Ángel David Revilla (born: July 16, 1982), better known as DrossRotzank (or simply Dross), is a Venezuelan writer, narrator and comedian, residing now in Buenos Aires, Argentina.
Starting his career writing humorous and satirical articles on his blog, "El Diario de Dross" (Spanish for Dross's Diary), about controversial subjects, such as politics, religion, science, urban culture, between others. He opened his blog in 2005 at the age of 23, although more basic and less "fancy" versions of the blog were online since 1998.
In 2008, he began uploading videos on YouTube, as a sort of "extra" for some of his articles already written. In 2008, he uploaded "Dross juega I Wanna Be The Guy" (Spanish for "Dross plays I Wanna Be The Guy"), and since it got good reception, he decided to start uploading videos on a regular basis.
Dross started uploading videoblogs, giving his opinion on viral and/or relevant subjects; always with a bit of an usual dark humor. His most known classic era videoblogs (from 2007 to 2013) are about religion and science. The actual schedule in his video list is filled, mostly, with terror and mystery narrated videos.
As of May 2019, his YouTube channel has gained over 20 million subscribers and over 4.8 billion views, making it the 177th most subscribed channel on YouTube.
Dross' persona origins[]
The story of the character, Dross, goes back to the times when he used to troll at, in that time, popular video game-themed Spanish speaking forums, such as Vandal and Meristation. The nickname was adopted when he first signed up at Vandal, and based the username on a WWF fighter, Warren Droz, mispelling "Droz" and writing "Dross" instead. As his posts on the forum were quite successful, he decided to keep it beyond the mistake.
He has remarked in many times the difference between the character he plays and the real entity behind it. This has served his audience as a sort of guide on what should be taken seriously and what not. While the videos in which he appears with a hat and glasses are in a humor tone, those that include Revilla as it is before the camera are referred as videoblogs of a more serious theme. He also stated in an interview with TNX Magazine: Power:
- How similar is Dross to yourself?
- As similar as Dr. Jekyll is to Mr. Hyde; distant, but dangerously close.
As a writer[]
Aside from his job as a humorist, the author wrote three books published up to date - claiming to have written 5 books, some of which are an autobiography, including his inspirations as comedian and author, and how he managed to get a considerable following on the web. Other examples can be quoted as "El Festival de la Blasfemia" (The Blasphemy Fest).
Two short stories can be found in old web records, such as Carnaval Negro (Black Carnival) and La Guerra de Ysaak (The War of Ysaak), both of them being sent to different editors around the world. The first episodes of Carnaval Negro can be found on his blog, where a full version of The War of Ysaak is also available.
Some other short written stories and novels such as El Rey Padrote (The Pimp King), Tiempos Difíciles (Hard Times), "The Legend of the Knight" and "The Shadows from below" also dwell the Stories section of his online home.
Trivia[]
- The person who recommended him I Wanna Be The Guy was Itzuwanaru, it was confirmed after he posted a comment on that video.
- He has a sister which moved to USA in early 2000s, remarking her identity unknown.