Jörg Sprave (born 7 April 1965) is a German

YouTuber A YouTuber is an online personality and/or influencer who produces videos on the video-sharing platform YouTube, typically posting to their personal YouTube channel. The term was first used in the English language in 2006. Influence Influe ...

, known for his (predominantly)

English language English is a West Germanic language of the Indo-European language family, with its earliest forms spoken by the inhabitants of early medieval England. It is named after the Angles, one of the ancient Germanic peoples that migrated to the ...

channel JoergSprave (or The Slingshot Channel).

Career

On his channel, Sprave produces and tests self-made, sometimes exotic

slingshots A slingshot is a small hand-powered projectile weapon. The classic form consists of a Y-shaped frame, with two natural rubber strips or tubes attached to the upper two ends. The other ends of the strips lead back to a pocket that holds the proj ...

and bows. Although most of his designs include at least one

rubber band A rubber band (also known as an elastic band, gum band or lacky band) is a loop of rubber, usually ring or oval shaped, and commonly used to hold multiple objects together. The rubber band was patented in England on March 17, 1845 by Stephen P ...

, the projectiles used vary according to the model. Some examples include

saw blades A saw is a tool consisting of a tough blade, wire, or chain with a hard toothed edge. It is used to cut through material, very often wood, though sometimes metal or stone. The cut is made by placing the toothed edge against the material and mov ...

, arrows and

Oreo Oreo () (stylized as OREO) is a brand of sandwich cookie consisting of two biscuits or cookie pieces with a sweet creme filling. It was introduced by Nabisco on March 6, 1912, and through a series of corporate acquisitions, mergers and split ...

cookies. While mainly focusing on slingshots, Sprave occasionally makes, modifies and tests other weapons such as

crossbow A crossbow is a ranged weapon using an elastic launching device consisting of a bow-like assembly called a ''prod'', mounted horizontally on a main frame called a ''tiller'', which is hand-held in a similar fashion to the stock of a long fire ...

knives A knife ( : knives; from Old Norse 'knife, dirk') is a tool or weapon with a cutting edge or blade, usually attached to a handle or hilt. One of the earliest tools used by humanity, knives appeared at least 2.5 million years ago, as evidenced ...

and air guns. Sprave's designs have been the subject of numerous English-language reports, often highlighting their creativity or power, such as in

Popular Mechanics ''Popular Mechanics'' (sometimes PM or PopMech) is a magazine of popular science and technology, featuring automotive, home, outdoor, electronics, science, do-it-yourself, and technology topics. Military topics, aviation and transportation o ...

, Gizmodo, and

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. As of December 2021, the channel has over 2.8 million subscribers. The videos, which are nearly universally in English, are viewed mostly in the

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territori ...

, the source of the majority of his subscribers. Sprave is known for the invention of the "Instant

Legolas Legolas (pronounced ) is a fictional character in J. R. R. Tolkien's ''The Lord of the Rings''. He is a Sindar Elf of the Woodland Realm and one of the nine members of the Fellowship who set out to destroy the One Ring. He and the Dwarf Gimli ...

", an add-on magazine device for a bow which converts it into a repeating-style weapon, firing up to five arrows per magazine. It was first introduced in his YouTube video entitled "'''Instant Legolas' - Archery Reinvented''", uploaded on 6 August 2017. A commercial version, "The Fenris", was released in June 2020, made by Steambow, an Austrian crossbow manufacturer, and sold by GoGuns GmbH. On 2 March 2018 Sprave started a labor union for YouTubers together with the largest German union,

IG Metall IG Metall (; IGM; German: ''Industriegewerkschaft Metall'', "Industrial Union of Metalworkers'") is the dominant metalworkers' union in Germany, making it the country's largest union as well as Europe's largest industrial union. Analysts of Ge ...

, called FairTube. The goal is to improve transparency and fairness for YouTube creators against unfair demonetization and banning. The union hopes to force changes to YouTube policies using the

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, which requires transparency in dealing with personal data, which the union argues includes moderation decisions and categorization.

Personal life

Sprave expressed an interest in slingshots from an early age, and sold some of his own creations to classmates in school. Sprave holds a degree in economics from the Universität Paderborn. Since 1989, Sprave has been on the board of directors of ''MacroSystem Digital Video AG'', a manufacturer of

video editing software Video editing software, or a video editor is software used performing the post-production video editing of digital video sequences on a non-linear editing system. It has replaced traditional flatbed celluloid film editing tools and analog video ...

, including the Casablanca video editor. For some time, Sprave worked on his channel full-time, but out of fear of financial dependence on

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, he turned to a part-time video production schedule in September 2015. On 1 January 2017, he reinstated his position as a full-time YouTube creator and as a partner for the channel's online store, which was incorporated into the "GoGun GmbH" in May 2017. Sprave became CEO of the GoGun GmbH in December 2017.

Awards

Sprave's winning video for the '' Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation'' ''Condom-Challenge'' consisted of the design of a slingshot for condoms. As of April 2017, the video remains one of his most popular clips with more than 6.1 million views.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Sprave, Jörg 1965 births Living people People from Dortmund German YouTubers