Jake Paul, YouTube’s most divisive star, decides to rescue Texas from Harvey

In a video to his 10 million YouTube subscribers Tuesday, Jake Paul laid out his plan: He was going to Houston to save it from Harvey. "I need your guys' help. I need your power. I need your commitment. We have the chance to save thousands of lives and to show the world the power of social media." The video was dramatically titled, "This might have to be my last vlog ..."

"This is extra special to me," he said in the video. "Because there could be Jake Paulers that are devastated by this."

Paul and "Uncle Kade," a member of his crew of aspiring social media influencers, stood in front of a white pickup truck loaded with gear and supplies for their 22-hour drive to Houston. Paul seemed amped, pacing and shouting interjections ("They're dying!") as he and Kade explained to their viewers that they wanted to help. They also wanted to let people know that their trip wasn't about vlogging (that's video blogging, for the olds among us), even though Paul is famous for vlogging daily about, essentially, having a massively successful vlog.

The Houston trip was also about vlogging, however. It can't be anything else for Paul, who has turned "It's everyday bro" into his mantra. The "everyday" means that he vlogs every day of his life. If Paul was going to Houston, so were his cameras. As the excitement built, Paul told his fans, "We are gonna get them supplies, we are gonna save their lives, and we're gonna flippin' vlog it all at the same time!"

"We're gonna flippin' rise, and we're gonna everyday-bro it, in their face," Paul said at another point. It wasn't clear whether he was talking about Harvey or his haters. Maybe it was both.

Paul, 20, became famous on the now-defunct social media platform Vine, and then even more famous on YouTube this year, propelled by the devotion of an army of young teens, the "Jake Paulers."

Most people over the age of 15 probably had no idea who Paul was until this summer, when a local news station reported on the nightmare he was creating for his neighbors. Hordes of 12-year-olds waited outside his home every day for a glimpse of their favorite star; the stunts and pranks he engineered for his vlog were meant for a movie set, not a residential neighborhood. Paul lost his role on a Disney Channel show during the ensuing fallout – the company's kid-friendly brand doesn't like the burning of furniture.

Over the past few months, Paul has weaponized the drama that surrounds him. He and older brother Logan (also an extremely famous YouTuber) "fight" and reconcile endlessly in vlogs, pranks and dis tracks. Their fans don't care whether the rivalry has all the authenticity of a realityshow competition. Each of those videos gets millions of views, sometimes tens of millions, on YouTube. The complaints of his neighbors became a major story arc for his vlog, complete with a fakearrest prank. With Paul, everything becomes content.

Which is perhaps why Paul's plan to go to Texas and help was met with skepticism by the YouTube community outside of his fan base. They believed that it would be well within Paul's character to head into a natural disaster just for the vlog. Paul appeared deadset on personally rescuing people from flooded houses in Houston, something he said he wanted to do, several times over the course of his announcement. Yes, the star had set up a GoFundMe page and was selling a Harveythemed T-shirt with the intention of donating proceeds to Harvey victims. But literally saving lives, on camera, would make for better footage.

Paul was in Texas by Tuesday night, and he almost immediately made the news for causing chaos. The star planned to bring drinking water to people in Houston and wanted to show the world the power of the Jake Paulers by enlisting local fans to fill up two U-Haul trucks with donations. He gave out the address for a Walmart parking lot and said he personally would be there to help collect any donations his fans could get there.