In his kitchen, Kevin nervously moved furniture and set his phone against a bowl on the counter.
“So I thought you could go to the refrigerator and take the cake out. I’ll come by and say, ‘Wait! Don’t you want a better snack?’ and I’ll hand you some carrots.”
“OK,” Lily waited for her cue.
“I’ll ask Lily. I bet she’ll be in my videos with me.”
Kevin walked home with his tail between his legs. His dream of being loved by thousands or hundreds of people was fading. He was tired of being ordinary.
He wanted to be special.
This wasn’t what Kevin expected at all. He thought they’d be as excited as him. A cloud of doubt began to form in his head and in his heart.
He tried to push it away.
“I don’t have to be the expert on any of those topics. I just need to make it entertaining to watch.” He thought of Nastya and how he didn’t find it particularly captivating, but…190 subscribers sure did!
“Meh, no thanks,” Carlos said.
“Yeah, I don’t want to be on YouTube,” Minji concurred.
Kevin was bewildered.
“You don’t want to be in my videos with me?”
Carlos and Minji looked at each other.
“I’ll subscribe to it. I just don’t want to be in it,” Minji said gingerly.
“Yeah, me too. I’ll subscribe to it, Kevin.” Carlos kicked the ball to Minji and they continued down the field.
Kevin watched more videos featured on “Top YouTube Videos” of the week.
There were video game reviewers…
Truth or Dare players…
And World Wrestling Entertainers
Craft makers…
Kevin scrolled Anastasia’s account. She was in lots of videos with her dad. Who can I have in my videos? Carlos? Minji? Lily? I’ll ask them. They’ll be so excited!
And all you have to do is create silly videos? Easy!
Some of her videos are 5-minutes and some are 22 minutes long. Piece of cake!
Kevin was dumb-founded.
I’m not as cute as her. She has bows in her hair. She’s five. My mom thinks I’m cute, but nobody else does…
Kevin watched her video.
She’s talking about eating healthy food. That’s easy. I can do that. This is kind of dumb, though. People really like this?
Kevin learned about a 5-year-old girl named Anastasia who has six channels and over 107 million subscribers total. Last year, she made over $18 million!
Kevin’s eyes bugged out.
Over $18 million?
Over 100 million subscribers?
I have to pick a brand name…the name of my channel…and I can’t create an account without it!
Kevin realized he didn’t even know what his channel would be about. His little chameleon heart beat fast. He felt an urgency with unknown origin.
When Kevin got home, he didn’t start his homework, he searched on the internet: “How to start your own YouTube channel.”
This was his result:
Kevin felt scared and excited at the same time.
Kismet 