It’s hard to believe that YouTube is only ten years old. How would people like you and I procrastinate without watching funny babies, cute cat videos, and grown men falling off treadmills?

YouTube was founded February 14, 2005 by founders Chad Hurley, Steve Chen, and Jawed Karim. These three men all started together at another popular internet site, PayPal.  While working there they came up with the idea for YouTube and the rest is history.

YouTube isn’t only popular in the United States. It has grown all over the world. Every day YouTube has over 4 billion views worldwide, and over 900 million people are regular users of YouTube. YouTube is also available in 75 countries and in 61 languages.

The most viewed video on YouTube (of all time) of PSY, a Korean Pop singer who became famous for a dance in his music video Gangam Style, with over 2 billion views, which we all are guilty of dancing to at one point or another. The YouTuber with the highest amount of subscribers is PewDiePie who’s hilarious antics make a viewer want to watch more and more. He currently has over 35 million subscribers, and is known for his gaming and “challenge” videos, in which he takes on absurd or very difficult tasks.

When it comes to YouTubing, there are various ways to get popular through your videos. Popular themes of most viewed vids are pranks, sports videos, and gaming videos. Popular prank YouTubers include, Jack Vale, Roman Atwood, and Vitaly Zdorovetskiy. These people spend their days pulling off practical jokes on strangers to get millions of views per video.

There are many different kinds of sports videos on YouTube, such as soccer, football, lacrosse, basketball, baseball, tennis, track, and many more. Most of the sports videos are edited clips of highlights or funny sporting mistakes. Gaming videos are the most common types of channels on YouTube. Many popular gaming YouTubers include, Wroeteshaw, KSI, MaxPlaysFIFA, and many others. Gaming videos are usually about common video games such as FIFA, Madden, NBA 2K, Minecraft, Call of Duty, Battlefield and almost any other kind of game.

YouTube has many benefits for those who use it, but it can also have many negatives. Justin Bieber is currently a multi-million dollar recording artist who was discovered by his singing videos that he posted on YouTube. His most popular was Baby, which currently has over 1 billion views. However, some singers don’t reach that positive kind of fame, such as Rebecca Black, an aspiring 14 year old singer posted a original song called “Friday” today the video has over 77 million views and over 1.5 million dislikes. After her video was posted she was forced out of school due to bullying and her life hasn’t been the same since. Although the majority don’t end up like Rebecca Black, or Justin Bieber there is a certain possibility of infamy, or fame.

There is a constant debate between YouTube and television. Some argue that television is going the way of the dinosaur, and that YouTube is the way of the future. Others argue that television isn’t going away and that YouTube is just a phase. Freshman Bryce Gay, is a very big YouTube fan. “I like how there is variety, you can choose to watch what you want when you want to.” Along with Bryce, Freshman Samson Yang enjoys to spend his time on YouTube “I enjoy prank videos and other comedy videos. Sports videos are also fun to watch” On the other hand there are some who fight on the side of the television and why that is better than YouTube, these people find it more traditional and find that the content is much better than YouTube.

YouTube can change the lives of people. Many people look for extra motivation through videos on YouTube. Others have made a living making YouTube videos and putting them out for people to see. Others may see a video of a cat playing the piano and decide that today would be the day they get a cat. Aspiring athletes can watch videos of their favorite player and learn from him or her. Others have seen a negative life change from YouTube.

Almost every student at the school has a YouTube account and there even were a couple students who make videos of there own. The ease of YouTube is one of the many reasons many people enjoy watching YouTube videos and making YouTube a large part of there day.