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95% of the Youtube content I want to see is either educational or created by friends/family. I don't want TikTok-style algorithmic content. At this point, I th

by blagie 4y ago

95% of the Youtube content I want to see is either educational or created by friends/family. I don't want TikTok-style algorithmic content. At this point, I think there's a business model in making a Youtube front-end which is designed to be not horrible for niche users like myself. I suspect I'm a small enough percentage of the market to not be worth bothering with for a $1T company, but plenty enough to sustain a mid-sized startup.

MildlySerious 4y ago
Last time I checked the API was very restrictive towards building custom clients that are somewhat complete. There was no endpoint for getting the subscription feed and the discussion about it had been open for years already. So you have to use a lot of quota to construct it manually. iirc they had some weird rules about caching the results of API calls as well, but I could be mistaking that with something else.
- blagie 4y ago
  I suspect curated creators would be interested in managing their content. Youtube is a bad experience on both sides. And I suspect they'd need to, if nothing else, to do quality content-tagging. Some of this could be crowdsourced too.
- ThatMedicIsASpy 4y ago
  There is Youtube.js using the private api. https://github.com/LuanRT/YouTube.js https://github.com/LuanRT/YouTube.js
good8675309 4y ago
In regards to alternative Youtube clients. Not sure if it fits your requirements but I've used MiniTube which is pretty decent: https://flavio.tordini.org/minitube https://flavio.tordini.org/minitube
- blagie 4y ago
  This is almost the exact opposite of what I want. A lot of screentime is not healthy, and I don't want an interface which encourages that. This is based on the model of a TV running. I want to be very deliberate about what I watch, when I watch it, and why I watch it. I don't want anything which will lead me to watching more videos or to watching them casually. For the most part, I have specific times when I watch specific videos with family. I also use videos as a work break when I burn down. An ideal work break is 5-20 minutes, and I don't want to be pulled into any more. It seems like a good tool, but for the opposite niche.
l72 4y ago
I just add any creators I like to my RSS feed. Then I get nice chronological ordering and updates when they post new videos. No recommendations I don't care about, just the content I want to see.
- wafriedemann 4y ago
  I do the same thing. Reeder even has some adblock magic. In Firefox I use Unhook to just allow search. I do admit, however, that I barely find anything new anymore now that everything's blocked. Have to figure out new ways to find inspriation.
- worble 4y ago
  I'm shocked that the RSS feeds still exist honestly. I think it's only a matter of time until they're killed off.
uwuemu 4y ago
HN is a funny place. Each time one of these billion (or trillion) dollar scumbag companies does something scumbaggy, people come out of the woodwork and wish there was an alternative frontend. Twitter, Instagram, Youtube, Facebook... it has happened before and it will happen again. YET there's a A LOT of people here who get incredibly butthurt as soon as you mention the crazy idea of public website crawling being explicitly encoded into law as allowed. The only entities that would be hurt by this would be these fucking evil corps who abuse and evade the law all the time and are conspiring to extract as much money from the population as they can in countless shady ways.
mozman 4y ago
As with most Google companies the packet promotion process is decreasing the quality of the product and the user experience. YT is clearly pandering to advertisers. I feel a little (ok, a lot) of schadenfreude every time I hear about a move that makes advertisers uncomfortable.. The internet used to be made by users for users. Commerce has ruined software development and the general experience on the web for many. I can’t think of a world where uBlock doesn’t work anymore. I think I’d leave the business and find a new career doing something physical where I don’t have to be subjected to this crap.
- blagie 4y ago
  ... I'm not sure about that. Most of my problems with Youtube have much more to do with me being a niche customer than anything. I honestly believe most of the world most wants to see stupid cat videos, videos of people embarrassing themselves, videos which will make them feel validated, and so on. The older I get, the less faith I have in humanity.
  - mozman 4y ago
    I don’t see these as mutually exclusive. The ego of tech companies think they know better than the user. Never doubt what you want. Niche or not you’re still a user. Shorts are cancer.
des1nderlase 4y ago
This is not a niche scenario by any measure. Edu videos are getting more views than probably any other edu content online or in person.

by blagie 4y ago

MildlySerious 4y ago

Last time I checked the API was very restrictive towards building custom clients that are somewhat complete. There was no endpoint for getting the subscription feed and the discussion about it had been open for years already. So you have to use a lot of quota to construct it manually. iirc they had some weird rules about caching the results of API calls as well, but I could be mistaking that with something else.

blagie 4y ago
I suspect curated creators would be interested in managing their content. Youtube is a bad experience on both sides. And I suspect they'd need to, if nothing else, to do quality content-tagging. Some of this could be crowdsourced too.
ThatMedicIsASpy 4y ago
There is Youtube.js using the private api. https://github.com/LuanRT/YouTube.js https://github.com/LuanRT/YouTube.js

good8675309 4y ago

In regards to alternative Youtube clients. Not sure if it fits your requirements but I've used MiniTube which is pretty decent: https://flavio.tordini.org/minitube https://flavio.tordini.org/minitube

blagie 4y ago
This is almost the exact opposite of what I want. A lot of screentime is not healthy, and I don't want an interface which encourages that. This is based on the model of a TV running. I want to be very deliberate about what I watch, when I watch it, and why I watch it. I don't want anything which will lead me to watching more videos or to watching them casually. For the most part, I have specific times when I watch specific videos with family. I also use videos as a work break when I burn down. An ideal work break is 5-20 minutes, and I don't want to be pulled into any more. It seems like a good tool, but for the opposite niche.

l72 4y ago

I just add any creators I like to my RSS feed. Then I get nice chronological ordering and updates when they post new videos. No recommendations I don't care about, just the content I want to see.

wafriedemann 4y ago
I do the same thing. Reeder even has some adblock magic. In Firefox I use Unhook to just allow search. I do admit, however, that I barely find anything new anymore now that everything's blocked. Have to figure out new ways to find inspriation.
worble 4y ago
I'm shocked that the RSS feeds still exist honestly. I think it's only a matter of time until they're killed off.

uwuemu 4y ago

HN is a funny place. Each time one of these billion (or trillion) dollar scumbag companies does something scumbaggy, people come out of the woodwork and wish there was an alternative frontend. Twitter, Instagram, Youtube, Facebook... it has happened before and it will happen again. YET there's a A LOT of people here who get incredibly butthurt as soon as you mention the crazy idea of public website crawling being explicitly encoded into law as allowed. The only entities that would be hurt by this would be these fucking evil corps who abuse and evade the law all the time and are conspiring to extract as much money from the population as they can in countless shady ways.

mozman 4y ago

As with most Google companies the packet promotion process is decreasing the quality of the product and the user experience. YT is clearly pandering to advertisers. I feel a little (ok, a lot) of schadenfreude every time I hear about a move that makes advertisers uncomfortable.. The internet used to be made by users for users. Commerce has ruined software development and the general experience on the web for many. I can’t think of a world where uBlock doesn’t work anymore. I think I’d leave the business and find a new career doing something physical where I don’t have to be subjected to this crap.

blagie 4y ago
... I'm not sure about that. Most of my problems with Youtube have much more to do with me being a niche customer than anything. I honestly believe most of the world most wants to see stupid cat videos, videos of people embarrassing themselves, videos which will make them feel validated, and so on. The older I get, the less faith I have in humanity.
- mozman 4y ago
  I don’t see these as mutually exclusive. The ego of tech companies think they know better than the user. Never doubt what you want. Niche or not you’re still a user. Shorts are cancer.

des1nderlase 4y ago

This is not a niche scenario by any measure. Edu videos are getting more views than probably any other edu content online or in person.