YouTube is Officially 20 Years Old

[27monster27 15,847]

https://variety.com/2025/digital/news/youtube-20-billion-videos-new-features-20th-birthday-1236375132/

20 years ago today, YouTube launched alongside its first true* video Me at the zoo. YouTube was launched as a video sharing platform in response to struggles to find videos of popular events online. The platform has evolved into one of the most important social media outlets in history. The ease of sharing video content easily brought in a major audience, and by the end of the 2000s several YouTube videos were already pulling in tens of millions of views. As of the twenty year anniversary, there are over 20 billion videos on the platform.

*Correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe there was a now deleted test video uploaded first.

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Happy twenty years to the platform that we know Lady Gaga first took over when VEVO came out:

 

[StrawberryBlond 15,555]

And I remember discovering it way back then as well. I don't know how I stumbled across it but I believe I was searching for a music video and found it here and then realised there was a bunch of interesting content and this was back when the site had no restrictions against uploading copyrighted stuff so people were uploading whole episodes of shows and whatnot. I remember telling my friends in school the next day about this cool new website I'd discovered and they'd never heard of it and they were always ahead of the curve on these things. So it became my great little find and now look where it is. I'm usually always the last to know when such sites come into existence but with this one, I was there when no one had even heard of it. Its been a constant in my life all these years to the point it's weird to imagine a time without it.

[Economy 52,838]

43 minutes ago, StrawberryBlond said:

And I remember discovering it way back then as well. I don't know how I stumbled across it but I believe I was searching for a music video and found it here and then realised there was a bunch of interesting content and this was back when the site had no restrictions against uploading copyrighted stuff so people were uploading whole episodes of shows and whatnot. I remember telling my friends in school the next day about this cool new website I'd discovered and they'd never heard of it and they were always ahead of the curve on these things. So it became my great little find and now look where it is. I'm usually always the last to know when such sites come into existence but with this one, I was there when no one had even heard of it. Its been a constant in my life all these years to the point it's weird to imagine a time without it.

I first heard about it in 2006. Even though I was 12, like a boomer I first heard of it when I was whatching Cable News 

 

Torontos CP24 brought it up and they were like "if you have a teen, odds are theyve visited this website. Its called youtube"

 

 

[Ayesha Erotica 1,924]

YouTube truly changed the world and has been THE video platform before TikTok snatched its crown and pushed it down to #2.

It is the site where I find new music and Youtube's algorithm suggested me The Fame songs even shortly before Gaga became famous and had her high chart positions, so I knew Gaga before the world knew her.

However, most of the American pop videos from the 2000s look awful to mediocre today, they do not exist in  720p HD or higher, just in 480p or fake upscaled HD, and a very blurry and pixelated. And they give YouTube a historical feeling.

The kids of today, the new generation, looks at these 2000s videos and considers them to be like how we - born in the 90s - found black-white videos from the post-WW2 era, old and dated. Even though, Full HD technology already existed at that time and even already in the 90s, it just didn't became a standard that fast. The Kpop scene very quickly moved to Full HD and have videos in good quality from their glorious days. 

 

[Ayesha Erotica 1,924]

9 minutes ago, Economy said:

Torontos CP24 brought it up and they were like "if you have a teen, odds are theyve visited this website. Its called youtube"

 

 

And two Canadians, Avril Lavigne with Girlfriend - first video to ever surpass 100 million views - and Jusitn Bieber with Baby - a very high number of dislikes - ruled the YouTube scene. Early YouTube was the heyday of Canada!

[Morphine Prince 109,645]

Crazy that I’ve been watching since 2005. And I watch YouTube every day. 

[LaLa 19,898]

Truly a cliche, I discovered it from the SNL sketch Lazy Sunday. I was 19 and it was life changing, kids today have no idea 

[RochesterJoannster 4,042]

It definitely seemed so different then. It somehow felt more like guilty pleasure/time wasting than actually watching TV. The lower quality of the videos was part of the charm. 
 

Now it’s pretty much how I watch TV, apart from Hulu for some of the shows. 

[4th Time Around 5,059]

20 years? Time starts to feel like it's moving crazy fast the older you get

[SevenWonder 4,743]

12 minutes ago, 4th Time Around said:

20 years? Time starts to feel like it's moving crazy fast the older you get

Honestly. 

[PunkTheFunk 125,703]

Damn I'm old. I think I first started watching Youtube in 2007/08. Shane Dawson (pre-cancellation), Fred, random viral videos like Charlie Bit My Finger, clips from MadTV, Chocolate Rain, Shoes, LEAVE BRITNEY ALONE... You had to be there 

[River 127,318]

I remember I was so scared that it was a virus

[Oriane 22,734]

As I remember, it had always been around in my internet days so I was shocked to learn, years later, that it had only existed since 2005. 2009 was when I started really being online, and I remember watching music videos, funny videos, doing karaoke with my best friend. It's crazy to think that YouTube was still relatively new, in my mind it was so long established.

[27monster27 15,847]

24 minutes ago, Oriane said:

As I remember, it had always been around in my internet days so I was shocked to learn, years later, that it had only existed since 2005. 2009 was when I started really being online, and I remember watching music videos, funny videos, doing karaoke with my best friend. It's crazy to think that YouTube was still relatively new, in my mind it was so long established.

I think I was on YouTube at least by 2009, though it may have been the early 2010's. I know I was for sure watching in 2010 because I showed my mom Firework by Katy Perry because I thought she would like it (she doesn't like most pop and Katy Perry so her loving reaction was probably forced ).

[Pigatha 1,330]

I used to love YouTube,  but it's not the same as it was 8-10 years ago and most of the good creators are gone or don't/can't make quality content anymore thanks to the restrictions.