YouTube is founded, ushering in mass online video
- Date
- 14 February 2005
- Category
- Culture, arts & philosophy
- Region
- United States
- Era
- Contemporary
- Significance
On 14 February 2005 three former PayPal employees, Chad Hurley, Steve Chen and Jawed Karim, founded YouTube, a website that allowed users to upload, share and watch video freely over the internet.
The first clip, a nineteen-second video titled 'Me at the zoo' featuring Karim, was uploaded on 23 April 2005. By making video publishing as simple as posting text, YouTube removed the technical barriers that had limited online video and rapidly attracted enormous audiences. Google acquired the company in late 2006, and YouTube went on to become the dominant global platform for user-generated and professional video alike, hosting everything from music and tutorials to news, activism and entertainment. It created new forms of celebrity and livelihood through advertising revenue sharing, helped drive demand for faster broadband, and reshaped the music, media and advertising industries. Like other major platforms, it also raised difficult questions about copyright, content moderation, recommendation algorithms and the spread of harmful material, becoming a central pillar of internet culture watched by billions.
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Further reading
The wider story
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