Taryn Southern

Southern grew up in Wichita, Kansas and landed her first starring role in a pre-Broadway theatrical production at the age of 10.[1] As a teenager, she co-hosted a regional talk show for WB Kansas that discussed teen issues.[2] She graduated from Wichita East High School in 2003.[3]

At 20, Southern graduated from the University of Miami, earning a B.S. in Anthropology and a B.A. in Journalism. While in school she competed in American Idol and received a grant to travel to Peru to study the shamanic use of ayahuasca among rainforest communities.[4]

In 2004, at 17, she appeared on third season of American Idol, making it to Hollywood week and the Top 50.[5]

In 2006/2007, she produced a travel show, Project MyWorld, for DirecTV, which followed her and two friends as they traveled the world and met their MySpace friends.[6]

On July 2, 2007, she released a comedic YouTube video called Hott4Hill in support of the first presidential campaign of U.S. Senator Hillary Clinton. In the video, which she wrote and performed as a satire of the Obama Girl video, she sings about how much she would like to see Clinton win the election.[7] That same year, Southern appeared as a guest on Hardball with Chris Matthews [8] and was hired to be the face of Cosmopolitan.com's first daily online series.[9]

In 2008, she starred in the first online series for The WB, Sorority Forever, alongside best friend and lonelygirl15 star Jessica Rose.[10] In November 2008, Southern and Jessica Rose launched Webutantes, a new media studio.[11]

In 2008/2009, Southern wrote/produced her first comedic musical web series, Private High Musical, which was released across various media platforms, and which was later sold to MTV as a half-hour comedy pilot, with David Zuckerman (Family Guy) as co-writer/executive producer.[12]

In 2010, she had a recurring role in the 5th season of the CBS comedy series Rules of Engagement, as well as a part in the movie Battle: Los Angeles as a reporter.

In 2011, Southern was a correspondent for the US version of The X Factor.[13] She also provided voice overs for the character Judy on the Fred animated series on YouTube.

In 2012, she appeared as a guest star and voice on New Girl, American Dad!, The League, and Guys with Kids.[14] Notably, Southern launched her YouTube channel in 2012 by releasing one video per week for a year. As of 2015, she had more than 450,000 subscribers.

In 2013, Southern released her comedy album, which contained a few earlier releases, reached #20 on the iTunes comedy chart, and was recognized by Billboard."[15][16] The song “Crush”, which was on the album, made it to the Top 100 in radio play that August.[17] Since then, Southern has released more than 50 original songs and covers as well as an 80's inspired album, Flashback Friday.[18]

In 2013, Southern was hired to be a correspondent on Shark After Dark Live during Shark Week on Discovery Channel, which earned the #1 ratings spot in their time slot all week.[19] Southern was later hired to continue her role as correspondent for Naked After Dark on Discovery Channel, a companion late-night show to Naked and Afraid.[20]

In 2014, Southern's YouTube Channel was listed on New Media Rockstars Top 100 Channels, ranked at #52.[21]

In May 2015, Southern began hosting the 2000s and Today Countdown on The Pulse for Sirius XM. She also debuted a series with Marriott that was later renewed for a second season.[22][23] Later in 2015, Maker Studios announced that they would be launching a late night talk show with Southern as the host.[24] The series, which launched in 2015 and 2016, was an exploration of internet culture and featured guests ranging from celebrity/science enthusiast Seth MacFarlane and #1 Vine Star "King Bach" to psychedelic advocate Zach Leary and activist musician Kate Nash.[25]

In 2016, Taryn was featured in article in Vanity Fair, alongside several other popular video creators.[26]

By 2017, Southern had stopped posting regular content on her YouTube channel and removed many of her past videos. She cited the YouTube algorithm as problematic for the digital community, and a desire to focus on other creative endeavors and emerging technology.[27][28]

In 2017, Southern received a grant from the Google VR Creator Lab to create several pieces of experimental VR content, one of which was later nominated for a streamy.[29][30] Southern was also chosen to be an ambassador for The Geena Davis Institute Gender in Media #ShesGotDrive campaign to promote female voices in media.[31]

Southern's VR project led her to begin work on her 2018 album titled I AM AI, where the backing music was generated using a variety of AI-based musical composition tools including Amper, an open source product which allows users to create music based on user generated inputs.[32][33] The first single from I AM AI, Break Free, was released in August 2017 and features backing music generated using Amper. The song is about a woman who wants to break free of biological limitations.[34] The album received international attention, and radio play in the US.[35] For the song New World, Southern released a token using blockchain technology to enable hundreds of potential collaborators to split backend royalties on sales and streams of the track.[36]

In 2019, Southern and co-director Elena Gaby premiered I AM HUMAN at the 2019 Tribeca Film Festival.[37] The Winner of four "Best Feature" awards following its premiere, I AM HUMAN chronicles the emotional journey of three real-world pioneers with implantable brain interfaces: a paraplegic, blind retiree, an artist struggling with Parkinson’s, and the scientists and entrepreneurs on the frontlines of pressing technical and ethical quandaries. I AM HUMAN won: Best of the Fest at the 2019 El Dorado Film Festival,[38] Audience Choice for Best Feature at the 2019 Eastern Oregon Film Festival,[39] Outstanding First Feature at the Tallgrass Film Festival, Best Feature at Other Worlds Austin,[40] Best Director at the Oslo Film Festival.[41] I AM HUMAN was released on March 10, 2020 on video-on-demand platforms.[42]

• On My Face (2012)
• Flashback Friday (2015)
• I AM AI (2018)

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Taryn Southern.

• Official Website
• Taryn Southern at IMDb