The news comes as the site celebrates the day five years ago when the first beta version of YouTube was launched.
"We are a stage and we give everyone in the world an opportunity to participate and that is being a video platform for creating a solution for people to not only upload and distribute their videos on a global basis but to find and share videos."
He also said that while the two billion downloads marked a real milestone "I feel we have much further to go.
From cat videos to political videos to "how to" videos to entertainment - that is YouTube
-Chad Hurley, YouTube co-founder
"Two billion video streams is a large number but on average people are only spending 15 minutes a day on the site compared to five hours a day watching TV.
"I don't think we could have ever planned or imagined we would get to the scale or the size we are today. We were mostly trying to create a video solution for ourselves based on our own frustrations. We are proud of what we have achieved so far but we have a lot of work ahead," said Mr Hurley.
The site was bought by Google near the end of 2006 for $1.65bn.
The slogan for YouTube is "Broadcast Yourself" which Mr Hurley said was a play on "be yourself and also captured in my mind the essence of the site which was to let people express themselves."
The first person to express themselves on the platform was fellow co-founder Jawed Karim who posted a 19 seconds long video called "Me at the Zoo". It was uploaded on April 23, 2005 and can still be viewed on the site.
Among the other videos that have made YouTube history is that of a wounded girl dying in front of a crowd during the Iranian election protests, a YouTube interview with President Barack Obama, Ronaldinho's Nike advert and singer Susan Boyle's performance on Britain's Got Talent competition on TV.
"Maybe early on people only recognised us or explained YouTube by placing it in a box but there are so many people on our site and we receive so much content over a 24 hour period, it can't be about one thing.
Today it hosts channels for everyone from Queen Elizabeth to the Pope and from President Barack Obama to the Iraqi government.
"YouTube really is a phenomenon and is very much part of popular culture," said Catharine P Taylor, media blogger at news website BNET.com.
"It really is a game changer because it gives everybody a platform to broadcast from. There are many examples where an average citizen has become a big hit on YouTube and that is something that would have been impossible to contemplate five, six years ago."
"We are trying to create opportunities for everyone and this is not just about making big deals with major networks," said Mr Hurley.
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