Atlanta (CNN) -- Once upon a time, in a dark corner of CNN's Atlanta headquarters, there was a messy pile of VHS tapes covered in remnants of packing tape. It was January 2005, shortly after an earthquake had triggered a massive tsunami in the Indian Ocean. CNN, along with many news organizations, had put out a call for footage of the event. With mailing instructions. Like, physical mail. What came back were tapes of all colors and sizes, sent over the course of several weeks, that showed dramatic footage of the event captured by people who had lived through it. For the rest of us, seeing those waves push through entire towns helped us understand how truly enormous and ruinous the tsunami had been and how much help would be needed to overcome it.
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CNN's citizen journalism initiative, iReport, is 5 years old
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The first iReport on TV was a hot squirrel
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Since then, iReport has been integral to most major news stories of the past 5 years
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Our prediction for what's next? Collaboration is the future
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(If you're reading this story on @placeholder, flip through the photo gallery on top to see the short history.)
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The argument came down to whether we should put it on the @placeholder homepage.
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We were building momentum for a new site, so it was on us to pick something great and clickable that would entice the millions of people who visit @placeholder every day to get on the iReport train.
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We were building momentum for a new site, so it was on us to pick something great and clickable that would entice the millions of people who visit CNN.com every day to get on the @placeholder train.