Famous Birthdays
{{Short description|Website cataloging celebrity birthdays and facts}}
{{Use American English|date=August 2022}}
{{Use mdy dates|date=August 2022}}
{{Infobox website
| name = Famous Birthdays
| logo = Famous Birthdays 2014.svg
| logo_caption = Logo as of 2014
| screenshot = Famous Birthdays 2025 Frontpage Screenshot.png
| caption = The Famous Birthdays homepage as it appeared on January 8, 2025
| founded = {{start date and age|2012|11|7}} (current)
| location = Santa Monica, California
| country = United States
| key_people = Evan Britton
| creator = Edward Morykwas (original)
| type = Private
| language = {{hlist|English|Spanish|Portuguese|French}}
| programming_language = HTML, JavaScript
| launched = {{start date and age|1996}} (original)
| current_status = Active
}}
Famous Birthdays is an American website based in Santa Monica, California,{{Cite web |last=Gutelle |first=Sam |date=July 9, 2018 |title="Wikipedia For Gen Z" Famous Birthdays Launches Spanish-Language Site |url=https://www.tubefilter.com/2018/07/09/famous-birthdays-espanol-spanish/ |url-status=live |access-date=October 14, 2022 |website=Tubefilter |archive-date=October 14, 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221014122939/https://www.tubefilter.com/2018/07/09/famous-birthdays-espanol-spanish/ }} which is dedicated to cataloging the birthdays of famous people and compiling other facts about them.{{Cite web |url=https://thenextweb.com/insider/2015/06/10/famous-for-15k-pageviews/ |title=What you know about fame is wrong and this site proves it |last=Wright |first=Mic |date=2015-06-10 |website=The Next Web |language=en-US |access-date=2018-03-30 |archive-date=March 30, 2018 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180330143829/https://thenextweb.com/insider/2015/06/10/famous-for-15k-pageviews/ |url-status=live }}{{Cite web |url=https://www.socaltech.com/carving_an_internet_niche_with_famousbirthdays_com/s-0049284.html |title=Carving An Internet Niche With FamousBirthdays.com |last=Kuo |first=Benjamin F. |date=2013-05-14 |website=Socaltech |access-date=2018-03-30 |archive-date=August 1, 2016 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160801142052/http://www.socaltech.com/carving_an_internet_niche_with_famousbirthdays_com/s-0049284.html |url-status=live }}
Background
The original Famous Birthdays website was created by Edward Morykwas, a Michigan schoolteacher, in 1996. It offered e-cards.{{Cite news |date=2001-02-04 |title=Free Press Site of the Week - February 4, 2001 |pages=54 |work=Detroit Free Press |url=https://www.newspapers.com/article/detroit-free-press-free-press-site-of-th/128501189/ |access-date=2023-08-16}}{{Cite web |last=Callender |first=Sara |date=February 22, 2001 |title=Happy Birthday Everyone |url=https://riveroftime.net/troy-eccentric.jpg |website=Troy Eccentric Newspaper}}
The site was updated to its current format in November 7, 2012, by Evan Britton, who has since described the website as "Wikipedia for Generation Z".{{Cite web |last=Lorenz |first=Taylor |author-link=Taylor Lorenz |date=July 25, 2019 |title=A Wikipedia for Generation Z |url=https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2019/07/famous-birthdays-wikipedia-gen-z/594682/ |url-access=limited |access-date=October 14, 2022 |website=The Atlantic |archive-date=October 17, 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221017153507/https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2019/07/famous-birthdays-wikipedia-gen-z/594682/ |url-status=live }}{{Cite web |last=Gutelle |first=Sam |date=January 23, 2018 |title=How Famous Birthdays Uses 500,000 Daily Searches To Build A Database Of Gen Z Culture |url=https://www.tubefilter.com/2018/01/23/famous-birthdays-search/ |url-status=live |access-date=October 14, 2022 |website=Tubefilter |language= |archive-date=November 27, 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201127114340/https://www.tubefilter.com/2018/01/23/famous-birthdays-search/ }} Famous Birthdays originally focused on more traditional celebrities (such as actors, athletes, musicians, etc.), but has since expanded to also feature internet personalities. 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.
Status
In 2015, Britton's eighteen-person team attended VidCon. {{As of|2018|January}}, it had over 150,000 biographies. In July 2018, Famous Birthdays launched Famous Birthdays Español, a Spanish-language version of the site. 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 and Lorenz for The New York Times calling it a "a milestone in any influencer's career."{{Cite news |last=Lorenz |first=Taylor |author-link=Taylor Lorenz |date=May 26, 2020 |title=Step Chickens and the Rise of TikTok 'Cults' |work=The New York Times |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2020/05/26/style/step-chickens-tiktok-cult-wars.html |access-date=May 12, 2023 |issn=0362-4331}} As of June 2024 the website received 20 million unique visitors each month.{{cite news |url=https://economist.com/culture/2024/06/13/famous-birthdays-wants-to-be-the-wikipedia-for-gen-z |title=Famous Birthdays wants to be the Wikipedia for Gen Z |work=The Economist |date=13 June 2024 |access-date=19 June 2024}}
Features
Despite 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. Biographies tend to be of the same length, despite the relative fame of the individual in question.
References
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Category:Companies based in Los Angeles