7 ms·

This is a nice idea, but the one thing I haven't been able to divorce myself from is YouTube. I really hate how Google has allowed such a wealth of constant in

This is a nice idea, but the one thing I haven't been able to divorce myself from is YouTube. I really hate how Google has allowed such a wealth of constant information that completely dwarfs alternative video hosting sites. As censorious as Google can be(now "up next" is always some video from CNN or Fox), blocking YouTube from my network would mean cutting myself off from a large portion of the world.

ggg2 7y ago
pleroma (and i think maybe mastodon) provide media proxy that i think work for youtube. so when one person shares a video, one instance serves it to all the other users
- mkl 7y ago
  Wouldn't that just be sharing a link to YouTube? I.e. not re-hosting the video (which would probably violate copyright).
oil25 7y ago
YouTube and Maps are one of the few Google services left which are still available over Tor. You can proxy youtube-dl and retain some of your privacy this way.
- morganvachon 7y ago
  I've been thinking of setting up a super-tiny (about $15/year) VPS as a youtube-dl proxy for a while now. It's the only Google service that still remains valuable to me; I enjoy channels like Bad Obsession Motorsports and various indie musician channels, and Vimeo just doesn't have enough of that type of content, sadly. I know proxying through a VPS that I pay for doesn't 100% divorce me from Google's watchful eye, but it's enough abstraction that hopefully they don't get enough info to build a profile of the real me.
  - techsupporter 7y ago
    Several video creators who got their start on Youtube have branched out to making their own platform, Nebula, if you are interested: https://watchnebula.com/ https://watchnebula.com/
    - southerndrift 7y ago
      Unfortunately, they won't succeed. The way their homepage is designed suggest that they believe that their reputation and brands are enough to make people subscribe. Why is it not possible to click on a channel image and have a sneak preview? Their landing page is only good for people who already made the decision to join, not to attract new viewers. In other words, they rely on youtube to expand their audience.
      - whatshisface 7y ago
        They aren't doomed offhandedly, plenty of original content streaming platforms make money. However they won't help with people getting crushed by YouTube; I can't just create an account and start uploading to their HBO/Netflix analog.
loudtieblahblah 7y ago
IMHO, the world is better off without YouTube. It's narcissism, the vids that should be blog posts for computer help, recipes, all sorts of stuff just drags out content to extract money out of it. Nevermond both its left and right wing culture are low brow and toxic.
- heartbreak 7y ago
  This is Scott Wadsworth’s latest video. It’s not narcissism, it wouldn’t be better as a blog post, it doesn’t drag on to run more ads, and it isn’t low brow or toxic. There are billions of hours of content on YouTube. You haven’t seen a representative sample. https://youtu.be/cv6BdwMe560 https://youtu.be/cv6BdwMe560
  - mrmonkeyman 7y ago
    You just made me watch some random, surprisingly interesting crafting dude, use string. On things.
  - mirimir 7y ago
    I don't have audio on this VM host. And CC is way too annoying. But based on several seconds of it, this ~19 minute video could be maybe 2K words plus ten images. Then I might actually read it.
    - sho 7y ago
      I think it's safe to say that 99.999% of people do not share your bizarre youtube-watching setup. I think it's also safe to say that the 60s-ish master craftsman featured is never even going to attempt to cut down his demonstrative, highly visual content to fit in an inferior, limited blog post. I don't even know what your point is. How about you try not watching videos through a VM with no sound.
      - mirimir 7y ago
        True. But even if I had sound, I'd pick text over video. I don't have the patience for unedited rambling. I don't have sound because it'd be a security vulnerability. Given that my wife has a mobile on 24/7.
kalleboo 7y ago
It’s fascinating how differently the YouTube algorithm treats people. I've not once seen a Fox or CNN video recommended, I didn't even know they had a presence on YouTube
- whatshisface 7y ago
  Personalization makes it incredibly hard to "watch the watchers," because everyone is getting a slightly different view of what Google is doing. I would like to see a program where users submitted data about their recommendations to researchers so that we could uncover Google's opinions. It would have a lot of financial value to YouTubers and would make it harder for Google to abuse their role as censor. I could imagine shadow-burning YouTubers without banning them by shrinking their recommendation audience. Further, it would be good for Google. Every little shift in the weather is going to get blamed on them whether they deserve it or not, now that it's common knowledge that they weild this power in more than zero cases. Google is about to discover why judges write opinions. Administering justice from secret meetings leads to popular dissent more than it leads to justice.
  - distances 7y ago
    I clear my YouTube search and watch history about once a week. Partly because of privacy, but also because a single binge of, say, metal casting videos does not mean I want them recommend ever again in the future.
    - Nextgrid 7y ago
      They use browser fingerprinting and/or IP addresses as well. Even on a brand new browser session, doing something even slightly related to the previous session brings back its entire recommendation history.
      - taneq 7y ago
        Yeah, the fact that I can clear cookies, open a private browsing window with tracking protection turned on, go to YouTube, and be asked which of my two gmail accounts I want to log in with, is pretty creepy.
citruspi 7y ago
I've got Little Snitch configured to block Youtube (and most Google services) when my browsers request them, but if there's a YouTube video that's interesting enough to warrant the extra effort, I just switch to my terminal and use youtube-dl to grab it and play it back locally.
zuron7 7y ago
You can always use YouTube through an alternate resource. Try invidio.us
user234683 7y ago
If your concern is privacy, I've developed this project which routes everything through Tor except for the video file: https://github.com/user234683/youtube-local https://github.com/user234683/youtube-local There is also this project which is similar but much better, more polished, and with more features than what I have currently, but I haven't tried it to see if it supports a similar kind of selective proxying: https://github.com/omarroth/invidious https://github.com/omarroth/invidious Then there's Freetube, which supports proxying but I'm not sure of the details either. It doesn't scrape Youtube itself as far as I know; instead it consults with the main Invidous instance at invidio.us which provides an api: https://github.com/FreeTubeApp/FreeTube https://github.com/FreeTubeApp/FreeTube
asveikau 7y ago
My experience is if you watch videos on a given topic, they try to show you more of the same topic. So they probably decided you like American cable news. It can get frustrating when it only recommends a single topic. I might go through a phase where I want to see videos about something specific. The recommendation algorithm will re-enforce that and prevent me from moving on to something else. I found that if I make some effort to watch a lot of videos about other topics, they appear. You can also manually edit your viewing history.
- mikeash 7y ago
  The trouble is that they often take viewing a video as a sign that you’re obsessed with that topic. You click one Flat Earth video to see what the crazy sounds like, and for the next three months half of your recommendations are “Scientists don’t want you to know this!”
- ravenstine 7y ago
  I would rather that it would just play the next video by the current channel in reverse chron. Maybe if a channel made multiple videos in the last 24 hours, play that and then play other stuff. Instead, it immediately moves me to cable news if I am watching anything political, even though I never watch cable news voluntarily.
novaleaf 7y ago
What I do, and all the sites I visit (techie) are surprisingly not broken (aside from recaptcha spam): 1) use Firefox with multi-account containers, and disable 3rd party cookies. 2) put youtube in it's own "youtube" container. do not login to that container 3) put all other google stuff in it's own "google" container If you do that, and don't login to google except in the "google" container it makes it more difficult for google to know who you are on youtube or other non-google sites. But to make it so they REALLY don't know who you are, you need to do the above plus use a VPN. In my own usage I've discovered that youtube will recommend you videos based on your IP address's recent views if your not logged in.
CreatedForThis 7y ago
Video-hosting website alternatives as YouTube are indeed, pretty difficult to use in hope to replace entirely that service. I’ll say that peertube is going into a great way, but if it actually continues to gain success, it will surely take too many longs. You can however, if its mainly for telemetry purposes, use something else like invidio.us which i’ve been using alongside it, since i’ve deleted my Google account.
7ewis 7y ago
Up next for me is great, always suggests videos of people I usually watch but haven't yet seen - or similar videos it thinks it might like. Very rarely have any news outlet.
trickstra 7y ago
Try invidio.us - it hooks directly to the video feed of youtube, which means no ads, no tracking, reddit comments, your own subscriptions with rss which don't require "hitting the bell" and I just tested it works even when youtube hostname is redirected to localhost in /etc/hosts
MrMember 7y ago
I set up a daily script to download new videos from channels I like using youtube-dl. It works really well, I rarely visit the actual YouTube site anymore.

ggg2 7y ago

pleroma (and i think maybe mastodon) provide media proxy that i think work for youtube. so when one person shares a video, one instance serves it to all the other users

mkl 7y ago
Wouldn't that just be sharing a link to YouTube? I.e. not re-hosting the video (which would probably violate copyright).

oil25 7y ago

YouTube and Maps are one of the few Google services left which are still available over Tor. You can proxy youtube-dl and retain some of your privacy this way.

morganvachon 7y ago
I've been thinking of setting up a super-tiny (about $15/year) VPS as a youtube-dl proxy for a while now. It's the only Google service that still remains valuable to me; I enjoy channels like Bad Obsession Motorsports and various indie musician channels, and Vimeo just doesn't have enough of that type of content, sadly. I know proxying through a VPS that I pay for doesn't 100% divorce me from Google's watchful eye, but it's enough abstraction that hopefully they don't get enough info to build a profile of the real me.
- techsupporter 7y ago
  Several video creators who got their start on Youtube have branched out to making their own platform, Nebula, if you are interested: https://watchnebula.com/ https://watchnebula.com/
  - southerndrift 7y ago
    Unfortunately, they won't succeed. The way their homepage is designed suggest that they believe that their reputation and brands are enough to make people subscribe. Why is it not possible to click on a channel image and have a sneak preview? Their landing page is only good for people who already made the decision to join, not to attract new viewers. In other words, they rely on youtube to expand their audience.
    - whatshisface 7y ago
      They aren't doomed offhandedly, plenty of original content streaming platforms make money. However they won't help with people getting crushed by YouTube; I can't just create an account and start uploading to their HBO/Netflix analog.

loudtieblahblah 7y ago

IMHO, the world is better off without YouTube. It's narcissism, the vids that should be blog posts for computer help, recipes, all sorts of stuff just drags out content to extract money out of it. Nevermond both its left and right wing culture are low brow and toxic.

heartbreak 7y ago
This is Scott Wadsworth’s latest video. It’s not narcissism, it wouldn’t be better as a blog post, it doesn’t drag on to run more ads, and it isn’t low brow or toxic. There are billions of hours of content on YouTube. You haven’t seen a representative sample. https://youtu.be/cv6BdwMe560 https://youtu.be/cv6BdwMe560
- mrmonkeyman 7y ago
  You just made me watch some random, surprisingly interesting crafting dude, use string. On things.
- mirimir 7y ago
  I don't have audio on this VM host. And CC is way too annoying. But based on several seconds of it, this ~19 minute video could be maybe 2K words plus ten images. Then I might actually read it.
  - sho 7y ago
    I think it's safe to say that 99.999% of people do not share your bizarre youtube-watching setup. I think it's also safe to say that the 60s-ish master craftsman featured is never even going to attempt to cut down his demonstrative, highly visual content to fit in an inferior, limited blog post. I don't even know what your point is. How about you try not watching videos through a VM with no sound.
    - mirimir 7y ago
      True. But even if I had sound, I'd pick text over video. I don't have the patience for unedited rambling. I don't have sound because it'd be a security vulnerability. Given that my wife has a mobile on 24/7.

kalleboo 7y ago

It’s fascinating how differently the YouTube algorithm treats people. I've not once seen a Fox or CNN video recommended, I didn't even know they had a presence on YouTube

whatshisface 7y ago
Personalization makes it incredibly hard to "watch the watchers," because everyone is getting a slightly different view of what Google is doing. I would like to see a program where users submitted data about their recommendations to researchers so that we could uncover Google's opinions. It would have a lot of financial value to YouTubers and would make it harder for Google to abuse their role as censor. I could imagine shadow-burning YouTubers without banning them by shrinking their recommendation audience. Further, it would be good for Google. Every little shift in the weather is going to get blamed on them whether they deserve it or not, now that it's common knowledge that they weild this power in more than zero cases. Google is about to discover why judges write opinions. Administering justice from secret meetings leads to popular dissent more than it leads to justice.
- distances 7y ago
  I clear my YouTube search and watch history about once a week. Partly because of privacy, but also because a single binge of, say, metal casting videos does not mean I want them recommend ever again in the future.
  - Nextgrid 7y ago
    They use browser fingerprinting and/or IP addresses as well. Even on a brand new browser session, doing something even slightly related to the previous session brings back its entire recommendation history.
    - taneq 7y ago
      Yeah, the fact that I can clear cookies, open a private browsing window with tracking protection turned on, go to YouTube, and be asked which of my two gmail accounts I want to log in with, is pretty creepy.

citruspi 7y ago

I've got Little Snitch configured to block Youtube (and most Google services) when my browsers request them, but if there's a YouTube video that's interesting enough to warrant the extra effort, I just switch to my terminal and use youtube-dl to grab it and play it back locally.

zuron7 7y ago

You can always use YouTube through an alternate resource. Try invidio.us

user234683 7y ago

If your concern is privacy, I've developed this project which routes everything through Tor except for the video file: https://github.com/user234683/youtube-local https://github.com/user234683/youtube-local There is also this project which is similar but much better, more polished, and with more features than what I have currently, but I haven't tried it to see if it supports a similar kind of selective proxying: https://github.com/omarroth/invidious https://github.com/omarroth/invidious Then there's Freetube, which supports proxying but I'm not sure of the details either. It doesn't scrape Youtube itself as far as I know; instead it consults with the main Invidous instance at invidio.us which provides an api: https://github.com/FreeTubeApp/FreeTube https://github.com/FreeTubeApp/FreeTube

asveikau 7y ago

My experience is if you watch videos on a given topic, they try to show you more of the same topic. So they probably decided you like American cable news. It can get frustrating when it only recommends a single topic. I might go through a phase where I want to see videos about something specific. The recommendation algorithm will re-enforce that and prevent me from moving on to something else. I found that if I make some effort to watch a lot of videos about other topics, they appear. You can also manually edit your viewing history.

mikeash 7y ago
The trouble is that they often take viewing a video as a sign that you’re obsessed with that topic. You click one Flat Earth video to see what the crazy sounds like, and for the next three months half of your recommendations are “Scientists don’t want you to know this!”
ravenstine 7y ago
I would rather that it would just play the next video by the current channel in reverse chron. Maybe if a channel made multiple videos in the last 24 hours, play that and then play other stuff. Instead, it immediately moves me to cable news if I am watching anything political, even though I never watch cable news voluntarily.

novaleaf 7y ago

What I do, and all the sites I visit (techie) are surprisingly not broken (aside from recaptcha spam): 1) use Firefox with multi-account containers, and disable 3rd party cookies. 2) put youtube in it's own "youtube" container. do not login to that container 3) put all other google stuff in it's own "google" container If you do that, and don't login to google except in the "google" container it makes it more difficult for google to know who you are on youtube or other non-google sites. But to make it so they REALLY don't know who you are, you need to do the above plus use a VPN. In my own usage I've discovered that youtube will recommend you videos based on your IP address's recent views if your not logged in.

CreatedForThis 7y ago

Video-hosting website alternatives as YouTube are indeed, pretty difficult to use in hope to replace entirely that service. I’ll say that peertube is going into a great way, but if it actually continues to gain success, it will surely take too many longs. You can however, if its mainly for telemetry purposes, use something else like invidio.us which i’ve been using alongside it, since i’ve deleted my Google account.

7ewis 7y ago

Up next for me is great, always suggests videos of people I usually watch but haven't yet seen - or similar videos it thinks it might like. Very rarely have any news outlet.

trickstra 7y ago

Try invidio.us - it hooks directly to the video feed of youtube, which means no ads, no tracking, reddit comments, your own subscriptions with rss which don't require "hitting the bell" and I just tested it works even when youtube hostname is redirected to localhost in /etc/hosts

MrMember 7y ago

I set up a daily script to download new videos from channels I like using youtube-dl. It works really well, I rarely visit the actual YouTube site anymore.