What was the original purpose of YouTube when it was founded?

YouTube was originally conceived as a video dating site. Founders Chad Hurley, Steve Chen, and Jawed Karim later changed direction when the concept struggled to attract enough dating videos.

The early idea was influenced by Hot or Not, a website where users rated other people's photos. Hurley and Chen described YouTube's first concept as a video version of an online dating service. The founders even posted Craigslist advertisements asking women to upload videos of themselves in exchange for a $100 reward.

That plan quickly gave way to a broader service that accepted all kinds of videos. Jawed Karim has also offered a different account of the site's inspiration, pointing to the difficulty of finding online clips of Janet Jackson's 2004 Super Bowl incident and the Indian Ocean tsunami. Those experiences helped motivate the more open video-sharing model that YouTube became.

The distinction matters: YouTube launched as a general video-sharing platform, but its original purpose was narrower. Its first public beta opened on April 23, 2005, and the first uploaded video, “Me at the zoo,” featured Karim at the San Diego Zoo. Google acquired YouTube in November 2006 for $1.65 billion.