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Viral Video and the Rise of YouTube

Mr. Spock gives a behind-the-scenes tour in <em>Star Trek Cribs -- The Director's Cut.</em>
Mr. Spock gives a behind-the-scenes tour in Star Trek Cribs -- The Director's Cut.

In just six months, YouTube boomed from a startup viral video site to a Web phenomenon, a virtual library of cultural highlights and amateur video clips uploaded by anybody with a digital camcorder and some time to burn.

Users upload 50,000 videos a day, at last count, and visitors watch 50 million clips per day. Not bad for a company with 26 employees and an office over a pizza parlor.

The site is funded by venture capitalists. Despite its enormous popularity, it remains to be seen how YouTube will make money.

Guests discuss the future of YouTube: Is it free publicity -- or copyright infringement?

Guests:

Thomas Goetz, deputy editor of Wired magazine

Mike Miliard, staff writer for the Boston Phoenix

Paul Kedrosky, writes the "Infectious Greed" blog

Copyright 2022 NPR. To see more, visit https://www.npr.org.

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