“Hello everyone and welcome back to the vlog!” People across the globe live their lives in front of a camera in hopes of becoming ‘YouTube famous.’ If you are of the select few that are lucky enough to become popular on the platform, you can look forward to the money you make from sponsored videos, ads, and brand deals to live life.

Popular and successful youtubers like David Dobrik, Liza Koshy, and Shane Dawson all have a few thing in common: millions of subscribers and people waiting for them to upload their video. The Youtubers all have a very strong following; David Dobrik with 11 million subscribers, Liza Koshy with 16 million subscribers on her main channel and 7 million on her secondary channel, and Shane Dawson with a following of 21 million subscribers. Another attribute they share is that they all make a living on the videos, having an estimated net worth of approximately $4 million for Dobrik and Dawson and $12 million for Koshy.

Starting a YouTube channel can be a stressful undertaking if you don’t know how to start one. It entails much more work than some people might think from deciding what you will post about to the editing style of your videos to what you want your page to look like. But for friends, and YouTubers, Chloe Roberts, Christine Vo, Summer Thipsipasom, and Lauren Ready, starting a YouTube channel happened by more of an accident.

“So, Christine had a vlog camera and me and Lauren just started taking videos for fun and doing dumb stuff like we always do. Then Christine was like, ‘Oh, I’m actually going to post this,’ and that’s when we just decided that it might be fun to create our own YouTube channel,” Roberts explained.

Being on the huge social media platform, creates a certain vulnerability. One opens themselves up to the harsh world of the internet which, in turn, leads to hate comments and rude remarks. Sophomore, Lauren Ready isn’t immune to the cruel people of the internet.

“I think the one negative aspect of having a channel would be the people who have fun harassing us. Since we all go to the same school, they just feel like that ‘know us’ so they feel comfortable saying rude things,” Ready said.

While the rude comments are unrelenting towards the YouTube group, the group does a good job at managing the criticism by focusing on each other.

“We deal with it very well because we ignore it and just keep being ourselves. And since we have each other and are all involved in it, we lean on one another and talk to each other about it,” Ready explained.

While sophomore, Summer Thipsipasom, is enjoying being apart of the young vlog-group she doesn’t believe that any youtuber can consider their channel a full-time job. Thipsipasom believes that if you’re making money, then you could consider the videos a real job.

“I don’t think every Youtuber can say that YouTube is their job. I think if you are making money and it is working out for you, then I’d consider it a job,” said Thipsipasom.

Contrary to Thipsipasom, Ready would consider pursuing the hobby if their potential for growth increases.

“I feel like I’d consider doing this after high school depending on how much we grow. For right now, though, we are all just doing it as a way to have fun and spend time with each other,” Ready said.

While being a vlogger or Youtuber might not require a Bachelor’s Degree in Vlogging, it does require hard work and thick skin. But, no matter why you are pursuing it, whether for fun or to try and become famous, sophomore, Christine Vo, followed simple advice.

“One tip I can give to anyone who is thinking about starting a channel is to just have fun. Don’t care what anyone thinks and just do it and be yourself,” Vo said.