YouTube Turns 15 and Rollei Celebrates with Them

On February 15, YouTube celebrates its 15th birthday. In these 15 years, the platform has become one of the most important media of our time and, as such, has become indispensable.

There are free videos from almost every area of life and guaranteed for every viewer, but it doesn't stop there. YouTube is not only suitable for tutorials, vlogs, music, gaming or comedy, but since its founding in 2005 it has also developed into an important organ of democracy and individual participation, as it consistently proves.

Our customers – content creators from many different countries around the world – also regularly post impressive works there that they create with our products. At Rollei, we are fans of YouTube. That's why, for the portal's birthday, we're providing a small overview of facts about one of our favorite portals.

This was the first YouTube video

The first video was uploaded to YouTube on April 23, 2005 by Jawed Karim, one of the platform's three founders, and it's called 'Me at the zoo.' In it, the still quite young man explains in English that the cool thing about the elephants behind him is that they have a long trunk. And that's about all there is to say about that.

The first billion-record

YouTube also holds some records. The first video to reach the gigantic mark of one billion clicks, for example, was the song "Gangnam Style" by the Korean singer Psy. The satirically tinged song is about the wealthy district of Gangnam in the South Korean capital Seoul. Until July 10, 2017, with about 2.9 billion views, it was the most-watched video on YouTube at that time. It was only replaced by the music video for the song 'See you again' by Wiz Khalifa and Charlie Puth (today 4.4 billion views). However, the song did not remain at the top for very long, as it was replaced in August by the music video for the song "Despacito" by Luis Fonsi and Daddy Yankee (today 6.6 billion views).

YouTube channel with the most subscribers (Germany)

With currently 10.8 million subscribers, the YouTube channel "Kurzgesagt – In a Nutshell" is the most successful YouTube channel in Germany. There, scientific topics are explained in an easy-to-understand way and supplemented with animations. For example, wormholes or loneliness are clearly explained, and philosophical questions are also addressed.

YouTube channel with the most subscribers (worldwide)

The YouTube channel T-Series has over 127 million subscribers. It is an Indian record label that was founded in 1983 and not only produces music, but also Bollywood films. The large fan base of Indian films with musical dance scenes, in addition to India's large population, is one of the reasons why T-Series has such a large number of followers.

Female YouTuber with the most subscribers (Germany)

With currently 5.84 million subscribers, Bianca Claßen (aka Bibi) runs the channel BibisBeautyPalace and can currently be called Germany's most successful female YouTuber. She makes videos about makeup, pranks, and everyday situations in her life, which she shares with her YouTuber husband Julian Claßen.

YouTuber with the most subscribers (worldwide)

Felix Kjellberg, aka PewDiePie, currently has 103 million subscribers, making him (still) the most successful YouTuber in the world. Originally, the Swedish YouTuber's videos were about "Let's Plays," which are recordings of someone playing PC games and commenting on them. Later, his videos increasingly developed into entertainment. For example, he let his fans ask him personal questions and answered them. PewDiePie has currently taken a break from his YouTube activities.

Rollei on YouTube

Rollei has also been on YouTube since 2012. We don't have as many subscribers as PewDiePie and Bibi, but we're happy about every single one of our 1600 subscribers. We regularly upload useful videos there, in which our followers, for example, get to know our new products, or how they can use our products correctly. For example, how to create the perfect panorama, or how our Rollei Go! smartphone gimbal is calibrated. It's definitely worth checking out. Our first video, by the way, was about how to insert a center column into our Rock Solid Alpha tripod.

And with that, we say happy birthday, YouTube!

As of: 10.2.2020