In the Spring of 2014, Tyler Oakley, a video blogger on YouTube, worked with the Trevor Project to raise over half a million dollars towards his annual birthday campaign for the organization. Oakley and the team at the Trevor Project came together on Prizeo, a website that collects donations and in turn gives away prizes based on different tiers of money donated, along with the help of Oakley's subscribers and others to raise money for the LGBTQ (lesbian, gay, bi, transgender, queer) youth of America.

Tyler Oakley is a YouTube creator who, as of today, has just under 6,500,000 subscribers, making him one of YouTube's most watched channels. Every year, Oakley does a birthday campaign, usually between February and March, in which he raises money for his charity of choice, the Trevor Project. In 2014, he had his biggest year in raising money for the group, as he raised over half a million dollars by the end of the campaign, while the original goal amount was $150,000 by the last day of donating.

Founded in 1998, the Trevor Project is a group that provided crisis intervention and suicide prevention to LGBTQ youth. The group provides many different tools for individuals to use, including the Trevor Lifeline, a social networking community, and more. They work to save the lives of LGBTQ youth and educate those who may not know much about the group and what they do for the community.

On February 10th, 2014, Tyler Oakley began his yearly birthday campaign in hopes to raise $150,000 for the Trevor Project. Oakley's subscribers, Twitter and Tumblr followers knew it would be a stretch, but they had a strong belief that they could do it. With the campaign started, Oakley tweeted day in and day out, encouraging people to go online and donate. He held weekly live stream sessions where he brought in special guests, did flash donations in which everybody donated at the same time, called some viewers, did Q&As, and more. By the end of March, Tyler surpassed $150,000, as everyone who contributed to the campaign worked together to raise $525,704, more than three times his original set goal of money to raise for Trevor. The money raised will go to bettering the organization and the tools that they use to save the lives of the LGBTQ youth.

I spoke with two of Oakley's fans, Olivia and Alexis. I asked them what they thought about the results of the campaign, to which they had similar reactions. "I was shocked," Alexis stated, "I didn't get the news right away, but when I heard, I was very proud of what the community was able to come together and do." Olivia also stated that she was proud, as she said that everyone that was watching Tyler at the time was emotional. "We were all very emotional," she began, "Tyler was broadcasting at the time and when he reached half a million during his final flash donation and immediately began to cry. I, along with everyone else on here [Tumblr], came together, all happy and just talking about how proud we were. I met so many new people that I still talk to because of that day, just because we all shared the same views on Tyler and the result of the campaign." The two fans had similar beliefs with most of the questions I asked them about the campagin, including how Oakley deemed successful in raising the money, their thoughts on the Trevor Project itself and how they believe Tyler's 2015 campaign will go.

This year, Tyler started his campaign in the beginning of February and is still going on until the end of March. His goal is to raise $500,000 again and he is working in a similar way as last year to raise the money.