How did Youtube/Myspace/Facebook get their traffic in their early stages ?

[tyson_su]

I would like to start my own web portal and would like to know how one would get attention to the website. I would think that one could get good PR from getting Newspapers/Magazines/etc to write about your portal. Early on I assume that direct marketing efforts would just waste money i.e. Cost Per Acquisition Email, CPA Banners, CPA Coreg.

[inukjuak90]

YouTube was actually founded by three people -- and the 3rd
person's name is Jawed Karim.

If you are interested in a SUPER INSIGHTFUL history of how
YouTube was created, take a look at his video where he gave
a speech at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. In
that video, he has some really interesting comments on what
existed before YouTube. Later on in the video, he talks about
what they did to get their traffic:

http://youtube.com/watch?v=nssfmTo7SZg

(Please skip the first 4 minutes of boring introduction, and be
prepared to learn lots of amazing & interesting facts from this
guy -- who talks like a nervous high-school kid for 45 minutes.
His speech is rather dry and not great visually, but very funny.
Also, keep your finger on the volume button because he talks
low, but everything else is very loud.)