Seven years ago today, YouTube got its first content, a very unassuming 19 second video about how elephants have “really, really long trunks, and that’s cool.” Entitled “Me At The Zoo,” the clip was uploaded way back in 2007 and features — along with some elephants — YouTube co-founder Jawed Karim. In that time, the video has amassed some 7,490,607 views, a number that pales in comparison to newer classics like Rebecca Black’s Friday, which picked up nearly 30 million in 7 months, or what purports to be the original Nyan Cat video, which managed 71 million in a year.
Of course, between now and then, YouTube has really taken off. You know that, but the numbers are what really brings it home. On April 23rd 2005, YouTube had 19 seconds of video uploaded per day. Now, YouTube has one hour of footage uploaded every second at least; that number is from January. It also gets somewhere around 4 billion pageviews per day.
Where will YouTube be 7 years from now? It’s anyone’s guess, but if it wants to stick around, it’s going to have to fight off some of the intense lawsuits that have been levied against it. That said, YouTube is one heck of a Internet juggernaut, and it’d take a lot to bring it down. Here’s to hoping for 7 more years of videos, viral and otherwise. I’d really rather not have to go back to watching flash animations exclusively, as funny as some of them may be.
(via Mashable)
- YouTube is currently facing a 1 billion dollar lawsuit from Viacom
- YouTube is going to stream the entire 2012 Olympics
- Thanks to YouTube, people like Ray Sipe can reach the masses
