YouTube's evolution from a video dating service to a global platform has enabled millions to create careers and has become a primary source of entertainment and education worldwide.

Even after pivoting from a dating site, YouTube initially saw no traction. I would check the access logs and sometimes there would be no records for 24 hours. It felt demoralizing to have a cool idea but not a single person visiting the site.

I believed YouTube could become the destination for user-generated video on the internet. They had a spectacular team, and the product was delightful and easy to use, which led to Sequoia Capital backing YouTube's first financing.

Back in 2005, when YouTube was founded by Steve Chen, Chad Hurley, and Jawed Karim, broadband was just emerging in the United States, and it wasn't clear that the internet could even support video, let alone at the massive scale we take for granted today. YouTube was a longshot idea, and initially, almost no one noticed it.

YouTube is fundamentally about watching, sharing, and creating video content, and it aims to maintain its position as the world's oldest and largest creator economy.

YouTube will continue to focus on technology and support for creators, while the creative direction will be determined by the creators themselves. When I first started at YouTube ten years ago, the number of creators was around four or five, but now there's a proliferation of amazing content and creativity, which defines YouTube today and will continue to do so in the next decade.

Initially, we faced challenges with our website as users preferred YouTube over our platform, leading us to pivot our strategy based on user feedback.

The concept of going viral is synonymous with YouTube, but it didn't happen overnight. Initially, we would get one interesting clip going viral every week, which gradually increased to every few days, and eventually, every day there would be amazing new content.

The embed feature was crucial for YouTube's growth. It allowed users to share videos on platforms like MySpace, which helped create an organic virality without spending any money on marketing.