Shutterstock celebrates 15th birthday by sharing posters of important events -- iPhone, Facebook, Pokémon Go, and more
If you are a regular reader of BetaNews, you may have noticed that many of our licensed images come from Shutterstock. That online service is wildly popular, thanks to its massive collection of images and other media. Quite frankly, it is a joy to use -- both its website and mobile apps are top notch.
Today, the company reaches an incredible milestone -- a 15th birthday! Yes, the site was founded on this day way back in 2003. To celebrate, Shutterstock has released 15 digital posters -- one for each year the company has been in business. Each poster commemorates an important event that happened in that year. This includes some important tech-related moments, such as the launch of Facebook and the release of the first-ever iPhone. Not to mention, who can forget Pokémon Go -- a game that made augmented reality mainstream.
"Since its founding in 2003, Shutterstock has marked a number of company milestones, from reaching its first 300,000 images in year 2005 (now over 200 million) to surpassing over 1 billion image, video and music licenses sold earlier this year. In that time, the world has also seen historic moments including Angela Merkel becoming the first female chancellor of Germany in 2005 and NASA’s Curiosity rover landing on Mars in 2012," says Shutterstock.
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The company shares the 15 moments below. You can view all of the posters here.
- 2003 - Mapping of the Human Genome
- 2004 - Launch of Facebook
- 2005 - Angela Merkel elected as Germany’s first female Chancellor
- 2006 - Disney’s acquisition of Pixar
- 2007 - Release of the first iPhone
- 2008 - Barack Obama, first African-American President of the U.S., elected
- 2009 - Oldest skeleton of human ancestor found
- 2010 - Worst oil spill in U.S. history takes place in the Gulf of Mexico
- 2011 - Game of Thrones premieres on HBO
- 2012 - NASA’s Curiosity rover lands on Mars
- 2013 - Nelson Mandela dies at age 95
- 2014 - Germany wins FIFA World Cup in Brazil
- 2015 - Same-sex marriage becomes legal across the U.S.
- 2016 - Pokémon Go shows the possibilities for augmented reality
- 2017 - #MeToo movement goes global
Jon Oringer, Founder and CEO, offers the following statement.
In 2003, I recognized a need in the marketplace for commercially licensed photos. Since then, we’ve made incredible strides forward in becoming a global creative platform thanks to the work and dedication of not only our customers and contributors, but also our team of more than 1000 employees around the world. 15 years ago we couldn’t have predicted all the remarkable achievements and milestones we would accomplish together.
Over the next 15 years, we will continue to focus our efforts on enhancing the best-in-class customer and contributor experience, offering a creative platform with the highest-quality content and increasingly precise search tools powered by our custom deep learning and AI technology. There’s so much opportunity for Shutterstock in the years ahead and I’m excited for what’s to come.
Obviously, some moments on the list are more important than others. Make no mistake, Shutterstock does not say each moment is the most important of its respective year. These are merely a collection of moments that made a difference to the world. In other words, yes, 2011 likely contained more important things than the premiere of Game of Thrones, but that doesn't mean the phenomenon shouldn't be noted.
Which of the 15 posters is your favorite? Please tell me in the comments below.