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Welcome to Ryan's Toys review!

―Ryan's World

Ryan Haruto Guan[1] (born: October 6, 2011 (2011-10-06) [age 12]), better known online as Ryan Kaji, is an American child YouTuber currently living in Honolulu, Hawaii.[2] He mainly stars in videos on various toys on the family's ten channels (mainly Ryan's World). The Verge has described the channel as a mash-up of personal vlogs, unboxings, innocent childhood antics, and relentless, often overwhelming consumerism. His videos often feature his mother (Kieu-Loan Guan), father (Shion Guan), and twin sisters (Emma Guan and Kate Guan). All of the toys featured in Ryan's World go to charity. He is a Vietnamese-Japanese descent.

Videos on his YouTube channel are uploaded once every two days. The channel is the 91st most subscribed, and the sixth most viewed YouTube channel of all time. The channel has gained over $50 million in revenue in 2020 and it is likely to grow as Ryan's World progresses. That makes the channel one of the most financially successful YouTube channels of all time.

He has gained much media attention for his influence on young children, especially preschoolers when it comes to his toy reviews, and his parents have gained infamy for a theory that the parents are exploiting their children as laborers.

Ryan's World was nominated for the 2020 tenth annual Streamy Awards in the Kids & Family category, and won the award.

Ryan's World (Channels)[]

  • Kaji Family (formerly Ryan's Family Review)
  • Gus the Gummy Gator
  • VTubers
  • Combo Panda
  • Princess ToysReview
  • The Studio Space
  • EK Doodles
  • Stick with Kaji -Podcast

History[]

Before YouTube[]

Kieu-Loan Guan was born Nguyen Thi Kieu Loan on April 28, 1984. She was a Vietnamese immigrant who was raised in a refugee camp in Bidong Island, Malaysia.[3] Shion Guan was born on September 13, 1987 in Tokyo, Japan.

On June 28, 2002, Loan was caught stealing 6 items of clothing near her house at a JCPenney department store near her home. She was fined $150 and was placed on 6 months probation. Loan breached the probation order, and served 30 days in prison. In 2007, Shion emigrated to Texas to attend Texas Tech University. Shion and Loan met each other in November 2009 and got married. Their son, Ryan Haruto Guan was born on October 6, 2011.

The beginning[]

There is a theory that Loan and Shion Guan created their YouTube channel Ryan ToysReview to exploit the vulnerabilities of their children online. Another theory created by the parents is that Ryan asked his mother, "How come I’m not on YouTube when all the other kids are?", when Ryan watched YouTube family channels. However, both of these theories are not confirmed yet to this very day. Ryan's mother quit her job as a high school chemistry teacher to work on the YouTube channel full-time, as she mentioned in an interview. His mother took him to a store and bought him his first toy, a Lego train set, a moment that Loan recorded and uploaded to the channel as their first video. Another claimed reason that Ryan's father has mentioned is that he had a large family born outside of the United States. So, they thought that YouTube was a great way to share Ryan's childhood memories with them.

Ryan's first video was published on March 16, 2015, when he was 3 years old. The video is titled, "Kid playing with toys Lego Duplo Number Train Toy Review, Unbox, Build". In the video, he appears in a store and chooses a toy, returns it home then takes it out from the box and plays with it. The first intro was introduced in the third video, a picture of Ryan and Lego Hulk doing the same pose, with Disney Pixar's Lightning McQueen and Tow Mater at the side. In 2016, Ryan's channel became the most-subscribed YouTuber in the United States, and his sisters Emma Guan and Kate Guan were born, who would later become additional laborers by the Guans.

Pocket.Watch[]

In 2017, Ryan's parents signed a deal with Pocket.watch, a startup children's media company that was founded in 2016 by Chris Williams and Albie Hecht, in order to further capitalize the channel. Pocket.watch does the marketing and merchandise for Ryan's YouTube channels. In 2018, Ryan ToysReview, in cooperation with Pocket.watch and WildWorks, created an app called Tag with Ryan for iOS and Android devices. As of 2020, the family had 80 deals through Pocket.watch.

Ryan's World Toys[]

At the Toy Fair 2018 in New York, Ryan ToysReview announced a line of toys, branded as Ryan's World, in cooperation with pocket.watch and Bonkers Toys. The toys that were first released exclusively at Walmart on August 6, 2018. The toys were later released at Target and on Amazon.

The Ryan’s World bright-colored slime is sold for $4 5per inch, $9 per Ryan’s action figure, and French fry shaped squishy toys for $18. Likewise, his other toys like Shiney Silver, Glitter Gold, and Molten Orange cost $5 per piece. His Aladdin themed Ali and Abu Build A Bear cost around $60.

On May 7, 2021, Ryan set up his own twitter account from which his mother and father send tweets on his behalf. It was later suspended, possibly because of his age at the time.

Ryan's Mystery Playdate[]

Ryan's Mystery Playdate

In 2019, the Guans and pocket.watch produced a 20-episode television series for preschoolers titled Ryan's Mystery Playdate. The show was acquired by Nick Jr. for a premiere date of April 19, 2019, in the United States. In an attempt by Pocket Watch to match the YouTube channel's style, all of the show's dialogue is improvised, and the only scripted segments are scene transitions and explanations of the challenges.

The series focuses on Ryan, his parents, and two animated characters named Gus the Gummy Gator and Combo Panda. Episodes show a selection of physical challenges and unboxing puzzles. The show has a run time of 24 minutes.

On April 24, 2019, the series was renewed for a second season of 20 episodes. It has a total of four seasons and 90 episodes.[4]

Controversies[]

Child exploitation[]

Loan and Shion Guan have been allegedly exploiting their children for years on YouTube for monatary gain. In 2016, their popular YouTube channel, Ryan ToysReview, which features Ryan as the main attraction, generated approximately $11 million. As a result, Kieu-Loan and Shion amassed approximately $50 million through the videos that star their three children in 2020 posted on YouTube, possibly violating the Child Labor Provisions of the Fair Labor Standards by having their children to work tens of hours per week and securing their financial future by harvesting profits from their children, causing critics to question the ethics of filming their children without consent to rake in advertising and sponsorship dollars. The exploitation of children under 14 years of age to gain economic gains is illegal according to the law.

They have advertised to millions with the image of their children. They named their YouTube channel “Ryan ToysReview” to advertise towards younger audiences that are interested in toys. They exhibit toys to catch the eye of children in hopes of them viewing. For this purpose, the parents earn a substantial wealth of money through the surplus of children for watching their videos.

According to Cale Clarke of Relavent Radio, Shion Guan realized the massive number of videos with preschool audiences and they decided on making content that centers on Ryan to hope that their target audience (2-6 years old) would stumble on their channel, intentionally exploiting Ryan and the underdeveloped minds of their audience. Shion created the Ryan's World franchise by establishing a partnership with PocketWatch, further securing the financial future of Ryan, Emma, and Kate Guan. [5] [6][7]

View-botting claims[]

Ryan's channel came under fire by the YouTube community for view-botting, most noted YouTubers attacking. Some people such as PewDiePie and Idubbbz have exclaimed that Ryan's parents are manipulating him to receive more money and fame from YouTube.

Inappropriate content[]

In November 2017, people were calling out Ryan ToysReview and other toy channels for using inappropriate content for children, and possibly forcing the child into creating content, as discussed by fellow content creator Philip DeFranco with concerns as he has his own son. Phil later did an interview with the parents and is now completely supportive of the channel.

This backlash made YouTube delete over one hundred of the channel's videos, causing the channel to lose over 715 million video views, dropping it from the third to the fifth most viewed YouTube channel of all time, all in the span of six days, just ten days before the channel reached 10 million subscribers on December 4th, 2017. The channel quickly became the fourth most viewed YouTube channel of all time again, after surpassing JustinBieberVEVO, and eventually third which it currently is by surpassing netd müzik.

Violation of COPPA[]

On August 28, 2019, a complaint was filed by Truth in Advertising and the Federal Trade Commission due to its sponsored videos not being properly disclosed. Truth in Advertising has claimed that "Nearly 90 percent of the Ryan ToysReview videos have included at least one paid product recommendation aimed at preschoolers, a group too young to distinguish between a commercial and a review." This complaint ultimately lead to the FTC fining YouTube and Google for violating COPPA (Children's Online Privacy Protection Act) in September 2019. As a result, YouTube created new rules and restrictions on children's content which started to be enforced on January 6, 2020. However, Ryan's parents continue to make money through their merch.[8]

Unhealthy food promotion[]

A study published by Pediatrics on October 26, 2020 analyzed more than 400 YouTube videos featuring 'kid-fluencers' (including Ryan) that promote fast food brands such as McDonald's, Carl’s Jr., Hershey’s, Chuck E. Cheese and Taco Bell. Experts say the videos are not just advertising but public health issues, because they market unhealthy food to children. Analysis identified 271 foods and beverages appearing in 418 of Ryan's most popular videos, and 90% of the foods were unhealthy food. Sunlight Entertainment (the production company of Ryan's World) responded to the incident:

“We care deeply about the well-being of our viewers and their health and safety is a top priority for us. As such, we strictly follow all platforms terms of service, as well as any guidelines set forth by the FTC and laws and regulations at the federal, state, and local levels.
As we continue to evolve our content we look forward to ways we might work together in the future to benefit the health and safety of our audience.”

Loan's shoplifting controversy[]

Ryan's mother, Loan Guan (then Kieu-Loan Thi Nguyen) had the cops coming at the age of 18. She had stolen clothes worth $135. The police insisted her to pay $135 fine for stealing, but she did not pay any of the fine. By another strike a few months later, she was arrested for good. She was in prison for about two months until she was released.

Considering the fact that she was a grown adult when she did acts like this, the police said there was something wrong with her mental health. Kieu-Loan's greed, may be connected to the intent of the creation of the Ryan ToysReview channel because as said before, there is a unconfirmed theory that Ryan ToysReview, owned by Kieu-Loan and Shion Guan, was created to capitalize on the vulnerabilities of young children almost 13 years later. [9]

Trivia[]

  • They have their own production company called Sunlight Entertainment, which was created to help streamline the workflow of the channels, and has a 30-person team of professional workers to help produce live action and animated content, releasing about 25 videos a week.[10]
  • Ryan's mother used to be a high school chemistry teacher but quit to operate the channel.
  • Comments on the channel were turned off after an incident with pedophiles on YouTube commenting on kids channels as well as to avoid violating COPPA.

Channel milestones[]

Note: The following dates are according to Social Blade. Dates may vary by one or two days due to differences in time zones.

Subscriber milestones[]

  • 1 million subscribers: January 4, 2016
  • 2 million subscribers: March 17, 2016
  • 3 million subscribers: June 2, 2016
  • 4 million subscribers: August 26, 2016
  • 5 million subscribers: November 11, 2016
  • 6 million subscribers: January 18, 2017
  • 7 million subscribers: March 24, 2017
  • 8 million subscribers: June 9, 2017
  • 9 million subscribers: September 11, 2017
  • 10 million subscribers: December 4, 2017
  • 11 million subscribers: January 13, 2018
  • 12 million subscribers: February 2, 2018
  • 13 million subscribers: March 26, 2018
  • 14 million subscribers: May 29, 2018
  • 15 million subscribers: July 17, 2018
  • 16 million subscribers: September 3, 2018
  • 17 million subscribers: November 10, 2018
  • 18 million subscribers: January 27, 2019
  • 19 million subscribers: April 17, 2019
  • 20 million subscribers: July 7, 2019
  • 21 million subscribers: August 2, 2019
  • 22 million subscribers: October 13, 2019
  • 23 million subscribers: December 20, 2019
  • 24 million subscribers: February 14, 2020
  • 25 million subscribers: May 10, 2020
  • 26 million subscribers: July 27, 2020
  • 27 million subscribers: October 30, 2020
  • 28 million subscribers: January 10, 2021
  • 29 million subscribers: March 23, 2021
  • 30 million subscribers: July 3, 2021
  • 31 million subscribers: November 24, 2021
  • 32 million subscribers: March 8, 2022
  • 35 million subscribers: November 30, 2023

Video view milestones[]

  • 1 billion views: November 25, 2015
  • 2 billion views: January 22, 2016
  • 3 billion views: March 7, 2016
  • 4 billion views: April 25, 2016
  • 5 billion views: June 12, 2016
  • 6 billion views: August 2, 2016
  • 7 billion views: September 30, 2016
  • 8 billion views: November 17, 2016
  • 9 billion views: December 30, 2016
  • 10 billion views: February 11, 2017
  • 11 billion views: March 22, 2017
  • 12 billion views: May 1, 2017
  • 13 billion views: June 5, 2017
  • 14 billion views: July 12, 2017
  • 15 billion views: August 21, 2017
  • 16 billion views: October 2, 2017
  • 17 billion views: November 14, 2017
  • 18 billion views: January 13, 2018
  • 19 billion views: February 14, 2018
  • 20 billion views: March 17, 2018
  • 21 billion views: April 20, 2018
  • 22 billion views: June 1, 2018
  • 23 billion views: July 13, 2018
  • 24 billion views: August 19, 2018
  • 25 billion views: September 29, 2018
  • 26 billion views: December 7, 2018
  • 27 billion views: January 25, 2019
  • 28 billion views: March 12, 2019
  • 29 billion views: April 29, 2019
  • 30 billion views: June 19, 2019
  • 31 billion views: July 27, 2019
  • 32 billion views: September 13, 2019
  • 33 billion views: October 20, 2019
  • 34 billion views: November 23, 2010
  • 35 billion views: December 31, 2019
  • 36 billion views: January 31, 2020
  • 37 billion views: March 6, 2020
  • 38 billion views: April 15, 2020
  • 39 billion views: May 22, 2020
  • 40 billion views: July 5, 2020
  • 41 billion views: August 17, 2020
  • 42 billion views: October 4, 2020
  • 43 billion views: November 18, 2020
  • 44 billion views: December 25, 2020
  • 45 billion views: January 17, 2021
  • 46 billion views: March 19, 2021
  • 47 billion views: May 16, 2021
  • 48 billion views: July 22, 2021
  • 49 billion views: December 8, 2021
  • 50 billion views: January 31, 2022
  • 51 billion views: April 3, 2022
  • 56 billion views: November 30, 2023

References[]

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