---
title: "Which came first, Java or YouTube?"
description: "Java vs YouTube: Java came first, by 10 years — 1995 against 2005. What happened in each case, and why the dates are often given differently."
url: https://atoneplace.net/which-came-first/java-vs-youtube/
site: "At One Place"
---

# Which came first, Java or YouTube?

**Which came first, Java or YouTube?: Java**

1995 — 10 years before YouTube

Java came first, by 10 years. Sun Microsystems announced Java publicly.

## Side by side

|  | Java | YouTube |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Year | 1995 | 2005 |
| Date | 1995-05-23 | 2005-02-14 |
| Category | technology | technology |
| What happened | Sun Microsystems announced Java publicly. | The domain was registered; the first video followed in April. |

## Java

Java was announced in May 1995, having started in 1991 as a project called Oak aimed at interactive television — a market that did not exist yet. Its promise was "write once, run anywhere", achieved by compiling to bytecode for a virtual machine rather than to a specific processor. JavaScript arrived seven months later and was named after it purely as a marketing decision; the two languages are unrelated.

## YouTube

The youtube.com domain was registered on Valentine's Day 2005, the first video — "Me at the zoo", 19 seconds of a co-founder at San Diego Zoo — was uploaded on 23 April, and the site opened publicly in the winter. Google bought it in November 2006 for $1.65 billion, about twenty months after the domain was registered. It is younger than Facebook by a year and older than Twitter by one.

## Common questions

### Which came first, Java or YouTube?

Java, by 10 years — 1995 against 2005.

### When did Java start?

1995. Sun Microsystems announced Java publicly.

### When did YouTube start?

2005. The domain was registered; the first video followed in April.

## Related pages

- [Apple or Java?](https://atoneplace.net/which-came-first/apple-vs-java/)
- [the internet (ARPANET) or Java?](https://atoneplace.net/which-came-first/arpanet-vs-java/)
- [the internet (ARPANET) or YouTube?](https://atoneplace.net/which-came-first/arpanet-vs-youtube/)
- [email or Java?](https://atoneplace.net/which-came-first/email-vs-java/)
- [email or YouTube?](https://atoneplace.net/which-came-first/email-vs-youtube/)
- [the Macintosh or YouTube?](https://atoneplace.net/which-came-first/macintosh-vs-youtube/)
- [Windows or YouTube?](https://atoneplace.net/which-came-first/windows-vs-youtube/)
- [the World Wide Web or YouTube?](https://atoneplace.net/which-came-first/world-wide-web-vs-youtube/)
- [Python or YouTube?](https://atoneplace.net/which-came-first/python-vs-youtube/)
- [Java or Microsoft?](https://atoneplace.net/which-came-first/java-vs-microsoft/)
- [Java or the Macintosh?](https://atoneplace.net/which-came-first/java-vs-macintosh/)
- [Java or Windows?](https://atoneplace.net/which-came-first/java-vs-windows/)

## Sources

- Wikidata — Wikimedia Foundation (https://www.wikidata.org/) [CC0 1.0]