Launched in February 2005 by Silicon Valley veterans, YouTube had by mid-2006 grown into the clear leader of online video, serving more than 100 million clips per day and commanding roughly 60 percent of the market, ahead of Yahoo, MSN, Google, and AOL, according to audience tracker Hitwise. Visitor numbers quadrupled between January and June 2006, per Nielsen/Netratings data.
The site's most-watched clip, a six-minute dance routine called 'Evolution of Dance' by motivational performer Jud Laipply, logged more than 31 million views, more than double the second-ranked video. Viral moments such as soccer star Zinedine Zidane's World Cup headbutt also generated waves of user parodies.
The platform's mainstream appeal became clear when NBC, after initially demanding removal of unauthorized 'Saturday Night Live' clips, reversed course and struck a promotional partnership with YouTube once it realized the site was driving higher viewership for the show than the original broadcast itself.
Analysts compared YouTube's position to that of Myspace and Skype, both acquired for large sums despite thin profit models. The New York Post estimated YouTube's value at between 600 million and one billion dollars, though no formal acquisition offer had been made publicly as of mid-August 2006.
Historical summary. TurkishPress restated this wire report, first published in August 2006, in its own words.