Video Tube (Battle of Manzikert)

Video Tube

Official Logo of Video Tube.
Recommended Page of Video Tube.
URL	video_tube.com
Slogan	Your Content
Type of site	Social Media, Video Platform
Registration	optional
Available language(s)	French (Official), English, Greek, Muscovite, Iberian
Users	793 million
Content licence	Uploader holds copyright (standard license); Creative Commons can be selected.
Written in	MIX_Script
Owner	Jean-François Beauvau
Launched	May 5, 2003 (17 years ago)
Revenue	$500 billion
Alexa rank	#3
Current status	active

Video Tube, formerly known as Camtube (2003 - 2006), and colloquialy reffered to a V-Tube, is a French video-streaming corporation based in Lyon. It was established in 2003 by Charlie Martin, a university-graduate at the Sorbonne as Camtube, and began to gain traction following its Wikilopedia article being nominated for featured status in 2004. By 2007, it was the second-largest social media company in the world, only behind Share.com. In 2014, it was purchased by Video Imperium and acts as its largest asset.

Video Tube allows for users to upload, view, rate, share, add to playlists, report, comment on videos, and subscribe to other users. Most videos are created by independent users, though companies such as The Athenian Chronicle often upload videos concerning topics they are involved in (i.e: in the case of TAC, news). Available videos include video-clips, TV-Shows, educational content, music videos, vlogging, documentaries, trailers, and more, in addition to text content such as the blogging feature available since 2006.

Unregistered videos can only view, but cannot submit or even approve of videos. Officially, all who run a channel must be at least 15 years of age.

In 2010, Video Tube introduced content monetization for publishers on the site.

History

Video Tube was founded in 2003 by Charlie Martin, shortly after he graduated from the University of Paris, where he majored in Computer Science. Martin stated that the idea of Video Tube (or then Camtube) was inspired by the de facto social media system at his school, where assignments were submitted via the Grand Global Web.

Kauto Star's first win in France RARE FOOTAGE

The first video uploaded to Video Tube, footage of a local Equestrian game in his home town of Bordeaux.

The domain, camtube.com was activated on May 13, 2002, while Martin was still embroiled in his senior years of university. Development of the site continued in the meanwhile, with Martin temporarily receiving aid from his very own computer science professor. A temporary beta version was released on December 11, 2002, with the very first video on the platform, titled "Jeu équestre local à Bordeaux" (Local Equestrian Game in Bordeaux) being uploaded on December 12. Martin was registered under the username of "Charles, duc d'Orléans."

Photo of a 23-year-old Charles Martin.

The official version of Camtube was launched on May 5, 2003. By then, Martin had proceeded to upload four more videos, in addition to two other accounts that had uploaded two videos each. The site grew slowly, as it was relatively obscure.

Initial Growth

On May 8, Martin, having concluded that his site was to be a flop, sold the website to his co-worker at an eatery in Paris for ₣4. His co-worker was Hector Lefrançois. Lefrançois initially cared little about the site and "completely disregarded it." He has no skill in computer science and instead invested in his passion: art.

Space Shuttle Challenger Explosion (GRAPHIC)

The Dragonfly Disaster.

On July 6, 2004, the German-French Space Mission, Operation Libellue-Libelle, commenced. As the rocket was blasting forwards, an error within the ship's engine resulted in the ship imploding on itself. The incident was caught on video by User:Kloklorule7, a Cascadian student who had attended the launch with his school. He uploaded the video to Camtube, where it garnered over 5.7 million views in just 72 hours. Lefrançois then proceeded to report a massive increase in viewership and the number of publishers on the website, with the total amount of channels shooting up from a steadily declining 319 channels to 40,000 channels in just under a week.

The popularity of the video put Camtube in the spotlight, with many companies beginning to invest and establish their presence in the company. Lefrançois proceeded to abandon his dreams of becoming an artist as now he had to focus on Camtube. 

From November 8, 2004 to October 9, 2005, Cam Tube was based in an attic above a strip mall in Eastern Paris. He was able to hire a team of seven people who aided him in handling with the website.

Rise to dominance (2006 - 2010)

The Gaulle Restaurant, two years before its abandonment in 2005. In 2006, it was made Video Tube's offical HQ.

In 2006, Lefrançois, still wishing to pursue his dreams as an artist, moved to Lyon. His employees, which now numbered at 18, also reluctantly moved. He failed to bring his dream to life however and instead, he vowed to devote his time towards Camtube, or Video-Tube as he denoted it. On May 6, a day following its three-year anniversary, the company officially changed its name, with Lefrançois stating that Video-Tube was more apt for describing the content featured on the platform. He also saved enough money to purchase an abandoned restaurant in Lyon, transforming it into the company's headquarters. 

The first video to reach 10 million views was an animated comedy-skit about life in New England during the Twenty Years War titled "Life in hell: Living the Dream!" The video achieved this record on October 9, 2007. On March 8, 2008, the uploader of that video, Stikerine9000, became the first publisher (or alternatively, Video-Tuber) to reach a million subscribers.

Three days later, Charles Martin, the founder of Video-Tube, was arrested by Parisian police following his attempt on Lefrançois' life. Martin expressed deep regret for selling his business and attempted to convince Lefrançois to hire him as the vice president of Video-Tube in 2007, to which Lefrançois declined. This escalated in January of 2008 when he threatened to sue Lefrançois for a million dollars for what he called "credit theft." Admittedly, he was most likely intoxicated, but nonetheless, relations between the two continued to deteriorate. Martin was tried in June of 2009.

In that same year, various companies worldwide filed copyright lawsuits against Video-Tube for the featuring of clips from shows or cinema possessed by those companies. Most were eventually dropped by late 2010, though some unsuccessfully attempted to challenge Video-Tube.

Milestones and Diversification (2010 - 2014)

Logo of Video Tube from 2010 - 2017

On April 6, 2010, President Lefrançois announced te implementation of content monetization based on the views a video would acquire. In that same announcement, he also announced a mobile app featured on portable phones and a new logo to "suit the times." The company's name was changed to Video Tube instead of Video-Tube In April of 2011, the University of Constantinople in Byzantium estimated that 68 hours' worth of content was being uploaded to Video-tube every minute. The site received 900 million unique viewers in 2012 and about 300,000 new channels were created every year. The first video to reach 50 million was the music video for the British band Dukes of Redrock's most popular single, "Kick? I Jolly Well Won't Kick!" This was about a year preluding the bands disbandment in 2013. It was swiftly surpassed by a music video from the Cascadian singer Louis Green in May of 2012, which garnered over 150 million views in the first month and nearly 900 million views by the end of the year. It was the first video to acquire 1 billion views. Johnathan Reeds was the first channel to reach 10 million subscribers, acquiring that record in June of 2012. This coincided with the introduction of a new interface with the video channels displayed in a central column on the home page, similar to the news feeds of social networking sites.

Under Video Imperium 2014 - (ongoing)

In January of 2014, Video Tube CEO Hector Lefrançois stepped down, stating that he wished to fulfill his dreams as a painter. He was replaced by Lidia Merino, a manager working for Video Tube who was of Iberian ancestry. She attempted to implement a "One Site, One Layout" policy, stripping the site of the vast majority of its customization features and replacing it with a turquoise or green background. This garnered massive backlash from users and eventually, the company was forced to back down.

In November of 2014, a controversy caused over Merino's reckless behavior towards her employee's led to a massive strike conducted by employees of Video Tube. Merino was forced to step down and the company's stock plummeted. In desperation, the company was sold to Video Imperium, a large corporation that owned numerous video-sharing platforms. This was not received well by users.

In 2015, the Video Tube gaming channel Posibloop was the first channel to garner 50 million subscribers.

A blog feed on Video Tube.

In March of 2015, then CEO of Video Tube, Francis Gicquel, announced Streaming Tube, a new feature that would allow for the live streaming of content. He also introduced Share Tube, which would introduce two new features to the platform. The first would be blogs, giving creators the ability to blog and vlogs, which would give creators abilities to vlog. The features were introduced to establish something that creators could utilize to interact with their users. The move received widespread acclaim from creators and viewers alike.

In September 2015, Video Tube introduced categories, a way of categorizing videos. Some categories, such as the educational and musical categories, were further divided into subcategories.

In 2016, the company announced Kindervideo, a mode within Video Tube that was designed for a pre-teen audience. It has a simplified user interface and recommends content aimed towards children. In 2018, Kindervideo was made into a separate app entirely on mobile.

In 2017, Gicquel stepped down as CEO and was replaced by the current owner and CEO, Jean-François Beauvau. Also in that same year, a channel dubbed Hielgate, mainly based around comedy was the first channel to gain 100 million subscribers. In March of that year, the company also abandoned its 2010 logo and adopted the current one (picture above in the infobox).

In 2019, Video Tube announced Vidcorn (a combination of the word video and popcorn), a new premium service that would offer ad-free access to all content on the platform, premium original series, and films produced by YouTube personalities, as well as background playback of content on mobile devices. The company also established Musictube, a music-oriented streaming website and app.

Notable Videos

Most Viewed Videos

Name	Thumbnail	Rank	Duration	Views	Uploader

Notable Subscribers

Most Subscribed Channels

Name	Icon	Rank	Subscribers	Total Views	Number of Videos	Category	Country of Origin
Hielgate		1	134 million	45 billion	2,145	Comedy	Germany
Martenique		2	94 million	23 billion	3,713	Animation	France
L14		3	92 million	24.5 million	2,301	Entertainment	Cascadia
Salvation For the Lord		4	90 million	56 billion	5,342	Religion	Italy
Arthur McGregor		5	89.7 million	36 billion	5,457	Entertainment/Gaming	Ireland
The Meme Machine		6	83.5 million	27.6 billion	7,123	Entertainment	New England
Chloe Ka Official		7	81.7 million	14.6 billion	3,457	Music	Mexica
Derick Green		8	78.9 million	16.1 billion	2,818	Commentary	Eastern Elizabethia
Ulam		9	74.5 million	11.3 billion	1,237	Science	Mexica
Gaspard Duchamp		10	73.3 million	41.7 billion	3,479	Commentary	Louisiana
Eagleboy9000		11	71.1 million	36 billion	2,781	Music	Brasil
Alois Wachsmuth		12	67.1 million	23 billion	1,723	Commentary	Germany
YUM		13	54.7 million	14.1 billion	337	Cooking	Flosia
VidTube Official Channel		14	51.6 million	575 million	76,245	Business	France
Marco Luis		15	45.7 million	3.1 billion	4,020	Vlogging	Iberia
很棒的食物 (Hěn bàng de shíwù)		16	44,1 million	7.8 billion	1,030	Cooking	China
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