People are taking YouTube seriously, more than just something from entertainment as a climate change campaign led by Jimmy “MrBeast” Donaldson was made successful by raising the target amount to plant trees.
Within two months, the charity campaign for Arbor Day Foundation to plant 20 million trees was started and YouTubers collectively managed to raise more than $20 million. The amount was mainly donated by around half a million donors and a few well-off tech executives.
Donaldson collaborated with fellow YouTubers like Mark Rober with 8.7M subscribers, Guava Juice 14.6M, Marques Brownlee 9.5M, Smart Every Day 7.4M, Ninja 22.4M, Jacksepticeye with 22.9 million subscribers, whereas many other channels joined the “Team Trees” campaign after it was announced on October 25th.
After the videos of organizers and the charity streams, by October 31st, almost $10 million were raised. Many prominent tech executives donated generously to the cause. Elon Musk, Tesla and SpaceX CEO donated $1 million, whereas Tobi Lutke, CEO of Spotify donated $1,000,001. Jack Dorsey, who is heading both Twitter and Square both, donated twice, once $150,000 and then $200,000.
Susan Wojcicki, CEO of YouTube also donated $200,000 for the campaign and also made a video with Rober to talk about climate change.
According to the Arbor Day Foundation representative, Team Trees is one of the fastest environmental fundraising campaigns as it managed to reach the target quickly. After the targeted trees are planted, they will absorb and store 1.6 million tons of carbon and eliminated 115,000 tons of chemical air pollution, says the representative.
Other social media platforms as Twitter were also used by the Team Trees to raise awareness about climate change but special efforts were made to get limelight on YouTube. On the initiative launch day, Team Trees’ videos were posted on YouTube to play with the YouTube algorithm. It was taken care of that every video on the day was tagged as climate change so more people can view the relevant videos and know about the campaign.
The initiative started when Donaldson’s fans joked about celebrating 20 million subscribers by planting 20 million trees. This led to charity drive and side by side benefited YouTuber’s as well. More than 35 million views were noted on Donaldson’s video whereas other partners in the campaign also receive tens of million views on their fundraiser videos.
Donaldson is one of his private videos that said it shows how YouTube is not just a drama fest but instead the YouTubers have an actual influence on people that can be used to bring change in society.
The plantation drive will start in January 2020 and will continue maximum by December 2022. Though Arbor Day Foundation works internationally as well but most of the plants will be planted in parks around America.
Rober said although 20 million trees will not entirely changer the climate for better but it would spread the message, especially for politicians to understand that its about time that something is done about the climate change.
Photo: YouTube / Twitter.
Read next: Ryan Kaji, Dude Perfect, Anastasia Radzinskaya: These are the top YouTube earners of 2019
Within two months, the charity campaign for Arbor Day Foundation to plant 20 million trees was started and YouTubers collectively managed to raise more than $20 million. The amount was mainly donated by around half a million donors and a few well-off tech executives.
Donaldson collaborated with fellow YouTubers like Mark Rober with 8.7M subscribers, Guava Juice 14.6M, Marques Brownlee 9.5M, Smart Every Day 7.4M, Ninja 22.4M, Jacksepticeye with 22.9 million subscribers, whereas many other channels joined the “Team Trees” campaign after it was announced on October 25th.
After the videos of organizers and the charity streams, by October 31st, almost $10 million were raised. Many prominent tech executives donated generously to the cause. Elon Musk, Tesla and SpaceX CEO donated $1 million, whereas Tobi Lutke, CEO of Spotify donated $1,000,001. Jack Dorsey, who is heading both Twitter and Square both, donated twice, once $150,000 and then $200,000.
Susan Wojcicki, CEO of YouTube also donated $200,000 for the campaign and also made a video with Rober to talk about climate change.
According to the Arbor Day Foundation representative, Team Trees is one of the fastest environmental fundraising campaigns as it managed to reach the target quickly. After the targeted trees are planted, they will absorb and store 1.6 million tons of carbon and eliminated 115,000 tons of chemical air pollution, says the representative.
Other social media platforms as Twitter were also used by the Team Trees to raise awareness about climate change but special efforts were made to get limelight on YouTube. On the initiative launch day, Team Trees’ videos were posted on YouTube to play with the YouTube algorithm. It was taken care of that every video on the day was tagged as climate change so more people can view the relevant videos and know about the campaign.
YOU DID IT!!!!#TeamTrees has raised $20 million which means there will be 20 million trees planted!— YouTube (@YouTube) December 19, 2019
Thank you @MrBeastYT, @MarkRober and all of the creators who made this a reality!🌲🌲🌲
The initiative started when Donaldson’s fans joked about celebrating 20 million subscribers by planting 20 million trees. This led to charity drive and side by side benefited YouTuber’s as well. More than 35 million views were noted on Donaldson’s video whereas other partners in the campaign also receive tens of million views on their fundraiser videos.
Donaldson is one of his private videos that said it shows how YouTube is not just a drama fest but instead the YouTubers have an actual influence on people that can be used to bring change in society.
The plantation drive will start in January 2020 and will continue maximum by December 2022. Though Arbor Day Foundation works internationally as well but most of the plants will be planted in parks around America.
Rober said although 20 million trees will not entirely changer the climate for better but it would spread the message, especially for politicians to understand that its about time that something is done about the climate change.
Photo: YouTube / Twitter.
Read next: Ryan Kaji, Dude Perfect, Anastasia Radzinskaya: These are the top YouTube earners of 2019
