YouTube co-founder gives commencement address

Professor Christine Hurt had the opportunity to represent the law school at the University of Illinois commencement yesterday. Not too bad as Christine reports YouTube co-founder and llinois alum, Jawed Karim, gave the commencement address.

Karim, who netted $60 million with the sale to Google (left early to get doctoral degree at Stanford) told of starting YouTube on Valentines Day. Led to the line of his speech: ‘One of the best things about being a computer science major is that Valentine’s Day is just like any other day.’

The rest of the speech?

It was short, it was funny, and it had video clips. He advised students to always be open to opportunity and to take risks while you can (like leaving college while still young to try something brand new).  He apologized for ruining their gpa’s by inventing YouTube!  He was self-deprecating when reminding students that things don’t work right away.  In 1997, Karim’s application to the University of Illinois’ computer science department was rejected.  He wrote a letter asking them to reconsider, which they did. …He also talked about how lame YouTube was in the beginning until users started uploading their own videos — a concept that the founders had not envisioned.

Silicon Valley may have the money but the brains are coming from the Midwest. Illinois alumni and faculty have created numerous products and companies including Netscape Communications, AMD, PayPal, Siebel Systems, Mortal Kombat, YouTube, Oracle, Lotus, Yelp, LED, integrated circuit, transistor, MRI, and Plasma screen. (wikipedia)