Inside the New YouTube Exhibit Featured in V&A Museum

A brand-new YouTube exhibit launched yesterday, February 18th, in the Victoria and Albert Museum in London. The exhibit is a key milestone that cements YouTube's and the internet's place in design history.

The heart of the exhibit features the very first video ever uploaded to the platform: "Me at the zoo."

Posted by YouTube's Co-Founder Jawed Karim at just 19 seconds, the video marks the beginning of a huge shift in internet culture, and the birth of UGC.

The video was posted 20 years ago and sits at 382 million views. Karim's YouTube channel has amassed nearly 6 million subscribers, despite not having posted a video since.

The V&A installation presents YouTube exactly as it appeared on the 8th December, 2006. The reconstruction was developed by the museum in collaboration with YouTube’s UX team and interaction design studio oio, perfectly recreating the nostalgia of the platform’s early interface.

The exhibit is a recognition of how YouTube redefined the term Creator in just 20 years. Long before the algorithm dominated social media, YouTube's early watch page quietly established online participation in the form of upload, rate, comment and share. It was the essential groundwork for what would become a billion-dollar industry.

Visitors can see the reconstructed watch page at the V&A in the 1900-now gallery, while a behind-the-scenes look at the technical process behind the rebuild will be hosted at the V&A East Storehouse.