Ray William Johnson

           

Ray William Johnson
YouTuber Information
Profile	Ray William Johnson
Style	Comedy
Date joined	May 25, 2008
Twitter / X	@Raywj @EqualsThreeShow
Facebook	raywilliamjohnson Equalsthree
Other media	Ray's Instagram Equals Three Instagram
Videos	814+
Status	Active
Associates	ERB • Joe Penna
Username	Ray William Johnson
Personal information
Full name	Ray William Johnson
Nationality	American
Channel trailer
File:The Upside Downs - BANG! (music video)
Most viewed video
DON'T CALL ME FAT!!
First video
I will end you!! (2009)

BreakingNYC (vlogging channel)
YouTuber Information
Profile	BreakingNYC
Style	Vlogs
Date joined	January 11, 2010
Shut down	March 1, 2012
Videos	0
Status	Inactive
Username	Ray William Johnson

“	I'm Ray William Johnson, and I approve this message!	”
―Ray’s classic outro

Ray William Johnson (born: August 14, 1981 (1981-08-14)), formerly Fat Damon, is an American YouTuber, actor and comedian. He became famous through his YouTube show, Equals Three, in which he provided humorous commentary on viral videos. Although his content was dark and crude at times, he managed to gather fans from all over the world ranging in various ages.

History

Johnson's webshow, Equals Three, led his channel to becoming the most-subscribed on YouTube from June 25, 2011 to January 12, 2013, even it would eventually be surpassed by Smosh. The show included a wide range of celebrity guests, including Gabriel Iglesias, Snoop Dogg and Robin Williams. Due to the show praise all over social media, both positive and negative, it led to Johnson meeting up with other famous YouTubers, including his past rival Smosh.

By early 2012, Johnson was a YouTube millionaire, becoming the first YouTuber to gain a net worth of $USD million.

Though the channel had the biggest and, at one point, the fastest growing following, the show faced criticism from the YouTube community, with some finding it immature, lowbrow, and offensive, and with others claiming that Johnson did not deserve the fame. Some also said that Johnson's style of commenting on viral videos was not only unoriginal, but also lazy and ripe with copyright infringement.

Many would argue that the downfall of his channel began in November 2012 when Maker Studios, his YouTube partner at the time, wanted a higher revenue cut from his Equals Three show. When Johnson refused, his contract was canceled, along with the latest album of an animated musical comedy group he led called Yourfavoritemartian. The channel, at one point, was both the most-subscribed and most viewed music channel on YouTube, which was the same for the Equals Three channel which gained over 10 million subscribers by August 2013 and 3 billion video views by early 2017, hitting one billion views in late 2011. The music channel was as well shut down by Maker Studios, which it gained over 1.2 million dollars worth of sales without any promotion or record label.

The channel, now independent, was run by only Johnson and his crew, later named "Equal Three Studios". The channel was losing popularity, gaining only 1-2 million views per video, when previous videos averaged around 5 million views. Also, due to new changes to the platform, including algorithm changes and the addition of the Trending page, by late 2013, his channel lost its spot within the 10 most-subscribed channels on YouTube.

BreakingNYC, his old vlog channel, was his very first YouTube channel; RunawayPlanet. The channel is no longer active, and Johnson has since deleted all of the videos on it, but still currently posts his Instagram stories to his YouTube channel and is active on Facebook, while also doing stand up comedy show tours.

In late 2013, Johnson directed a highly acclaimed five-part video series titled "Riley Rewind" which starred his then-girlfriend and fellow YouTuber, Anna Akana. Around the same time, he and Akana, along with Derek Shelby, made a podcast show called "Runaway Thoughts", which not only discussed different things, but answered fan questions (which often got of topic hence the name "Runaway Thoughts") and interacted with the audience. The podcast was well received with Variety naming it in the top 10% of podcasts in 2013.

Ray Johnson left Equals Three in March of 2014 due to wanting to tackle bigger projects and a lack of motivation to continue the series. Since then, the channel saw a major drop in views and subscribers daily. He, at first, uploaded vlogs to his channel and originally wanted the show to end for good in the middle of 2014, but due to outcry from fans wanting the series to continue, he made a private audition for the next host of Equals Three, with the winner being Robby Motz. 20 years old at the time, he was first met with mixed reviews until most accepted him as an adequate replacement.

Motz would also eventually leave in July of 2015, only a year after his debut. His reasons were similar to Johnson's. Later that month, Kaja Martin took over. However, the fans despised her as a host, with every video starring her having a like ratio averaging around 50% or below. While she claimed to not be phased by the backlash, the Equals Three crew would ask their fans to stop, with little to no success.

After only hosting the show for 5 months, Martin would leave in December 2015, with Carlos Santos serving not only as her replacement, but as the final host of Equals Three. While Santos was received more positively than Martin and even Motz, with fans claiming his humor and style of commentary to be the most similar to Johnson's, the show would reach an un-celebratory end, with the final episode, "Friday THE 13TH", airing on May 13, 2016. No new episodes have aired since with no concrete explanation as to why. While many fans have asked Johnson to return to Equals Three, he had since moved on to other social media platforms, primarily doing vlogs and storytime videos, and had gained a newfound popularity outside of YouTube.

The show since Johnson's departure failed to gain as many views and subscribers as it once did. The subscriber count would fluctuate throughout the years and throughout the new hosts, rising slightly during Motz's reign, falling drastically during Martin's, and a little of both during Santos'. Due to the abrupt halt of both Equals Three and all other video series, the subscriber count continued to plummet.

His peak subscriber count was over 10.8 million, achieved in November 2015, and afterwards, in June 2018, the channel plummeted to as low as just under 10 million subscribers.

On December 25, 2019, Johnson uploaded a video titled "Guess what I did...", announcing that he was returning to YouTube with a new show called "SUPERHVMAN", where he described the show as "a mix between a TED Talk and Equals Three." He would upload more videos within this new series to positive reception. However, the season 1 finale of SUPERHVMAN, "How to Live a Happier Life", would prove to be his last, airing on February 26, 2020.

On September 13 of the same year, he started a new series based on roasting TikTokers, with each new video receiving more and more dislikes.

As of right now, the Ray William Johnson channel continues to slowly bleed subscribers. Newer videos struggle to surpass 40-50,000 views, older videos are constantly getting deleted, and the channel is losing about 10,000 subscribers per month.

Other Shows

Besides The Equals Three show, there have been other videos shows on the channel as said before.

Booze Lightyear

Starring

• Ray William Johnson
• Carlos Santos
• Kaja Martin
• Jules Medcraft
• Kelly Landry
• Luis Victor Jimenez

Other Shows

• 10/10 (formerly known as Top 6)
• Comedians On
• Date Debate
• SUPERHVMAN

Capital Hill Gangsta

This was the first series on Ray channel. It started in 2008 with the video called "John McCain may have herpes" and ended on February 17, 2009 (a total of 46 episodes) with the episode "Did you lose?", when Ray changed the name of the show. All of these videos (as well as some of the =3's videos) are either deleted or set on private on his channel. In the show, he discussed current political issues with a twist of humor.

List Of Subscriber Milestones

• 1 million subscribers: March 17, 2010.
• 2 million subscribers: September 23, 2010.
• 3 million subscribers: March 3, 2011.
• 4 million subscribers: July 3, 2011.
• 5 million subscribers: November 14, 2011.
• 6 million subscribers: October 20, 2012.
• 7 million subscribers: January 25, 2013.
• 8 million subscribers: March 25, 2013.
• 9 million subscribers: June 5, 2013.
• 10 million subscribers: August 11, 2013.

Decline

• Below 10 million subscribers: June 26, 2018.

Notable Videos On RWJ's Channel

Kick his @ss!!

First video on the channel

DON'T CALL ME FAT!!

Most viewed video

THANK YOU FOR EVERYTHING

Ray's last =3 video

The Resurrection

Robbie's first =3 video

ROBBY APPROVES THIS MESSAGE

Robbie's last =3 video

AND THE NEW HOST IS...

Kaja's first =3 video

LAST EPISODE

Kaja's last episode

FRIDAY THE 13TH

Last =3 video

3 Hosts

Ray William Johnson, the host of =3 from February 20, 2009 to March 12, 2014*

Robbie Motz, the host of =3 from July 16, 2014 to July 24, 2015

Kaja Martin, the host of =3 from July 28, 2015 to November 27, 2015

Carlos Santos, the host of =3 from December 4, 2015 to May 13, 2016

Lawsuits

Jukin Media

In November 2014, Ray initiated a lawsuit against Jukin after they had accused Johnson’s production company of stealing some of its viral videos for inclusion in the =3 comedy clip series. For example, in a November 7, 2014 episode of =3, then-host Robby Motz poked fun of a man from a Jukin-owned clip who tripped and dropped his new bride at an Arizona wedding.

Equals Three sued Jukin (which owns the FailArmy YouTube channel and has built a very good business out of licensing and distributing viral video clips) claiming the studio’s use of viral clips was protected under fair use. Equals Three also accused Jukin of denying the production company ad revenue after Jukin issued YouTube takedown notices against Equals Three videos that contained its owned and licensed clips. On October 13, 2015, Judge Stephen V. Wilson of the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California said Equals Three’s episodes provided commentary on Jukin’s videos and were therefore protected under fair use. Jukin then sued the Equals Three company. In March 2016, Ray William Johnson’s and Jukin Media’s lawyers came together to bargain a settlement prior to the official ruling from the jury.

Riley Rewind

Famous Quotes/Sight Gags

• "FAKE AND GAY!" – Used by Troll, his character portraying what a troll would usually say by feigning typing on a keyboard and sounding like a jerk.
• "GEEZUS!!" – A phrase used when a video goes very viral, very fast.
• "Zing!" – A subtitle which came up when Ray has made a joke concerning sexism, racism, or just something which is funnier than usual.
• "Epic Face! Epic face!" – A line Ray used when he found a video with people making strange faces. The line usually goes, "epic face! epic face! epic face! epic face! Jizz... in... my pants." Though, on occasion, the ending was changed to fit the video's needs. It was often referred to as, "The Joke."
• "Jizz In My Pants!" – A line he used every time after he used "Epic Face! Epic Face! Epic Face!" He would take pictures and then point out the funny faces. This was one of his most popular lines.
• "Two camels in a tiny car!" – A comeback line he used in the older videos. He usually said it when the Troll pops up.
• "I'm a @#!*%!" – Used all the time, because apparently, he is one.
• "Honey Badger don't give a $#!%&!" – A reference to Honey Badger.
• "BALLS!" – Ray's swear word of choice.
• "Get back in the kitchen! - Famous sexism joke.
• "Here's the dildo" – Reference of people thinking that Ray said that in "Shake Dat Ass", but he actually said, "Here's the deal though".
• "HOW DOES SOMEBODY NOT KNOW HOW TO FLUSH THE TOILET AFTER THEY'VE HAD A SHIIII$#!%&!T?!" – Used at the end of the videos since "Who sh&@!?".
• "Throwing a Baby" - In many of his videos, as a semi-racist joke, Ray throws a plastic African American baby doll against the back wall of the set. This baby was replaced in one episode with an Asian toddler doll after Ray was called out for racism. After the Asian toddler's head fell off during a video, Ray went back to using the African American baby.
• "Can we &@!$ it?" – Reference to some discussions in the podcast where Ray and Anna would take anything they were discussing and ask if they could $@&! it.
• "Shut the %$#@ up Dan!!!" - What Robby said when Dan interrupted him.
• "....And I approve this message" - Would be said during every ending of the show.

Trivia

• In June 2011, he would surpass Nigahiga to become the most-subscribed channel. He would then be overthrown by Smosh in January 2013.