Did Janet Jackson help create YouTube? Viral post explored amid 20th anniversary

Janet Jackson’s career was negatively impacted after the Super Bowl XXXVIII halftime show controversy, but it seemingly became the driving force behind the creation of YouTube.

On the 20th anniversary of the first upload, 'Me at the zoo,' a post from @stoppfeenin touched upon a lesser-known fact behind the platform's birth. The original poster referenced a 2015 Forbes article detailing how Janet Jackson unknowingly helped create YouTube more than 20 years ago.

According to Forbes, one of the YouTube founders, Jawed Karim, was unable to find any of the videos of Janet Jackson’s controversial wardrobe malfunction during the 2004 Super Bowl halftime. The former PayPal employee, collaborating with his colleagues Steve Chen and Chad Hurley, began working on a website “where people could upload their own content.”

Jackson didn't directly help create YouTube. Her controversial incident at the Super Bowl influenced the platform’s founders to launch it.

Eventually, YouTube went live in February 2005 with its first-ever video, 'Me at the zoo,' featuring Jawed Karim. In the 19-second-long clip, the software engineer chatted about elephants in the back, which has garnered 365 million views. The following year, Jawed Karim mentioned the incident involving Janet Jackson in an interview with USA Today.

According to the newspaper, the Super Bowl show wardrobe malfunction and the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami gave Jawed the idea to create YouTube. During the conversation, Karim recalled the challenging task of finding videos about Janet Jackson’s incident, which was also the case with the natural disaster in Asia that year.

The 2004 Super Bowl halftime show that inspired YouTube sabotaged Janet Jackson’s career

The Rhythm Nation 1814 artist headlined the Super Bowl XXXVIII halftime show in February 2004. During the performance of the medley of her hits, Justin Timberlake made a guest appearance. The duo then sang Rock Your Body, which concluded with Timberlake, a part of Jackson’s costume. The move caused a wardrobe malfunction for 9/16th second.

The incident caused much uproar, causing MTV and CBS to apologize. In an interview with Reuters, the then-CEO of MTV claimed that it was Jackson who had planned the stunt. Later, the singer also issued an apology via MTV News and said:

“The decision to have a costume reveal at the end of my halftime show performance was made after final rehearsals. MTV was completely unaware of it. It was not my intention that it go as far as it did. I apologize to anyone offended — including the audience, MTV, CBS and the NFL.”

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Timberlake also shared his apology via MTV News and called the incident “not intentional and regrettable.” After two years, Janet Jackson appeared on The Oprah Winfrey Show and displayed her regret for saying sorry despite the malfunction being accidental. The singer reportedly faced backlash from almost everyone and was reportedly blacklisted, while Timberlake’s career skyrocketed.

Years later, in 2021, Justin apologized to Britney Spears and Janet Jackson in an unavailable Instagram post, according to Us Weekly. Janet, who didn’t talk much about the incident in her later interviews, mentioned in a 2022 conversation with Allure that her family and “God” helped her overcome that phase. She also mentioned that it was “tough” for her “to talk about that time.”

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