Connor Franta

As a teenager Connor Franta was a big fan of YouTube vloggers such as Shane Dawson and Mitchell Davis. Motivated to have his own channel, he uploaded his first YouTube video in August 2010. Since then, his popularity has been on the rise and today the young man’s self-named channel has over 5.58 million subscribers and has garnered more than 355 million views. His growing stature as an internet sensation prompted Connor to join a collaboration channel known as Our2ndLife along with five other YouTubers in 2012. The collaboration lasted several months before Connor decided to leave the group, citing personal reasons. His success as a YouTuber continued to grow as he established himself as an independent member of the Big Frame network, managed by Andrew Graham. Once having established himself as a well-known internet star, he publicly came out as gay in a YouTube video in 2014 in order to support other youngsters who were confused about their own sexualities. This video became an immensely popular one and established Connor as a youth icon for other gay youngsters. The young YouTuber’s quick rise to fame was acknowledged by nominations for Teen Choice Awards in 2014 and 2015. In 2015, he also was nominated for a Streamy Award in the "Audience Choice Entertainer of the Year" category. At the 42nd People's Choice Awards in 2016, he won the "Favorite YouTube Star" award. Leveraging on his online fame, the astute guy soon ventured into entrepreneurship as well and is today involved with a number of business ventures in fields as diverse as music curation and clothing, and has also launched his own line of coffee and lifestyle products.

Connor is openly gay and publicly came out in a video released on his channel in late 2014. Since then, this video has garnered over 10 million views and over 890 thousand likes, and is one of the most viewed video on Franta's channel. He strives to use his own experiences to help other young men and women who are struggling with their own sexual identities and are dealing with issues on how to come out to family and friends. As a person who cares deeply about the underprivileged, Connor launched a fundraising campaign for The Thirst Project in September 2014 with a goal of raising $120,000 within a month to build water wells for people in Swaziland. He offered his fans incentives like T-Shirts, posters, and a chance to have a Skype call with him. By the end of the month, the campaign had raised over $230,000. A similar campaign in 2015 helped to raise over $191,000 for the same project. In 2015, Connor received the Governor's Award for his work with The Thirst Project.

A highly popular YouTuber, Connor has recently expanded his horizons and has delved into the world of words. His debut book, a memoir, ‘A Work in Progress’ was released in April 2015. The book became a bestseller and appeared on the ‘New York Times’, ‘Publishers Weekly’, and ‘The Times’ best seller lists, selling over 200,000 copies. It also won the 2015 "Goodreads Choice Awards Best Memoir & Autobiography." In 2015, he also teamed up with Andrew Graham and Jeremy Wineberg to launch a record label, Heard Well. As an entrepreneur, he has also released his own line of coffee, called Common Culture Coffee. 'GET YO SELFIE GAME ON BROTHA HA AHAAA' -man watching me take this A video posted by Connor Franta (@connorfranta) on Aug 8, 2016 at 4:07pm PDT