While I’m typically content living in the era of Instagram Reels and TikTok brainrot, I often find myself yearning for the simpler days of candid YouTube content. Thankfully, I shall yearn no longer because of ‘IMG_0001’ – a website compiling random forgotten YouTube videos into one nostalgic treasure trove.
Much like my recent obsession with the online Web Design Museum, I found myself easily getting sucked into a rabbit hole of lost family memories and unfiltered early 2010s nostalgia. Shot with the authentic grainy charm of the humble iPhone 4, each video is a wholesome snapshot of the platform’s early days and a touching reminder of how far the internet has evolved in the past decade.
i found millions of YouTube videos that have default camera names as titles (like IMG_0276) and made it into a website where you can watch random ones.unedited, pure moments from random lives https://t.co/zdYQmkz0qk pic.twitter.com/T6zuED8y7NNovember 18, 2024
Created by Riley Walz, IMG_0001 is a collection of raw unedited YouTube videos published between 2009 and 2012 via the iPhones built-in “Send to YouTube” feature. Noticing that many of these clips were posted under generic IMG_XXXX filenames, Riley created a bot to trawl the 5 million uploads, compiling them on the nostalgic site for us sentimentalists to enjoy.
Each video appears in a completely random order, listing the upload date and view count (which rarely tops 100 views). From showjumping dogs to candid karaoke sessions, you never quite know what wholesome memory or bizarre lost media you’ll uncover next. In some ways, it feels like snooping into the private lives of strangers but I can’t deny how refreshing it feels compared to the filtered existences we see littering today’s social media.
