The First YouTube Video Ever Posted Has Made a Lot of Money

Before makeup bloggers and clips of funny animal fails, the first ever YouTube video was posted back in 2005. Since then, the website has become a leading video-sharing platform, and “Me at the Zoo” has made a lot of money. The video was posted by Jawed Karim, one of YouTube’s founders.

YouTube’s First-Ever Video

YouTube was founded by American software entrepreneurs and engineers – Jawed Karim, Steve Chan, and Chad Hurley on 14th February, 2005. Since then, people have gotten used to seeing viral videos like “Charlie Bit My Finger!” and songs like “Gangnam Style”, and it could be said they have become part of global culture. Still, the first-ever YouTube video wasn’t posted by a major content creator but by co-founder Jawed Karim on 23rd April, 2005.

The video shows Karim being at the zoo, and is aptly called “Me at the Zoo.” It is a 19-second video with the 25-year-old engineer talking in front of some elephants at the San Diego Zoo. That video has been watched over 265 million times, and Karim now has 3.54 million subscribers to a channel with a single video on it. It has undoubtedly made a lot of money since then, and while Karim never took a salary, benefits, or a formal title, he walked away with $64 million in shares.

Karim’s Video Demonstrated the Format Perfectly

The video itself was created using Karim’s camera and recorded by his high school friend, Yakov Lapitsky, who was with Karim in San Diego. While the video seems forgettable, it was the perfect model for what YouTube hoped to be for its users – a platform where anyone could share interesting or other moments from their own lives. YouTube’s statement was that its mission was to give everyone a voice and show people the world, and that format was certainly a great way to achieve that.

The comment section beneath the video is just as iconic as the video itself, and a post from the San Diego Zoo even states that the zoo was honored to be the location where the first-ever YouTube video was filmed.