Ray William Johnson Wiki

Ray William Johnson (born August 14, 1981) is an American video blogger, producer, and actor best known for his YouTube series Equals Three, in which he provided commentary on viral videos. Many of the videos featured on Equals Three are noted to have received an additional boost of popularity. In February 2011, one industry publication noted that Johnson had six of the top 20 most watched videos of the month. In early September 2012, Johnson had accumulated nearly two billion video views. , his YouTube channel had more than 10.6 million subscribers, and more than two billion video views. On March 9, he announced that the last episode of Equals Three as himself the host would air on March 12, 2014. The show later returned on July 16th, 2014 hosted by Robby Motz.

Early life
Johnson was born and raised in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma. He graduated from Norman North High School in 1999. In an interview with the Wall Street Journal, Johnson says he studied at Columbia University as a history major, while his profile adds he was preparing to study law.

Career
While at Columbia, Johnson started his formatted show, Equals Three, as a way to combine two popular video styles: watching viral videos and video bloggers. In Equals Three, Johnson reviewed, criticized, and added commentary to some of the internet's latest viral videos. Equals Three episodes are usually uploaded to his channel every Tuesday. Equals Three is on one of the most subscribed channels on YouTube, having more than 10.6 million subscribers in December 2013, and has been recognized by Guinness World Records. Episodes can consistently obtain several million views within a week. Johnson has obtained celebrity guests on Equals Three, including Robin Williams, Sarah Silverman, Gabriel Iglesias, Kal Penn, Margaret Cho, Bobby Lee, T.J. Miller, Garfunkel and Oates, John Cho, Jason Biggs, Andy Milonakis, Timothy De La Ghetto, RZA, and KassemG.

In January 2011, Johnson launched a collaborative YouTube channel called "YourFavoriteMartian" (YFM), which features animated music videos. The songs are performed by a virtual band of four fictional cartoon characters: PuffPuff Humbert (vocals, voiced by Johnson), DeeJay (turntables), Axel Chains (drums), and Benatar (vocals, guitar/keytar/bass/piano, voiced by Jesse Cale). Johnson writes lyrics, raps, sings, composes beats, and sometimes collaborates with other musicians to produce the songs.

YFM has released 31 original songs, 2 remixes of original songs, 1 remix of another artist's song, 1 mashup, and 8 covers through the channel. In August 2013 the channel had over 2.2 million subscribers. In November 2012, Johnson announced that the YFM project "has been retired".

In October 2012, Johnson moved Equals Three away from Maker Studios, a multi channel YouTube network he had hired to help produce the show. He had announced his departure in an episode of Equals Three. Johnson has stated that he left Maker Studios due to the pressure the company put on him into signing a new contract. Johnson released images of the contract, which showed Maker Studios wanted a 40% share of his online channel's AdSense revenue, and 50% of the intellectual property rights of his show Equals Three. He stated that they were using "thuggish tactics" to pressure him into signing the contract, one of which was allegedly leveraging his AdSense account for the intellectual property rights to YourFavoriteMartian. Johnson also claimed that Maker Studios CEO, Danny Zappin, is a convicted felon, a charge which Zappin later publicly admitted to.

In May 2013, Johnson announced he signed a deal to produce a sitcom for the American television network FX.

On December 12, 2013, Johnson released a 5-part web series titled Riley Rewind, which he directed and starred in. It is the story of a high school student who has the ability to rewind time. After the suicide of another student at her school, she attempts to change time and save her life.

Equals Three (2008–2014, 2014-present)
In Equals Three (stylized as "=3"), Ray William Johnson reviews, criticizes, and adds commentary to some of the internet's latest viral videos. Equals Three episodes are usually uploaded to his channel every Tuesday. Equals Three is on one of the most subscribed channels on YouTube, having over 8 million subscribers in April 2013, and has been recognized by Guinness World Records. Because of his popularity, Equals Three episodes can consistently obtain several million views within a week. Johnson has been able to leverage his popularity to secure several celebrity guests on Equals Three, including Robin Williams, Gabriel Iglesias, Kal Penn, Margaret Cho, Bobby Lee, T.J. Miller, Garfunkel and Oates, John Cho, Jason Biggs, Andy Milonakis, Timothy De La Ghetto, RZA, and KassemG.

On December 30, 2013, Johnson announced that he would be retiring Equals Three in 2014. On March 12, however, in the last episode of the series hosted by him, Johnson announced that he would be taking one to two months to instead find a new host to replace himself and continue the show's legacy. He stated that this decision was due to the support of the show by fans. After several months of auditions, Ray announced Robby Motz as the new host and the shows continuation starting from July 16th, 2014.

Maker Studios controversy
In October 2012, Johnson moved Equals Three away from Maker Studios. He had announced his departure in an episode of Equals Three. This started a controversy with Maker. Johnson has stated that he left Maker Studios due to the pressure the company put on him into signing a contract which gives Maker a 40% share of his channel's AdSense revenue, and 50% of his show's intellectual property rights. He stated that they were using "thuggish tactics" to pressure him into signing the contract, one of which was allegedly leveraging his AdSense account for the intellectual property rights to YourFavoriteMartian. Johnson also claimed that Maker Studios CEO, Danny Zappin, is a convicted felon, a charge which Zappin later publicly admitted to.

Your Favorite Martian (2011–2012)
In January 2011, Johnson launched a collaborative YouTube channel called "YourFavoriteMartian" (YFM), which features animated music videos. The songs are performed by a virtual band of four fictional cartoon characters: PuffPuff Humbert (vocals, voiced by Johnson), DeeJay (turntables), Axel Chains (drums), and Benatar (vocals, guitar/keytar/bass/piano, voiced by Jesse Cale). Johnson writes lyrics, raps, sings, composes beats, and sometimes collaborates with other musicians to produce the songs.

YFM has released 31 original songs, 2 remixes of original songs, 1 remix of another artist's song, 1 mashup, and 8 covers through the channel. As of March 2013, the channel has over 2.0 million subscribers, and over 482 million video views. In November 2012, Ray announced that the YFM project "has been retired".

Breaking (2009–2012)
BreakingNYC is a former daily video blog or vlog that Johnson started in December 2009 while living in New York City. He made the vlogs almost daily until June 2010. After nearly a year-long hiatus, Johnson resumed contributing to the video blog channel, creating a new higher quality series with a similar format. The new series titled, Breaking Los Angeles and the Adventures of Puff Puff, was released every Friday and is filmed in Los Angeles. Johnson often featured notable guests in his new series, including rappers Wax, Hoodie Allen and Dumbfoundead, slam poet George Watsky, comedian Gabriel Iglesias, and actor/director Bobcat Goldthwait. After Johnson took a three-month hiatus from making videos for the channel, a third season of Breaking Los Angeles (retitled to Breaking: Season 3), posted from December 14, 2011, to March 1, 2012.

Runaway Thoughts (2013–2014)
Runaway Thoughts was a podcast hosted by Johnson and his then-girlfriend, Anna Akana. They also had guest stars, such as Harley Morenstein, Natasha Leggero, Carlos Santos, Big Rob, and more. The original intention of the podcast was supposed to be the continuation of the RayWilliamJohnson YouTube Channel, as Equals Three was ending. However, in May 2014, due to Ray and Anna's breakup, the podcast discontinued and Ray began his focus on the Equals Three reboot in order to keep his channel going.