| “ | Wanna join my free gift card giveaway? | ” |
―Durv | ||
Dylan McEvoy (born: March 14, 2003), better known online as Durv, is an English YouTube vlogger and gamer who is infamous for making videos containing bottle flips, prank calls, challenges, reactions and gift card giveaways. His videos were often cited as clickbait due to their misleading nature or staged content. He is widely credited as a pioneer of the controversial "Calling fictional characters" trend that involves YouTubers pretending to call a fictional character - often at 3AM - and having them respond (usually with themselves or a friend playing the character).
Dylan's channel was originally terminated on May 31, 2017, for violating the Community Guidelines, but was reinstated on April 12, 2018. Despite this, he still continues to receive hate on his videos for his clickbait content.
In November 2019, he sold his channel to someone else, and it's name was changed to Trend Hub. In mid-2020 however, the name was changed back to Durv and he has reclaimed the ownership of the channel. In January 2021, Durv returned to his original channel, making a video claiming to come back. He briefly returned that November after another nine month disappearance, promoting a Minecraft channel. He is currently active on the channel "HypeCrew" where he makes videos playing slot machine games.
Controversy[]
Dylan was heavily criticized for using clickbait to gain views and subscribers, and although he still does it, not much has changed from where he had began.[1] He has also been criticized for starting several fake gift card giveaways by saying at the start of every single one of his videos, "Wanna join my free gift card giveaway?".[2] Many of his videos had a large number of dislikes because of this and has since become a meme.
It is said that Dylan used bots to artificially increase his growth on his YouTube channel. The reason for this being is that he always got the same estimated amount of likes and dislikes per video, and his comment section mainly contained repeated comments such as "I subscribed" and "I want iphone 7". There were no hate comments, and they could not be found at any point in time, despite the amount of people who disliked him. He admitted to using clickbait to earn more money and lying to his subscribers about the "free gift card giveaway". He also made a video called "why I hacked durv" (which is now deleted) which sparked more controversy throughout his YouTube career.
"My School is Deleting My Channel"[]
On January 14, 2017, Dylan uploaded quite possibly one of the most controversial videos he's ever made called, "MY SCHOOL IS DELETING MY CHANNEL".[3] In this video, he talks about how his teachers threatened to "delete" his channel because they supposedly did not like his content. That was it. But what made this video so controversial is the fact that it gained him over 6 million views and introduced everyone to the infamous line, "Wanna join my free giftcard giveaway?". After his termination, it was reuploaded and now has over 3,000 views with nearly 2,500 dislikes compared with 203 likes.
Diss track[]
In September of 2017, Dylan released an official diss-track called "Commentaries End" where he called out LeafyIsHere, Pyrocynical, Memeulous, WillNE and ImAllexx.[4] This diss-track was heavily criticized for having terrible lyrics and rapping by several people he called out and stirred up plenty of controversy across the internet. The "music video" had over 100,000 views before it was deleted along with the rest of his content, but since it has been reuploaded.
Termination[]
Dylan's original channel after being terminated (May 31, 2017)
On May 31, 2017, Dylan's channel was terminated for violating YouTube's Community Guidelines, although he claims it was for violence and not deceptive practises ("clickbait"). He had 1.4 million subscribers and 120 million video views at the time of the suspension. People who tried to visit Dylan's channel found the termination notice.
The Clash Trends channel after it was terminated on June 6, 2017.
On June 3, 2017 Dylan created another channel called Clash Trends[5] just a few days after being terminated. The channel gained popularity (and unwanted attention) after a video was uploaded by YouTuber NebulaUSA called "DURV MADE A NEW CHANNEL! (BREAKING TOS EXPOSED!)"[6] Despite rebranding himself as "Clash Trends" it was very clear by his notable voice and the use of the phrase "Wanna join my free giftcard giveaway?". After this, people started mass-flagging, disliking, and reporting his videos. Dylan quickly disabled the comments on the Clash Trends videos but the channel was subsequently terminated on June 6, 2017. Following this termination, until October 2017, Dylan used his brother's channel, Finnerz. In doing so, he exploited a loophole in the TOS by claiming he was a "video producer."
Dylan later created another backup account and started releasing videos. Very little is known about this third account but its existence and termination was confirmed by Dylan in a tweet dated to March 2, 2018. The reception was mixed - some fans commented that they supported him, while other fans responded with cynicism.
Reinstation[]
On April 12, 2018, Dylan announced that his channel was reinstated by YouTube.[7] In his video, "I'm back", he claimed he is done making gift card videos and "will make videos that everyone would want to watch" He lost 97,000 subscribers while his channel was terminated.
He uploaded his first video (which was shortly deleted) called "KID CRIES AFTER BROTHER DELETES ACCOUNT!", which got 1500 dislikes in 2 hours.[8] Shortly after, Dylan deleted the video and posted a tweet regarding the actions.[9] Fans responded with cynicism, quoting his "free giftcard giveaway" and condemning his use of clickbait.
Brief return and current activity[]
On 12 January 2021, Durv briefly returned to YouTube to explain where he had been and what he had been up to. After disappearing again for nine months, he returned again on 3 November for a Q&A, answering some questions from his viewers and promoting a new channel called Durvy for Minecraft videos. As of January 2023 the original Durv channel has remained inactive, but he briefly began uploading to a new, smaller channel of the same name where he made videos playing slot machines, although this channel was only ever active from September to November of 2021. He is currently active on the shared channel "HypeCrew" where he continues to make slot machine content, occasionally with a friend of his who also runs the account.
Subscriber milestones[]
Note: The following dates are according to Social Blade. Dates may vary by one or two days due to differences in time zones.
- 100,000 subscribers: October 20, 2016
- 200,000 subscribers: November 24, 2016
- 300,000 subscribers: December 15, 2016
- 400,000 subscribers: December 29, 2016
- 500,000 subscribers: January 8, 2017
- 600,000 subscribers: January 15, 2017
- 700,000 subscribers: January 19, 2017
- 800,000 subscribers: March 10, 2017
- 900,000 subscribers: April 11, 2017
- 1 million subscribers: April 21, 2017
- 1.1 million subscribers: May 3, 2017
- 1.2 million subscribers: May 11, 2017
- 1.3 million subscribers: May 14, 2017
- 1.4 million subscribers: May 25, 2017
Decline[]
- Below 1.3 Million Subscribers: July 9, 2018.
- Below 1.2 Million Subscribers: July 4, 2020.
References[]
- ↑ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=syruBxM8dMM
- ↑ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0IgH8X1Guow
- ↑ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o6CABX90vfI
- ↑ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zdCFXAsAfvU
- ↑ https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCTjHMNIyfWsZyN3Jyz3mIRA
- ↑ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xWpTRmd5o14
- ↑ https://twitter.com/DurvTM/status/984427060788629504
- ↑ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-7ifV5KvxJY
- ↑ https://twitter.com/DurvTM/status/986330079176347654