YouTube original viral clip 'Charlie bit my finger' to be taken off after selling for £500,000

There are massive numbers of viral videos out there on YouTube today, but one of the original viral clips on the video streaming platform was "Charlie bit my finger!" which will soon be taken off the site.

The 56-second video, posted in 2007, features two kids- three-year-old Harry and his year-old baby brother Charlie. The clip shows Harry putting his finger in Charlie's mouth again and again, then protesting when the latter bites it.

Harry and Charlie's father, Howard, had shared the video after he couldn't email it to the kids' godparents in America, but the adorable clip soon went viral after it was shared on a college networking site in the US, and went on to garner over 880 million views from across the world, reports the BBC.

However, the Davies-Carr family is taking down the video from the site, after auctioning it off as an NFT (non-fungible token), a unit of data stored on a digital ledger that certifies a digital asset to be unique and therefore not interchangeable. The auction received substantial bids throughout the weekend, but the bid dramatically increased in its final hours on Sunday and was finally sold to "3fmusic" for $760,999 (£538,000).

The family explained their decision in a statement that read: The iconic video will be removed from YouTube and one person will have the opportunity to own it in its new form as a 1/1 NFT, memorialising them in internet history forever. The NFT winner will also get the opportunity to create their own parody of the video featuring the original stars, Harry and Charlie."

"Harry and Charlie, now 17 and 15, are soon entering adulthood and embarking on the next chapter of their lives, the perfect opportunity to embrace the next iteration of the internet. Charlie Bit My Finger has been a huge part of the Davies-Carr family's lives for the past 14 years, and they are excited to welcome others to become a part of their story. This is not the end of the beloved video, but rather a new beginning," the family added.

An increasing number of people are selling their digital assets in NFTs, including some prominent personalities like Grimes, Johnny Depp, and even Twitter founder Jack Dorsey. The "Disaster Girl Meme" - a picture of a young girl smiling with a fire in the background - was recently sold as an NFT for $473,000 (£341,000). Most notably, Nyan Cat, a 10-year-old internet meme, was sold for $580,000 (£409,000) in February this year.

Most of the NFTs including the Nyan Cat's video and GIF are still available to be seen for free, making the purchase of NFTs non-profitable. However, Charlie's family is changing that by removing the original video from YouTube, though its copies will still be available.