Chad Hurley has the drawn face and chalky pallor that have become almost a mark of honour for internet entrepreneurs in their early days. If too little sleep is to blame, it would not be surprising.

YouTube, the online video-sharing site he launched in December with Steve Chen, chief technology officer, has hit the sort of popular culture nerve about which most people in his position only dream. Less than a year after its launch, YouTube has become the first site to turn online video into a mass market business, streaming more than 100m short videos a day to an audience of more than 30m in the US alone.