Famous Birthdays is an American website based in Santa Monica, California,[1] which is dedicated to cataloging the birthdays of famous people and compiling other facts about them.[2][3]
 Logo as of 2014 | |
 The Famous Birthdays homepage as it appeared on June 18, 2018 | |
Type of site | Private |
|---|---|
| Available in |
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| Founded | November 7, 2012 (current) |
| Headquarters | Santa Monica, California, United States |
| Created by | Edward Morykwas (original) |
| Key people | Evan Britton |
| URL | www |
| Launched | 1996 (original) |
| Current status | Active |
| Written in | HTML, JavaScript |
Background
editThe original Famous Birthdays website was created by Edward Morykwas, a Michigan schoolteacher, in 1996.[4][5][6]
The site was updated to its current format in November 7, 2012, by Evan Britton,[7] who has since described the website as "Wikipedia for Generation Z".[8][7] Famous Birthdays originally focused on more traditional celebrities (such as actors, athletes, musicians, etc.), but has since expanded to also feature internet personalities.[2] This shift came after Britton discovered that visitors were searching for individuals unfamiliar to him; at first mistaking the traffic as spam, he realized that the searches were of people with online followings such as Cameron Dallas.[8]
Status
editIn 2015, Britton's eighteen-person team attended VidCon.[8] As of January 2018[update], it had over 150,000 biographies.[7] In July 2018, Famous Birthdays launched Famous Birthdays Español, a Spanish-language version of the site.[1] In 2019, it had 20 million unique visitors each month. The same year, journalist Taylor Lorenz of The Atlantic described a Famous Birthdays page as a "status symbol" or "badge of honor" for internet personalities, noting its teenage and Generation Z demographic[8] and Lorenz for The New York Times calling it a "a milestone in any influencer’s career."[9] As of June 2024 the website received 20 million unique visitors each month.[10]
Features
editDespite its name, Famous Birthdays also includes entire staff-written biographies. Each page has a "boost" button—each visitor who clicks this button will "boost" the biography higher up into the "trending" or "most popular" rankings. Online celebrities may canvass their followers into swaying them higher into the rankings by encouraging them to press the "boost" button.[8] Biographies tend to be of the same length, despite the relative fame of the individual in question.[10]
References
edit- ^ a b Gutelle, Sam (July 9, 2018). ""Wikipedia For Gen Z" Famous Birthdays Launches Spanish-Language Site". Tubefilter. Archived from the original on October 14, 2022. Retrieved October 14, 2022.
- ^ a b Wright, Mic (June 10, 2015). "What you know about fame is wrong and this site proves it". The Next Web. Archived from the original on March 30, 2018. Retrieved March 30, 2018.
- ^ Kuo, Benjamin F. (May 14, 2013). "Carving An Internet Niche With FamousBirthdays.com". Socaltech. Archived from the original on August 1, 2016. Retrieved March 30, 2018.
- ^ "Famous Birthdays home page from 1998". Archived from the original on December 12, 1998.
- ^ "Free Press Site of the Week - February 4, 2001". Detroit Free Press. February 4, 2001. p. 54. Retrieved August 16, 2023.
- ^ Callender, Sara (February 22, 2001). "Happy Birthday Everyone". Troy Eccentric Newspaper.
- ^ a b c Gutelle, Sam (January 23, 2018). "How Famous Birthdays Uses 500,000 Daily Searches To Build A Database Of Gen Z Culture". Tubefilter. Archived from the original on November 27, 2020. Retrieved October 14, 2022.
- ^ a b c d e Lorenz, Taylor (July 25, 2019). "A Wikipedia for Generation Z". The Atlantic. Archived from the original on October 17, 2022. Retrieved October 14, 2022.
- ^ Lorenz, Taylor (May 26, 2020). "Step Chickens and the Rise of TikTok 'Cults'". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved May 12, 2023.
- ^ a b "Famous Birthdays wants to be the Wikipedia for Gen Z". The Economist. June 13, 2024. Retrieved June 19, 2024.
