YouTube video editing and Barely Political (2007–2010) First going into YouTube as the user
CamPain 2008, he began using
superimposition and
dubbing to produce short comedic films about candidates in the
2008 United States presidential election. Stevens' online content attracted the interest of
Ben Relles, who invited him to become a member of the online comedy group then known as
Barely Political. However, it was Stevens' educational content that attracted the most attention. He says he was inspired to create
scientific videos by
Paul Zaloom's work on
Beakman's World. Stevens realized that his most popular content tended to incorporate more serious real-world concepts, often exhibiting
interdisciplinarity. Notable examples include: "What is the
resolution of the eye?"; "What is the
speed of dark?"; "Why is your
bottom in the middle?"; and "How much
money is there in the world?" Later in 2010, Stevens launched two related channels, named
Vsauce2 and
Vsauce3, which eventually attained the sole hosts/producers
Kevin Lieber and
Jake Roper, respectively.
Google, TED talks and science education collaborations (2012–2016) In 2012, the year after
Next New Networks was acquired by
Google, Stevens also began working as a
content strategist for Google in
London. His role focuses on Google's YouTube platform, including meeting with fellow
content creators to optimize their videos' effectiveness. and "Why do we ask questions?" at TEDx
Vienna. He has also spoken at events for
Adweek,
VidCon,
MIPTV Media Market, the
Edinburgh International Television Festival, In 2015, he appeared at the YouTube Fan Fest in
Toronto. Through his work with
Vsauce, Stevens has collaborated with and appeared alongside prominent individuals within the scientific community. These include
Bill Nye (on "
Why did the chicken cross the road?"),
Derek Muller (on
quantum randomness),
Jack Horner and
Chris Pratt (on
dinosaur studies and
Jurassic World),
David Attenborough (in an interview about
Planet Earth II).
Mind Field and Brain Candy Live (2016–present) In 2016, former
MythBusters co-host
Adam Savage stated that he would join Stevens on a stage tour in 2017. Later in the year, Stevens published a video to
Vsauce announcing that he and Savage will visit forty cities across the United States in early 2017 to present
Brain Candy Live. The tour has been described as a live science-based stage show that is "between TED Talks and the
Blue Man Group". A second United States tour was scheduled for March–May 2018. Stevens partnered with YouTube Red (now YouTube Premium) to create and host
Mind Field, which premiered in January 2017 through YouTube's paid streaming service on the
Vsauce channel (all episodes have since been made available for free to non-premium subscribers, however there is some bonus content that requires a subscription to watch). Each episode of the educational series explores a different aspect of human behavior, by hearing from and conducting experiments on Stevens and guests. Stevens said that he had "pitched
Mind Field to many television networks and it [had been] rejected". In 2019, Stevens changed the name of the DONG channel to D!NG to avoid demonetization from YouTube's new policies on advertiser-friendliness. In 2025, Stevens began co-hosting a podcast with British mathematician
Hannah Fry called
The Rest Is Science. ==Personal life==