Since age 15, YouTuber Hayley G. Hoover has been posting entertaining vlogs to her popular channel. Now with 96,276 subscribers, 6,580,819 views, and over 100 videos, Hayley G. Hoover’s channel is incredibly successful.
According to Hoover, she daydreamed about being an SNL cast member when she was younger. She enjoyed making “dorky sketches” and “people watching them was an added bonus.”
Hoover became particularly well-known when she made the channel Five Awesome Girls with four of her good friends. This channel ran from 2008 to 2010 and was highly inspired by John and Hank Green’s vlogbrothers channel. Each day of the week, a separate member of Five Awesome Girls would post a video. From 2012 to 2014, Hoover also worked on an advice channel called Answerly.
Having grown up in Ohio, Hoover enjoyed running, cooking, reading, and movies. In college, she majored in Creative Writing and Gender Studies. She used her English background in her “’adult life’ much more than people said [she] would.”
Now, having graduated from college, Hoover works as a social media specialist/producer/writer for a production company in Los Angeles. She also does freelance writing.
YouTube had briefly been her full time job when she was partnered with the network Fullscreen, but now she is an independent YouTuber who just posts videos for fun.
Hoover’s videos are inspired by funny stories that she would want to tell a friend or weird things that are on her mind, she explained. “I don’t really rehearse,” she said. “I just sort of think through what I want to say and then see what comes next.”
Hoover’s videos have a wide range of topics, from Taylor Swift impersonations, to being ferocious like a lion, to serious issues like feminism and catcalling.
Hoover is a regular attendee of VidCon, a popular convention for YouTube personalities, started by John and Hank Green. “John and Hank have been good friends of mine for years,” she said.
Hoover has a tee shirt for sale with DFTBA Records, the record and merchandise company co-run by Hank Green. The shirt has a lion on it and says “Be Ferocious,” a reference to one of her videos. Her friend, Lauren Fairweather, who worked with her on Five Awesome Girls, designed the artwork. Alan Lustufka, the former owner of DFTBA, made it into a shirt.
Recently, Hoover commented on the YouTube sex abuse scandals. Several YouTubers over the last few years were accused of being in emotionally and sexually abusive relationships that relied too heavily on the fan-celebrity dynamic. Hoover said, “Where there’s power, there’s responsibility. Several people abused their power in the YouTube community and used their taste of fame to hurt other people. It’s important to me that abusers understand that they can’t get away with these behaviors unchecked, and it’s important to me that victims get the support they deserve.”
This perhaps relates to her opinion on YouTube. “Like all kinds of popularity, YouTube fame can be used for good or bad,” she said.
Hoover clearly has respect for her fans and her audience. Her friends and family have supported her YouTube channel immensely, though she admits they sometimes make fun of her for it.
Her fans often recognize her at YouTube events like VidCon. “I’m lucky that the people who watch my videos tend to be the kinds of people I’d actually want to hang out with, so when someone recognizes me in public, I get really excited,” she said.
To those with their own YouTube channels, Hayley said, “Only do YouTube if it’s fun for you.” She recommended only doing YouTube videos if it made you feel good about yourself or if you felt that your work was genuine and worthwhile.
Theresa Kelly is a third-year student majoring in English literature secondary education. She can be reached at TK780615@wcupa.edu.