the band’s “DJ,” make up the new lineup of imaginary band members.
The Upside Downs made their TikTok and Instagram début to positive reviews, with Ray remarking that “this is as near to YFM as it’s ever going to get” because he “can’t/won’t bring YFM back.” The band receives generally favourable reviews for the music videos Ray created for each of their tracks, with many commenting that it reminded them of Your Favorite Martian’s earlier days. As of December 2021, The Upside Downs is still going strong and releases new music videos about once a month.
litigation Jukin Media
After accusing Johnson’s production business of stealing several of its popular videos for use in the =3 comedy clip series, Ray filed a lawsuit against Jukin in November 2014. As an illustration, the then-host of =3, Robby Motz, made fun of a man in a Jukin-owned footage who fell and dropped his new bride at an Arizona wedding in an episode of =3 that aired on November 7, 2014.
Equals Three sued Jukin, arguing that the studio’s use of viral clips was protected by fair use. Jukin is the owner of the FailArmy YouTube channel and has established a very successful business out of licencing and distributing viral video clips. After Jukin sent takedown requests to Equals Three videos that contained its owned and licenced footage,
Equals Three claimed that Jukin had denied the production business ad income. As of October 13, 2015, Equals Three’s episodes offered commentary on Jukin’s videos and were thus protected by fair use, according to Judge Stephen V. Wilson of the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California. [1] Jukin then filed a lawsuit against Equals Three. Prior to the jury’s official decision, Ray William Johnson and Jukin Media’s attorneys met in March 2016 to negotiate a settlement.
Various Shows Ray William Johnson Has Appeared On
There have been other videos shows on the channel in addition to The Equals Three show, as was previously indicated.
10/10 Comedy On Date Debate (formerly Top 6)
SUPERHVMAN With Booze Lightyear
Ray Theodore Johnson
Santos, Carlos
Martin Kaja
Medcraft, Jules
Kim Landry
Victor Luis Jimenez
Government Hill Gangsta
The first season of Ray’s channel was this one. The show ran for 46 episodes from its debut in 2008 with the video “John McCain may have herpes” through its conclusion on February 17, 2009, when Ray changed the name of the programme. On his channel, all of these videos (as well as a few of the =3’s videos) have either been removed or made private. He addressed contemporary political concerns in the programme with a humorous slant.
Dr. Henrique Duck, PhD in Media Studies and Critical Theory, specializes in writing detailed critics stories and reviews. He has contributed to prominent newspapers and websites, providing insightful analysis of media content and its effects on society.
