On Saturday, the world’s most famous giraffe, April, gave birth to a baby boy.
Since February 10, 2017, Animal Adventure, an educational animal park in New York, has been livestreaming April’s pregnancy and creating a social media sensation with fans all over the world tuning in regularly to check on her progress. One industrious fan created an app to crowdsource pregnancy updates from tens of thousands of other fans following the livestream. A pregnant woman even parodied April’s livestream, becoming an internet sensation in her own right. Waiting for April to give birth became an experience shared around the world.
As the anticipation and audience grew leading up to the big moment,Animal Adventure Park became the second most live-viewed channel in the history of YouTube despite launching a mere 66 days ago. Here are the highlights of April and her baby bump:
Giraffes already hold the record for being the tallest land animals in the world, but here are some other records April set this weekend:
But April wasn’t just the star of a popular stream; she sparked a pop culture phenomenon, with YouTube creators and fans posting videos of their own that were watched over 48.7 million times, including day-by-day analysis of pregnancy signs, baby showers, and anxious messages about the wait.
We’ve seen some of the biggest events in music, sports, politics, and gaming play out on YouTube over the years. Thanks to one endearing mother giraffe, we’ll have to add animal events to that list now too.
Posted by Kevin Allocca, Head of Culture & Trends, recently watched “African Animal Lookout Camera.”