The Evolution of YouTube

Authors: Bella Vallone and Cassidy Bray

Did you know that YouTube was created as a dating app? According to the NationSquid YouTube video “YouTube | How It All Started”, Chad Hurley, Jawed Karim and Steve Chen’s first idea for YouTube was described as “Tune in, hook up” (YouTube | How It All Started). The original thought for YouTube was a dating website where instead of uploading photos you would upload short videos of yourself with a profile to go along with it. Unfortunately, this concept did not catch on as there was a similar site but it did open the gates for one thing, user-generated content. 

This content was the center point for YouTube, hence the name. The “You” is directed towards the content being user-generated and “Tube” is a nod to an original term used for television. On February 14th 2005, the domain “YouTube” was registered as a video sharing app that creators could post to. YouTube was the website that would finally be a solution to the questions that were being asked. It would become the platform where it would be easy to find videos, not making you search the web tirelessly for one anymore. The first video to be uploaded to YouTube was on April 25th 2005 by Jawed Karim. The video was “Me at the Zoo” which is a 19 second video of Karim in front of the elephant exhibit. YouTube was only in the beta stage when this video was uploaded. While YouTube was still in the beta stage, a Nike Ad became the first video to reach 1 million views on the platform. Soon after this happened Youtube went public as a cooperation for all to use. 

After YouTube went public, it continued to grow as a site and in popularity. YouTube started to gain investments, one being from Sequoia which after two rounds of deals totaled $11.5 million. In 2006, they also made a deal with Warner Music and shortly after this deal, YouTube was acquired by Google. YouTube started to gain recognition and in 2009, it won its first Peabody Award. Over the years, YouTube as a site did not win many awards but the creators on the app started to. The first ever award that was won was to Tay Zonday in 2008 for best music video on the platform. The first Youtuber to get a Gold Play Button, an award to represent subscriber milestones, was PewDiePie when he reached 1 million subscribers. Throughout YouTube's history, so many creators have received Play Button awards as well as other awards from various award shows that highlight their success in the media field. 

YouTube became a platform that many could rely on for its convenience. Founder Steve Chen states “I think the main attraction to the site can be broken down into a couple things. One, is not having a traditional time slot, you do not have to be at a certain place at a certain time to catch a show, so you can basically at any time you want, whether when you are in the office or home at night, you can log into YouTube and find what you want to see” (YouTube Co-Founders Chad Hurley & Steve Chen on Transforming Video Sharing l Charlie Rose Rewind). This quote from Steve Chen is almost 10 years old but is still one of the reasons people gravitate towards Youtube. While doing interviews around campus to see how often students used YouTube, there were a variety of answers. Some of these included “in the afternoon”, “when I have nothing else to do and I am just in my room”, “before I go to bed, when I am at school, I love YouTube” and I personally watch Youtube while I am eating or doing chores. Many people use YouTube at different times of the day for different reasons but no matter what there will be something to watch to keep you interested. 

With so many people going onto the platform, some videos over time would start to gain more traction and popularity. This in turn would cause some videos to go viral, some for good reasons and some for bad. Throughout YouTube’s history there are a good amount of viral videos to look at.

At the beginning of the many videos that started going viral, it was often copyrighted material. One of the first videos to go viral was the “Lazy Sunday” SNL skit, which was made in December of 2005, shortly after YouTube was first launched. This video was considered a “joke rap” and it featured the group The Lonely Island. This video being from SNL had to eventually be taken down due to copyright restrictions, but that doesn’t mean it didn’t have a large impact on future viral videos. This opened a whole new genre of joke raps, and was one of the reasons they became popular. Many more people started doing them. Not only were these rap videos posted to YouTube, but the copyrighted material didn’t stop. If anything, they increased. As viral as “Lazy Sunday went, people began posting more skits and clips that weren’t supposed to be uploaded. This eventually caused YouTube to make their copyright restrictions more strict. Another video that went viral on YouTube was a video titled “Charlie bit my finger”. This was a video of two small children posted by their parents. While the goal was to capture a sweet moment between the two siblings, it became something referenced by hundreds of people after they both laughed about the baby biting the other child’s finger. It quickly grew in popularity, becoming one of the most viral YouTube videos! 

YouTube’s history and the beginning of viral videos jumpstarted a lot of popular trends and new genres that were never thought of. The joke raps and songs were a very big thing for a while which grew into lip syncing and parodies of songs, and funny videos like “Charlie bit my finger” turned into different compilations and skits that are still popular today. YouTube is one of the biggest websites to this day, bringing in millions of views every single day. While the original idea for it to be a dating app didn’t catch on, the creators definitely found success in YouTube in the end.