YouTube exceeds two billion views a day

YouTube is celebrating exceeding two billion hits a day, five years after it launched in beta.

To celebrate its fifth anniversary, the Google-owned site will launch a campaign in which users tell their personal stories of how YouTube has affected their lives, underlining its founding commitment to be a place where “anyone with a video camera and an internet connection can share a story with the world”.

Five years ago Chad Hurley, the site’s co-founder and chief executive, said he had pinned his hopes for YouTube on the basic premise that “everyone in the back of their mind wants to be a star”.

The ‘My YouTube Story’ campaign will be featured on a Five Year Channel showing interactive world maps of user videos and an interactive timeline of video milestones.

Guest curators including American chat-show host Conan O’Brien will pick five of their favourite YouTube clips from the past five years.

The site has gained a billion views a day in the past seven months, indicating that its decision last year to introduce long-form content is paying off.

In October, YouTube struck its first content deal with Channel 4, making the broadcaster’s long-form programmes available on YouTube for free for the first time.Since then, it has struck deals with Channel Five, as well as with the IPL (for live streaming of cricket matches during the series). The site was bought by Google in 2006 for $1.65 billion.