The number one most subscribed personality on YouTube, PewDiePie (whose real name is Felix Kjellberg), recently sat with Yahoo Global Anchor Katie Couric and talked about how his YouTube fame came to be.
PewDiePie has over 40 million subscribers and has gathered over 10 billion views on all his videos and altogether, PewDiePie's subscribers outnumber that of Taylor Swift, Ariana Grande and Justin Bieber combined.
PewDiePie's YouTube stardom started five years ago when he started uploading videos of himself playing video games and with witty and humorous commentary. His name, PewDiePie, also came from video playing with "pew" referring to the sound of lasers and when he did well in the video games, he'd blurt out: "pewdiepie."
Today, according to ABC News, PewDiePie's monthly earnings reach up to $1.4 million and his brand continues to grow as he had also recently launched a new book and is set to start a new YouTube Red show called "Scare PewDiePie."
"It was definitely very exciting, and it is still exciting, of course. And I never expected it. I've never been the popular guy or whatever," PewDiePie told Katie Couric. "So, to all of the sudden be in this situation where there's so many people who loves what you do and appreciates what you do, that's amazing. And I couldn't be happier about it."
The 26-year old YouTube star also revealed that the cost of his fame is having to quit school. PewDiePie told Couric that when he saw the huge opportunity years ago, he decided to stop studying and make videos full time.
"I just felt like I was on the wrong path in life. I was going, you know, with an education that I felt like was more to make, you know, parents proud and stuff like that. It wasn't really what I wanted to do," PewDiePie said.
"And I saw that there was this opportunity over here that seemed insane, and it seemed too good to be true. But I wanted to give it a shot at least. And I'm here now and I'm lucky it worked out."
PewDiePie shared that his parents totally understand what he was doing, especially when they saw the reactions of fans and realizing that what he does meant so much to many people.
