YouTube was created by three former employees of the payments company PayPal: Chad Hurley, Steve Chen and Jawed Karim. The domain was registered in February 2005, and the first video, Me at the zoo, a short clip of Karim, was uploaded in April of that year. The site made it easy for anyone to upload and share video without technical knowledge, and it grew explosively. In 2006 Google bought it for 1.65 billion US dollars. YouTube became the world's largest video platform, giving rise to a new kind of celebrity known as the creator, changing music distribution and television habits, and raising debates over copyright, misinformation and content moderation.
Before and after
- 26 January 2005Discovery of Hiʻiaka
- February 2005Release of Armenian Wikipedia
- 3 February 2005Kam Air Flight 904
- 8 February 2005Release of Google Maps
- 14 February 2005Launch of YouTube
- from 21 February 2005 to 19 July 2008Premiere of Avatar: The Last Airbender
- 14 March 2005Anti-Secession Law
- from 22 March 2005 to 11 April 2005Tulip Revolution
- from 24 March 2005 to 16 May 2013Premiere of The Office
More in Science & technology
- 1945Discovery of promethium
- 1950Discovery of californium
- 1952Discovery of einsteinium
- December 1952Discovery of fermium
- 29 August 1982Discovery of meitnerium
- June 2002Discovery of oganesson
The era
This moment belongs to the Contemporary world (1945 CE to today), the world since 1945. You can also browse everything in the 21st century.