(mouse clicks)
♪ (dramatic chord) ♪
- (bashfully) Hi, guys.
Um, so this is my first video blog. - Oh.
- (girl) Um, I've been watching... - Lonelygirl?
- Lonelygirl!
- Are we in 2006?
- This is the reason I started YouTube.
- (girl) I really like a lot of you guys on here.
I really like Paytotheorderofofof2. - "Ofofof2."
- (girl) You're really funny and...
- Is this a real YouTube video? Is she a YouTuber?
- The first hoax.
- (girl) And then there's theWineKone or Wine.
- I remember him.
- WineKone-- that was one of the first people I subscribed to.
- (girl) Well, I guess the video blog is about me.
My name is Bree. - No, it's not.
- (Bree) I'm 16. - No, you're not.
- (Bree) I don't really want to tell you where I love, because...
- Because it's fake! Because it's fake!
- (Bree) I don't really want to tell you where I live, because...
- Smart. Smart. Good girl.
(in video: shrill scream, Psycho theme)
- (Bree) Um... well, what you need to know about my talent
is that it's really boring. Like really... - How boring is it?
- (Bree) ...really, REALLY boring. - I'm so confused.
- (Bree) That's probably why I spend so much time on my computer.
Hmm. - I don't get this.
I don't get this video.
- (Bree) I didn't really have a plan for this video blog.
- This is a complete lie.
- Because it's a studio.
- (Bree) I guess I'll just do this.
- ♪ I remember when ♪
♪ I remember, I remember ♪ - (laughing)
- I saw her on Greek after this.
- (Bree) Okay. - (imitating) Oh my god, no.
I don't know what I'm doing.
- (Bree) Bye! - She's so goofy and quirky. Phuh!
- I'm so confused.
- Were you making faces with her too? - Yeah, I was.
- Me too. (both laugh)
- How am I supposed to react to that?
- That was a nice throwback. Is it Thursday?
♪ (dramatic chord) ♪
- (Finebros) So what did we just show you?
- I don't know what you just showed me.
- A video blog of a girl.
- It was somebody's first vlog.
- Lonelygirl15.
- She was, like, one of the first internet hoaxes.
- You showed me Bree, aka lonelygirl15,
who is arguably the first super-popular blogger on YouTube.
- At the time, I had a really bad breakup.
And I didn't want to put myself out on YouTube,
because my ex-girlfriend would be like,
"You are so self-centered."
And then I saw her do it.
And I was like, "Yo, if she's doing it and people make fun of me,
I can just be like, 'She's crazy too, guys!'"
And then I started vlogging.
- (Finebros) Explain to those unaware about lonelygirl15.
What is the history of it, and why do you know it?
- So I was on YouTube before lonelygirl15.
And it sparked this entire controversy.
- People started wondering if it was real or not.
- It was revealed that, no, no, they were very staged.
They were written in advance.
- She got exposed! Drama!
She was, like, an actress, and it was all set up.
This was, like, the first real YouTube drama.
- (Finebros) So this is a vlogger from the early days of YouTube
that at one time was the number-one
most subscribed channel on YouTube. - (surprised) Really?
- I have a question. - (Finebros) Yeah.
- Did any of the YouTubers not know who she was?
You think Andrea Russett's gonna know?
You think Lia Marie Johnson is gonna know?
- (Finebros) And her channel name was lonelygirl15.
- Yep! I've heard of her!
- That's her?!!
I've never actually seen her or watched her videos.
But I've heard of her. And she's like an urban myth or something.
- (Finebros) So the reveal here is that
she was a vlogger just like any other vlogger
that you'd see on YouTube.
But it turned out that it was fake and she was an actress,
and the whole thing was scripted
and made by a production company. - This bitch.
- They trolled the world basically.
- I was sure that it wasn't fake.
One of my very first videos was mocking the fact
that people thought that it was fake.
- It was cut and edited so well.
I emailed her and she emailed me back.
At that point, you could not tell me anything else.
- Whoever thought of to pick a pretty girl, script her life out,
and take advantage of this rising platform was so smart.
- (Finebros) So this was the early internet
and was one of the first times that something on YouTube
made national news.
Why do you think this became newsworthy
for traditional media back then?
- Probably because YouTube was, like, not even a thing back then.
- Traditional media, I'm sure, guys were sweating, thinking,
"Why are they investing money into this?
Should we do the same thing?"
That really mystified people.
- We kind of regarded this whole thing as,
"Oh, whatever. It's for cat videos. It's illegitimate."
And then for someone to come out
with such production value behind it and make itself popular--
I think that's when a lot of people were like,
"Oh, maybe there's money here."
- Somebody was able to pull off this huge hoax
that fooled the whole internet, you know?
This was a big thing. No one had done anything like this before.
- (Finebros) Once this happened,
the concept of something being fake on YouTube
started to become even larger of a thing in part
due to lonelygirl15. - We can blame you for this, lonelygirl15.
She cursed us all.
- That's so cool! She caused the faking game.
Someone else caused the game, but she caused the fake.
- We have to question everything now. Everything can be staged.
- Kinda sucks.
Some things that are real, people are gonna call it out.
- I remember thinking that about Miranda Sings.
Like, "This girl has to be fake."
And of course she's not, now that I've met her, you know?
She's really like that in person.
- My stop-motion videos constantly had,
like, "Oh, this is all so fake!"
It's like, "Yes! Yes! Objects are moving by themselves.
It is indeed fake."
- (Finebros) So it was one of the first hits of YouTube.
And it continued with multiple channels,
with a crazy story about the occult and supernatural elements.
- Supernatural things happening?
- It was kind of like Lost, where the first episode is like,
"Oh, I see where they're going."
And then by season four, you're like, "What?
Have they been reading the fan fiction too much
and then just running with it?"
- (Finebros) Why do you think it still was able to last,
even though it became something that was fake,
which angered a lot of the YouTube community at the time,
but it still was able to continue?
- It worked because people are curious.
When they find out it's fake, they want to keep watching.
- You see us a lot in YouTube world. People try to shock people.
And nowadays, if that happened,
and everybody really 100% believed it,
that would've got millions of views.
- They were already fans.
So I think the idea that she was fake was still just like,
"Well, I like that character, I guess. It's not her.
But it's still someone I feel like I can relate to."
- Maybe after they understood it was faked,
they saw it just as any other show.
I mean, technically, everything on TV is faked.
- There was these two factions:
the ones that was like, "This is fake and it's awful,"
and the ones that were like, "This is fake and it's okay."
- I have channels of people that I watch even though I hate them,
just so I can be like, "What's this guy doing?
Oh god, that's [bleep] stupid. Dislike."
(amused) But I won't unsubscribe.
- Haters are just like obsessed fan girls gone wrong.
If you think about it, it's just like, "I hate this!"
It's like, "I hate Soulja Boy!"
But you're here every single video leaving a comment, bro.
Same thing with lonelygirl.
It's just like, they couldn't stop watching.
- (Finebros) So what kind of legacy, if any,
do you think lonelygirl has on the history of web video?
- I mean, I didn't even know the full story, and I knew the name.
So she definitely has a legacy.
- Question everything. That's the legacy she's left behind.
- The first YouTube scandal. (dramatic gasp)
- Oh yeah. So if you see a comment that says "fake,"
blame lonelygirl.
- She taught young men the most valuable lesson of all,
and it's that you shouldn't trust the pretty girl on the webcam,
because it's probably a company behind it
that just wants your money.
- It's representative of a time, I think,
when the internet was still very innocent.
Was really just, you know,
creators are just experimenting with different mediums.
- The production team behind it
really put a huge stamp on the internet.
I don't think it'd be the same if not for these guys.
- (Finebros) So finally, what kind of thoughts does it give you
that here we are talking about an old show on YouTube
and that there's a legacy and a history
to what all of us pioneered? - I know.
It makes me feel really old, so thanks for that.
Just goes to show how quickly things change.
- It's great because it shows a maturity in the industry.
- It represents our beginnings.
I'd like to say we've grown as a people and as a medium.
- If somebody went back in time and was like,
"Hey, this lonelygirl15 thing is just the beginning.
There's gonna be super expensive shows
that are made just for YouTube,"
I would've said, "No, it's my little niche thing.
I discovered it myself."
- I have kids that come up to me saying,
"I started watching you when I was a freshman in high school.
I just graduated college."
(chuckling) I'm like, that's crazy.
- (quietly) That's so weird.
I've been on React ever since I was little.
And the fact that people can look back on that
and they're like, "Oh, wow, she was so young"
and like, "Oh, memories," I'm like,
(disconcerted) "Yeah, they were my memories,
and they're also your memories?"
Like, you grew up watching me. It's just weird.
- It's just funny, because I feel like media still sees YouTube
as this new creature that's like, "Oh wow, look.
This is where all the kids go. This is the new big thing."
It's not new. It has history already.
- Where are we going? Where is this train taking us?
I answer your question with a question.
I almost want to interview you guys.
Can we get you guys in the hot seat
and I start asking you questions on this one?
- (sheepishly) Hey guys. My name is Jack. I'm 16 years old.
Thank you so much for watching this episode of YouTubers React.
I love you. (smooches)
- Make sure you subscribe to all these sexy people down here.
They are not fake.
- I'm Anna Akana. Stay awesome, Gotham.
- (sheepishly) Thanks for watching. Bye.
♪ (end music) ♪