HowToBasic
HowToBasic | |||||||||
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Personal information | |||||||||
Nationality | Australian | ||||||||
Residence | Cannington, Perth, Australia | ||||||||
Height | 5 ft 2 in (157 cm) | ||||||||
YouTube information | |||||||||
Channel | HowToBasic | ||||||||
Years active | December 2011–present | ||||||||
Genre | Surreal comedy, black comedy, visual gags | ||||||||
Subscribers | 9.2 million+[1] | ||||||||
Total views | 1.4 billion+[1] | ||||||||
Network | Fullscreen | ||||||||
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Subscriber and view counts updated as of July 22, 2017. |
HowToBasic is an Australian YouTube channel with over 9 million subscribers that gained popularity between 2012 and 2013. It shows bizarre visual gags disguised as how-to tutorials. The creator of the videos does not speak or show his face, and remains anonymous. The channel is a part of the Fullscreen network.[2]
The channel has reached over nine million subscribers as of June 2017,[3][4] the highest of any Australian YouTube channel.[4][2] In June 2013, the person behind HowToBasic was interviewed as part of a 6 PM News Bulletin by Nine News Perth broadcast on STW. The station preserved his anonymity on his request.[5] HowToBasic videos have been compared to the work of David Cronenberg and Marcel Duchamp.[6]
The channel was briefly suspended on multiple occasions, once in 2014 and again in late 2015 on presumed violations of YouTube's policy on misleading content. Soon after, the channel was restored, and suspension lifted in both circumstances.[7][8][9]
Content
The channel intentionally misleads first-time unaware viewers to believe it is a how-to channel, with video titles, thumbnails and descriptions, as well as the channel's general description, claiming its videos to be tutorials on different subjects, with a particular emphasis on cooking (which becomes less prominent later in time). The videos feature a man interacting with food and objects in a first-person view; he does not show his face or speak, but he does utter groans and other obscure sounds. At certain point of each video, the man begins to act aggressively, often by mixing or combining ingredients in an unusual way, and then creating a large mess by smashing, destroying, and throwing the aforementioned objects, with an excessive use of eggs, the channel's theme, and occasional use of dolls, chicken meats, fish and printed images, along with many different items and instruments including furniture hardware, electronics, and firearms. The earliest videos consisted of quick, but actual tutorials of very simple actions, such as "how to open a door"; with the videos' plots gradually changing to this form described above. Recent videos, however, are employing additional gags and fast cutting, with guest actors and related footages appearing. Notable guest actors to appear in these videos are Max Stanley of Maxmoefoe, an Australian YouTube personality and Filthy Frank a Japanese American YouTube personality.
Many of the videos often include a running gag in which the man gives a thumbs-up (or sometimes a middle finger) in front of the camera, usually before the scene ends while pointing the camera at the mess created.
Popular culture
The channel was parodied in the episode The Traitor from the animated cartoon The Amazing World of Gumball, in which Gumball makes a sandwich similar to HowToBasic's sub.
See also
References
- 1 2 "HowToBasic".
- 1 2 "Can you make money out of YouTube? You bet, just ask these Aussies.". The Sydney Morning Herald. Retrieved 2015-11-09.
- ↑ "HowToBasic". YouTube. Retrieved 2015-11-09.
- 1 2 "Top 100 YouTubers in Australia Filtered by Subscribers - Socialblade YouTube Stats | YouTube Statistics". socialblade.com. Retrieved 2015-11-09.
- ↑ "Perth teen's bizarre videos become internet hit". Nine News. Retrieved 2015-11-09.
- ↑ "Is Kurt Coleman the future of Australian screen storytelling?". The Conversation. Retrieved 2015-11-09.
- ↑ "UPDATED: Popular YouTube Channel HowToBasic Terminated Without Warning". MOARGeek. Retrieved 2015-12-09.
- ↑ HowToBasic [@HowToBasic] (4 December 2015). "HowToBasic on Twitter: "No idea why YouTube deleted my account earlier today. Maybe it was to congratulate me on hitting 6 mill" (Tweet). Retrieved 9 December 2015 – via Twitter.
- ↑ Spam404 [@Spam404Online] (4 December 2015). "Spam404 on Twitter: "We just got word back from YouTube, they have reinstated @HowToBasic. Thanks again @YTSecurity for letting" (Tweet). Retrieved 9 December 2015 – via Twitter.