Online content site, YouTube, marks 20 years in existence this year.
The video sharing juggernaut, was launched on Valentine's Day 2005, having been reportedly put together by colleagues Steve Chen, Chad Hurley and Jawed Karim, with Karim uploading the first ever video to the site on 23 April that year.
This video was titled, Me At The Zoo, showing Karim at the San Diego Zoo elephant exhibit, which earned 348 million views.
Fast forward to last year, YouTube had reached over 2.5 billion viewers worldwide last year. Its music and premium tier subscribers also hit 100 million.
Over a billion hours of YouTube material have been watched on a daily basis on TV sets, according to Google.
"If you go back 20 years, it would have seemed laughable that this website with kids making parody videos would become a threat to Disney, ABC, and CBS", eMarketer analyst Ross Benes said. "That's what they were able to accomplish".
According to analysts, Google's purchase of YouTube for $1.65 billion in stock, has been viewed as a key moment, as it combined Google's search and advertising acumen, with a platform that shares videos with passionate users.
The company have also built a successful model, by sharing revenue with creators, leading to a growing audience. They have also allayed previous concerns regarding inappropriate material, including parody videos of popular cartoon characters in violent or risqué situations.
Such material had previously been shown as safe for children by recommendation software.
According to projections, YouTube is expected to have more paid subscribers than all US cable television, within two years, Benes has said.
As well as competing with streaming services like Netflix, Prime Video, and Disney, the site has also been in competition with TikTok and Instagram reels.
Following TikTok's increasing popularity, YouTube have introduced its 'shorts' feature, which has averaged over 70 billion daily viewers.
Speaking on their growth, Mike Proulx, vice president and research director at market research company Forrester, had this to say.
"As the original streaming video platform, YouTube has continued to evolve and differentiate", he said. "It's the de facto standard for long-form, user-generated video, literally defining the modern 'creator'".
Last September, the platform were forced to suspend adverts on Russel Brand's YouTube channel, following allegations of sexual misconduct against the comedian. More on this here.
