SpaceX

Space Exploration Technologies Corp. is a private American aerospace manufacturer and space transportation services company headquartered in Hawthorne, Los Angeles, California. It was founded in 2002 by American businessman Elon Musk (born: ) with the goal of enabling the colonization of Marshttps://www.smh.com.au/business/companies/elon-musks-spacex-livestream-is-his-most-surprising-success-20160527-gp4zm4.html through reducing the cost of spaceflight. SpaceX has developed several launch vehicles (Falcon and Starship) and the Dragon spacecraft.
The company uploads update videos on their activities, and previously hosted livestreams on YouTube.
==Content==
SpaceX started its YouTube channel on July 30, 2008, shortly before its third orbital flight attempt. The company started livestreaming videos on its website at its first launch (Falcon 1 flight 1) in 2006,https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kkxB5d4Piuc and on YouTube in 2014.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lbHnSu-DLR4&ab_channel=SpaceX Livestreams, called webcasts, are preceded with waiting music from Test Shot Starfishhttps://www.billboard.com/music/music-news/test-shot-starfish-music-for-space-space-x-breakdown-8478508/ and an intro,https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sIOZHYSzDOs&pp=ygUNc3BhY2V4IGludHJvcw%3D%3D which on all but onehttps://www.fabermusic.com/news/buros-stowaways-used-in-spacex-starlink-mission09112020-1 has featured original music. They are hosted by an employee of the company, who provides information about the mission and the countdown process. A spokesperson of a secondary party (e.g. NASA, Axiomhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5nLk_Vqp7nw) might join if involved in the mission. Important missions have multiple hosts, often people with different backgrounds and expertises, and often other SpaceX employees watching the stream live at the headquarters serve as an audience.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wbSwFU6tY1chttps://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2015/12/rocket-launch-as-cultural-event/421815/
Additionally, the company uploads videos of developments, including animations,https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zqE-ultsWt0 tours of facilities,https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yFbrK_sRV9Q onboard views,https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4_sLTe6-7SE recap edits of important launches with previously unseen footage,https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yKVcDu7vv4w and compilation videos.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q_s_7iTydYU 
In September 2023, SpaceX stopped streaming all of their launches on YouTube and instead broadcasts them exclusively on X, the social media platform Musk has owned since 2022.https://www.yahoo.com/entertainment/spacex-abandons-youtube-live-streams-105946423.html The company still uploads regular videos on YouTube.
==Notable streams and videos==
The company, alongside its CEO Musk, is known for its extensive and unconventional, especially for the traditionally conservative aerospace sector, use of social media. These efforts are accredited to have increased public interest in spaceflight after the Space Shuttle program ended.https://www.cnbc.com/2020/07/25/how-did-spacex-and-social-media-help-nasa-become-cool-again.html
=== How Not To Land an Orbital Rocket Booster ===
SpaceX is a pioneer in rocket reusability through propulsive landing, and the process toward perfecting it was closely documented by both space enthusiastshttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ge1_6MUWAYg and the company itself.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZwwS4YOTbbwhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BhMSzC1crr0 
The company uploaded this compilation of the development process of the Falcon family's propulsive landing system on September 14, 2017,https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bvim4rsNHkQ&ab_channel=SpaceX when the company had already routinely been landing first-stage boosters for over a year. The Monty Python-inspired blooper reel is set on John Philip Sousa's Liberty Bell March and contains previously unreleased or higher-definition footage of the company's landing test failures with humorous and light-hearted commentary.https://interestingengineering.com/video/elon-musk-just-shared-this-explosive-spacex-blooper-reel-and-its-incredible Notably, the term "rapid unscheduled disassembly", a euphemistic description of an explosion, is introduced in the video, and is now frequently used by the company and space enthusiasts,https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/rapid-unscheduled-disassemblyhttps://www.nytimes.com/2023/04/20/science/rapid-unscheduled-disassembly-starship-rocket.html as well as being the namesake of an achievement in Halo Infinite.https://www.trueachievements.com/a376258/rapid-unscheduled-disassembly-achievement It is the most-watched non-livestream video of SpaceX, with 29.1 million views as of January 1, 2024. Footage of the reel has been frequently used in motivational videos.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=43TmnIaL3n4
=== Falcon Heavy Test Flight ===
SpaceX conceived the Falcon Heavy, consisting of three Falcon 9 boosters strapped together, in 2011 in order to compete with the oligopoly of established and often government-backed launch companies.https://www.reuters.com/article/space-business-rocket-idUSN0513302920110405/ It would be the second-most powerful rocket ever launched into orbit, only behind NASA's legendary Saturn V Moon rocket, if successful.https://web.archive.org/web/20180206143738/http://www.spacex.com/sites/spacex/files/falconheavypresskit_v1.pdf 
The maiden launch of the Falcon Heavy was a highly anticipated event with extensive coverage by mainstream media worldwide. The flight was held at LC-39A, which also launched Apollo 11, on February 6, 2018. Around 100.000 people came to Kennedy Space Center to see the launch.https://www.space.com/39779-falcon-heavy-facts.html To demonstrate to customers, including NASA, that their new rocket is capable of launching something into deep space, SpaceX simulated a mission to an orbit beyond Mars with many complex objectives.https://www.nasaspaceflight.com/2018/02/spacex-debut-falcon-heavy-demonstration-launch/https://finance.yahoo.com/news/elon-musk-apos-tesla-missed-180525262.html The company repeatedly stated that this test flight was far from guaranteed from being successful.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BqvBhhTtUm4?t=852 Against expectations, almost all of the mission's objectives were successfully fulfilled. The rocket lifted off and successfully sent Musk's own car into space, after which the side boosters landed simultaneously back on Earth. Besides the webcast, SpaceX streamed over four hours of onboard footage of the Tesla Roadster and Starman as it was heading away from Earth.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aBr2kKAHN6M
This launch was seen live by 2.3 million people, at the time the second-highest live viewing rate of all time on YouTube, behind Red Bull Stratos.https://www.theverge.com/2018/2/6/16981730/spacex-falcon-heavy-launch-youtube-live-stream-record It is the company's most-watched video. As of January 1, 2024, the livestream of the Falcon Heavy launch has over 32 million views, that of Starman is viewed over 19 million times and the recap video (featuring David Bowie's Life on Mars?) is watched over 8.8 million times. The launch was widely talked about on social media and turned into internet memes,https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-42973449 notably by jschlatt.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a8uyilHatBA&ab_channel=jschlatt 
===Crew Dragon Demo-2 (over multiple streams, with NASA)===
===Inspiration4 (over multiple streams)===
===Starship test campaign===
This is the last livestream of a major mission by the company on YouTube. SpaceX does still provide updates of Starship in the form of trailers and recap videos.
==Channel milestones==
===Subscriber milestones===
*3 million subscribers: May 26, 2020
*4 million subscribers: May 30, 2020
*5 million subscribers: December 11, 2020
*6 million subscribers: February 23, 2022
===Video view milestones===
*300 million views: May 29, 2020
*400 million views: August 17, 2020
*500 million views: March 3, 2021
*600 million views: March 8, 2022
==Gallery==
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==References==
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