Topic
21 facts from 15 episodes, in date order. These are what speakers said on the shows, each linked to the moment it was said. They aren't independently verified.
2005
The 'Lazy Sunday' sketch from Saturday Night Live, uploaded to YouTube, increased YouTube's traffic by 83%.
“this is in that brief phase where YouTube was an ascendant startup and not yet part of Google. That one skit increased YouTube traffic by 83%.”
2006
Google acquired YouTube in 2006 for $1.65 billion.
“So big acquisition price. I mean, this is a $1.65 billion acquisition.”
2006
Google bought YouTube in November 2006 for $1.65 billion in stock, less than 18 months after the site launched.
“So, in November 2006, which is less than 18 months after the product launched, Google buys YouTube for $1.65 billion in stock.”
2009
A video from the so-called Catch Me Killer was posted to YouTube in 2009.
“This happened in 2009. I mean, these are kind of the internet has come so far s i in such a short amount of time.”
mid-2010s
Choudary says Facebook, Instagram and YouTube were seen as social networking winners in the mid-2010s, all built on the social graph.
“Facebook, Instagram, YouTube were declared as the winners of social networking, and all of them were structured on a s on a simple logic of the social graph.”
2011
Google Brain's 2011 cat paper trained a nine-layer neural network on unlabeled YouTube frames using 16,000 CPU cores on 1,000 machines.
“What they did was they trained a large nine-layer neural network to recognize cats from unlabeled frames of YouTube videos using 16,000 CPU cores on 1,000 different machines.”
2014
Harari says that around 2014 the managers of Facebook and YouTube told their algorithms to increase user engagement.
“the managers of Facebook and YouTube, they told their algorithms. Your goal is to increase user engagement”
2016
The hosts say YouTube had about $5 billion in annual run-rate revenue when they covered it in 2016, and now around $35 to $40 billion.
“YouTube was doing about $5 billion run rate revenue.”
2019
Google reported YouTube as a revenue segment of about $15 billion a year in its most recent earnings.
“A fast-growing revenue segment of $15 billion a year.”
2020
At the time of recording, Ben Gilbert cited 1.5 billion monthly active users for WhatsApp, making it the largest messaging network, versus 2.4 billion for Facebook and 2 billion for YouTube.
“Facebook has 2.4 billion MAUs. YouTube has 2 billion. WhatsApp has one and a half, making it the largest messaging network.”
2023
Pichai says Google has built generative AI into more than 25 of its products, including Gmail, Google Docs, Search and YouTube.
“we have incorporated generative AI in over twenty five of our products, be it Gmail or Google Docs or search or YouTube and so on.”
2024
YouTube's advertising revenue was $36 billion in 2024, according to the hosts.
“So, last year in 2024, YouTube ads alone did $36 billion in revenue.”
Undated
Chenyi Shi argues that YouTube accumulates knowledge about each user's tastes and other viewers' watch time, which makes search easier than on a copycat platform.
“YouTube accumulates this unique set of knowledge about both what you like and watch time of others that attest to the quality of the video.”
Undated
Chenyi Shi describes YouTube as charging users in attention, monetizing that attention through advertising and then paying creators.
“they have accumulated so much heterogeneous content that they are able to charge enough mindshare from their users. And they monetize that mindshare with advertising dollars, which they then pay their creators.”
Undated
Ben Gilbert says many people thought Google was making a mistake with YouTube because the service lost billions of dollars for more than a decade.
“Famously, everybody thought that Google was nuts with YouTube because it lost billions of dollars for more than a decade.”
Undated
Mitch Lasky says Minecraft-related videos on YouTube passed 1 trillion views, all made by the community rather than Mojang.
“Minecraft, for example, where they just crossed the 1 trillion view mark on YouTube, right?”
Undated
The hosts say YouTube pays creators 55% of revenue on long-form video and 45% on Shorts.
“they pay out 55% of revenue on long form and 45% on shorts directly to creators.”
Undated
Arora recalls that for years it was unclear how YouTube would make money while Netflix was seen as the profitable streaming business.
“I remember how for the longest of years, nobody quite knew how YouTube was gonna make money, and everybody was looking at Netflix as the one who are making money in streaming.”
Undated
Liam Dunne says that if he had to pick one channel for search visibility he would choose YouTube because it is a Google-owned search channel.
“I'd bet on YouTube. It's a it's actually a a native search channel, it's owned by Google. I think it's gonna be around for a while.”
Undated
Elisabeth Vincentelli says YouTube clips of Celine Dion's talk-show appearances revealed her eccentric personality and helped change her public image.
“Because what starts appearing on YouTube are videos of her appearances on talk shows, for instance.”
Undated
Joe Rogan noted that the disturbing Elsagate-style cartoons began appearing before generative AI existed, so someone must have paid to produce them.
“well, what's really weird is they started coming out before AI was even available. So somebody had to put some money into making those cartoons.”
Episodes