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"The actor who plays Fred Figglehorn \u2014 who rose to fame as a boy on YouTube in 2008 before starring in a movie and Nickelodeon show \u2014 revealed his sexual orientation in a YouTube video on Tuesday.\n\"I'm gay. It feels so weird to say it on camera,\" 19-year-old Lucas Cruikshank said. \nSee also: Kobe Bryant, Bill Clinton Tweet Support for Jason Collins' Coming Out\nFor those unfamiliar with Cruikshank, he caught fire five years ago with such quirky videos as \"Fred Goes Swimming,\" \"Fred Loses His Meds\" and \"Fred Goes to the Dentist.\" \nCruikshank's \"Fred\" YouTube channel has 2.1 million subscribers and the videos on it have accumulated more than 992 million views. His personal channel, \"Lucas,\" has 14.4 million views and nearly 324,000 subscribers. \nOther YouTube personalities \u2014 like Troye Sivan \u2014  and every day people have used YouTube in recent months to announce they're gay \u2014 sometimes just to assuage the constant barrage of questions from subscribers. \nCruikshank published the \"Are You Gay?!?\" video on the Lucas channel. After receiving countless questions about his sexual orientation, Cruikshank came out officially, though he said his friends and family already knew.\nEntertainers who are gay are apparently feeling more and more comfortable expressing themselves publicly. Singer Steve Grand, for example, released a brave music video that tells \"the universal story of longing to be loved\" from the perspective of of a gay male. Meanwhile, creators of The Boxtrolls film trailer featured same-sex parents.\nBONUS: 9 Gay Leaders Making a Difference in Technology\n\n\n\n9 Gay Leaders Making a Difference in Technology\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n1. Chris Hughes\n\nOne of the co-founders of Facebook, Hughes left the company in 2007 to become director of online organizing for Barack Obama's first presidential campaign. In 2010, the entrepreneur founded Juno, a social network aimed at connecting users interested in social good and activism. \nCurrently, Hughes is the publisher and editor in chief of The New Republic, a progressive political commentary magazine. \nHughes married partner Sean Eldridge, president of investment fund Hudson River Ventures and LGBT equality advocate, in June 2012.  \nImage courtesy of Facebook, Chris Hughes\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n2. Peter Sisson\n\nSisson founded telecommunications company Toktumi in 2008. The company is known for its successful app, Line2, a VoIP service that makes voice calls over Internet protocol addresses rather than relying on telephone companies -- similar to Skype. \nAccording to Big Think, Sisson says being a gay entrepreneur can be challenging, but in his home of San Francisco, it's a \"non-issue.\"\n\"There's never been any sort of problem with anyone finding out that I was gay and suddenly not wanting to do business with me or not wanting to fund me,\" he said.\nImage courtesy of Facebook, Peter Sisson\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n3. Peter Thiel\n\nBest known for co-founding PayPal and working as its CEO, Thiel is also a successful venture capitalist and hedge fund manager. When eBay acquired PayPal in 2002, Thiel's stake was estimated around $55 million. \nHe also made the first outside investment in Facebook in 2004, securing a 10.2% stake for $500,000.\nAs an openly gay advocate of LGBT causes, Thiel has contributed to the American Foundation for Equal Rights and GOProud. \nImage courtesy of Flickr, TechCrunch50-2008\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n4. Megan Smith\n\nSmith is the VP of business development at Google. She has been with the company over 15 years, starting when PlanetOut partnered with Google in 1998. Smith acted as CEO at PlanetOut, an entertainment and media company targeting the LGBT community. \nSmith and her wife, journalist Kara Swisher, have two young sons, Louie and Alex. \nImage courtesy of Flickr, Joi\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n5. Dana Contreras\n\nContreras started working at Twitter two and a half years ago. She quickly climbed the company ladder to become a senior systems engineer.\nAs a transgender woman, Contreras finds Twitter as welcoming and supportive a workplace as they come. \nContreras married her wife Melissa five years ago, before she gender-transitioned.\nImage courtesy of Twitter, Dana Contreras\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n6. Tom Coates\n\nHailed as one of the earliest webloggers on the Internet, Coates operated award-winning new media blog plastigbag.org until mid-2011, around the time he resigned from Yahoo. He also organized London's Hack Day in 2007, and advises several startups, including Lanyrd.\nImage courtesy of Flickr, Joi\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n7. Joel Simkhai\n\nIn 2009, Simkhai (left) founded Grindr, arguably the most popular dating and social network for gay and bisexual men. The company boasts over 4 million users in 192 countries. \nInitially, Simkhai faced self-doubt as a gay man in business. \"One of my problems was I thought I couldn't be as successful,\" Simkhai told Inc. \"That's partially because I didn't have any gay role models who were very successful and in high-profile jobs.\"\nImage courtesy of Facebook, Joel Simkhai\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n8. Jason Goldberg\n\nFounder and CEO of Fab.com, Goldberg initially launched the property as a social network for gay people before transitioning the company to a design inspiration and ecommerce site. \nGoldberg and business partner Brian Ellner also launched a site called The Four 2012, which pioneers gay marriage equality through social media efforts. \nGoldberg married husband Christian Schoenherr in August 2012 in New York City.  \nImage courtesy of Facebook, Jason Goldberg\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n9. Jon Hall\n\nJon \"Maddog\" Hall is the executive director of Linux International, a non-profit that promotes Linux-based open source software development. \nHe earned the nickname \"Maddog\" as a professor at Hartford State Technical College, where he also served as computer science department head. \nAccording to Out magazine, Hall was inspired to come out on the 100th anniversary of mathematician and computer scientist Alan Turing's birth. \u201CI explained to people who wondered why I came out online that there are a lot of young geeks who are going through the same thing,\u201D he said. \u201CAnd I wanted to let them know they were not alone, and that it gets better.\u201D\nImage courtesy of Flickr, campuspartybrasil\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nImage: Christopher Polk/Getty Images for KCA"^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
<http://mashable.com/2013/08/20/fred-gay-youtube-lucas-cruikshank/>