UCL third year becomes Facebook sensation

By now, a large number of us are probably more than familiar with Julius’ viral videos. Countless pranks, social experiments and magic tricks have landed him with a total of over 200 million views.

However, in most recent videos, a new figure has caught the attention of many. Apparent girlfriend, Amber Doig-Thorne, a third year UCL theoretical physicist has been the target of numerous pranks.

However it doesn’t stop there, an equal exchange of completely hilarious pranks between the two has left fans eager to see more. The Tab spoke to Amber and Julius to get further insight into their newly found viral success.

Power couple

Dealing with this kind of viral success as a student could be overwhelming for some but for Julius and Amber it has been quite the exciting experience. Julius tells us: “the videos are going viral globally, people all around the world have been messaging us, from India, China, Canada. They’re just really interested in what we do since it’s so relatable.”

Amber adds: “I even got recognised in Barcelona a few weeks ago.”

Taking this into account, there is no doubt that being recognised around university would be inevitable for Amber too. Friday nights at ULU would not be the same without being recognised by around 50 people and Wednesday sports nights usually tend to be the cherry on top for Amber.

When asked about how she felt about all this recognition, she tells us: “I spread myself really thin, so I do lots of stuff around uni and even before the videos, when I walked around UCL there would be so many people I’d talk to. Although, now its just been amplified to like a thousand times.”

“I mean it is amazing though, to be only 21 years old and have 220,000 Snapchat followers, 88,000 followers on Facebook and 30,000 on Instagram”

The catalyst for the increasing success of the two ultimately comes down to social media. Julius explains: “we’ve been a lot more successful on Facebook, it is so much better for engagement, since you can share stuff.” With the figures to back it up, he adds: “the first video went viral, every day, all over the world for a month. It was the valentines day one which got almost 62 million views. Theres so much potential for it, I think we’re just gonna grow”

statz

Not only has Facebook been majorly useful, Snapchat has been greatly beneficial too, especially for Amber. The likes of DJ Khaled and Kylie Jenner  have some of the most viewed snapchat stories and it pretty much looks like thats the way our pranksters are heading. Amber informs us: “I was googling what the most viewed snapchats were and how many views they get daily, and they get around 1.2 million views. We get 10% of that which is unreal”

“I’m always out clubbing and partying, so I guess people just find that interesting. My views literally go up by the second and I get some really sweet snaps from fans sometimes. Replying to them makes their day,  which is a great feeling for me too. It’s all just crazy”

Am I famous now?

However there are some down falls to having such an immense snapchat fanbase: “Sometimes I do find it weird that there are so many people watching me, knowing what I’m doing. A while ago there were some people who snapped pictures of me to Julius because they saw me at a club. It’s like I’m constantly being observed.”

What many don’t seem to be aware of is the fact that both Julius and Amber are still students who are dealing with typical student problems – handing in dissertations and going to lectures – well at least to some of them – Amber confesses: “I haven’t been to lectures since January, but that’s just because I’ve been busy with so much”

Third wheeling

“I still work hard though and it hasn’t really affected me at all. Theoretical physics is one of the hardest degrees to do as well because our pass rate is higher than other degrees” When asked about what career plans Amber had in mind for after she completes her masters, she told us that she had “always wanted to go into banking” and in fact after an internship last year, secured herself a renewed contract where she will most likely go into trading and sales.

The couple are currently carrying on with their war of intense pranking, however on the side, they have also recently made it on to the Warner Bros premier list.