Iconic YouTube video 'Charlie bit my finger' won't be disappearing from the internet any time soon after the new owner decided to leave the clip on the video platform.
The original video sold as a non-fungible token (NFT) for US$760,000 last week after racking up nearly 883 million views.
NFTs are digital assets that have a blockchain-based digital server allowing verification of ownership. Other famous internet memes, like 'disaster girl' and 'Leave Britney alone' have sold as NFTs, with the former fetching over US$500,000.
Howard Davies-Carr, father of the stars of the Charlie video, originally posted it in 2007 and auctioned it exactly 14 years to the day from its online debut.
It showed three year old Harry putting his finger in the mouth of his one year old brother, Charlie, resulting in the famous utterance "Charlie bit me".
"After the auction we connected with the buyer, who ended up deciding to keep the video on YouTube," Davies-Carr told Quartz.
"The buyer felt that the video is an important part of popular culture and shouldn't be taken down," he said.
As well as being the sole owner of the 'Charlie bit my finger' NFT, 3fmusic - which appears to be a music studio in Dubai, according to Quartz - also has the ability to create its own parody with the original stars, now 17 and 15 years old.
The family plans to donate part of the winning bid to offset the cost of mining the bitcoins used to buy the NFT with the rest put towards the brothers' education, they told Business Insider at the time.
