Youtube has fully blocked Invidious

Submitted ⁨⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩ by ⁨captainkangaroo@discuss.tchncs.de⁩ to ⁨technology@lemmy.world⁩

https://github.com/iv-org/invidious/issues/4734#issuecomment-2365205990

cross-posted from: discuss.tchncs.de/post/22423685

EDIT: For those who are too lazy to click the link, this is what it says

Hello,

Sad news for everyone. YouTube/Google has patched the latest workaround that we had in order to restore the video playback functionality.

Right now we have no other solutions/fixes. You may be able to get Invidious working on residential IP addresses (like at home) but on datacenter IP addresses Invidious won’t work anymore.

If you are interested to install Invidious at home, we remind you that we have a guide for that here: https://docs.invidious.io/installation/..

This is not the death of this project. We will still try to find new solutions, but this might take time, months probably.

I have updated the public instance list in order to reflect on the working public instances: https://instances.invidious.io. Please don’t abuse them since the number is really low.

Feel free to discuss this politely on Matrix or IRC.

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Comments

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Nima@leminal.space ⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
i absolutely despise youtube. these fuckers are putting ads on paused videos now, and then this.

they will never get better. only worse. we need regulations badly.

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- beejjorgensen@lemmy.sdf.org ⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  We need a competitor badly.
  
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  - RmDebArc_5@sh.itjust.works ⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    Peertube/Odysee exist, even if they are relatively niche.
    
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  - scarabic@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    Paying Nebula subscriber here 🙋‍♂️
    
    Pony up or your call for a competitor doesn’t mean anything. People don’t want ads? Fine. There has to be another revenue stream.
    
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  - silasmariner@programming.dev ⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    Whatever happened to dailymotion?
    
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- IsThisAnAI@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  You want regulations on ads for a free service?
  
  The entitlement is wild.
  
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  - cheddar@programming.dev ⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    Free or not, monopolies should be regulated.
    
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  - homesweethomeMrL@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    They’re a monopoly that relies on users to produce content. You see, in a functional capitalist system, when one supplier deliberately hinders competition through unfair trade practices, they are made to change their methods in order to foster competition.
    
    When that system is corrupted and fails to act in a timely manner, all bets are off.
    
    You know where else you can go to find the billions of videos users have uploaded? No. How did it get that way? Just, luck? No.
    
    Yes, we want regulations on ads in YouTube, and it’s an ignorant and arrogant position to call that “entitled”.
    
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  - scarabic@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    You’ll never get upvotes for telling people this reality, but you are of course completely correct.
    
    If only we saw as much enthusiasm for voting generally as we see for taking ads off YT. Maybe we’d actually get a government that was willing to regulate titans.
    
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Excrubulent@slrpnk.net ⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
Not just invidious, they’ve just de facto blocked video embedding:

Image

If you’re wondering how a viable competitor could arise, other companies needing a video hosting solution that they can rely on to run their storefronts is a perfect case. This is the Humble Bundle storefront, and they could pretty easily spin up a peertube instance. If that became commonplace, it could be one way for peertube to become ubiquitous.

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- Mwa@lemm.ee ⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  yo rainworld i used to have a friend that was a fan of that game
  
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  - turtletracks@lemmy.zip ⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    It’s a 10/10 for me! Amazing game but definitely not for everyone
    
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  - P4ulin_Kbana@lemmy.eco.br ⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    What happened?
    
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  - rain_worl@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    aww, thanks!
    -rain world
    
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- helenslunch@feddit.nl ⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  Professional hosting for business use is not hard, and fairly common even. But these make up a tiny fraction of YouTube videos, and they mostly post there to get organic growth and be suggested to people already watching YouTube.
  
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  - Excrubulent@slrpnk.net ⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    Sure but it’s really common to see embedded youtube videos on storefronts, and if storefronts en masse abandoned it that’s one more piece of the market that youtube has lost.
    
    They can’t keep locking it down and not lose market share, is my point. They’re enshittifying so much, so fast, and eventually there will be a tipping point.
    
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- rdri@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  Seems it’s fixed now?
  
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  - Excrubulent@slrpnk.net ⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    Could be, maybe it’s intermittent, but the more times they try to lock this shit down and it stops working for storefronts, the more unreliable it becomes.
    
    What percentage of visits can they afford to have this error happen before they seek alternatives? If it were my business and I didn’t know how many customers were closing the store page because the video didn’t play and they lost interest, I would be immediately looking for an alternative.
    
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  - TriflingToad@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    is that a possible workaround? Also, a tip from my school trying to block YouTube (idk if it applies here) is that you can ‘add to queue’ to where it plays in the corner then there’s a button to make it bigger.
    
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- rain_worl@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  rain world???
  
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  - Excrubulent@slrpnk.net ⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    Rain world.
    
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- dan@upvote.au ⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  
  other companies needing a video hosting solution that they can rely on to run their storefronts is a perfect use case.
  
  Many companies use Vimeo for this.
  
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- flames5123@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  I watch embedded videos all the time. Literally hundreds this weekend. Embedded is not “de facto blocked”.
  
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  - Excrubulent@slrpnk.net ⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    Well I now can’t unless I disable my VPN. Storefronts would probably like VPN users to be able to use their stores, in which case they might be more interested in an alternative.
    
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meldrik@lemmy.wtf ⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
Start asking your favourite content creators to post on PeerTube.

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- brrt@sh.itjust.works ⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  And how are they going to make a living to keep producing videos?
  
  I’d say ask them to join Nebula.
  
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  - meldrik@lemmy.wtf ⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    That depends. If they only make a living with YT ads, then it’s going to be hard.
    
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  - Fosheze@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    All the people I watch on youtube make the majority of their money on patreon or twitch. Youtube is way too heavy handed with demonitization and copyright strikes to be a trutsworthy income source.
    
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  - Allero@lemmy.today ⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    Nebula is cool and all, but at the end of the day, it’s still a commercial platform, and those do tend to enshittify and depend a lot on externalities.
    
    As creators grow more dependent on Nebula, Sam and the team of original Nebula creators can wield more power and change the rules. They already dictate the kind of content that is allowed - for example, Second Thought, one of the original creators behind Nebula, was asked to leave as he doesn’t agree to change public stance on Israeli-Palestinian conflict (he is pro-Palestine). This has left him without a source of revenue necessary for the production to expand, and put him into debt.
    
    Solution? Probably independent sponsorships that would go both on YouTube and PeerTube videos. Or a creator reward system like in Lbry/Odysee. Something that would allow to reward creators without going full commercial.
    
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  - GhiLA@sh.itjust.works ⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    They can still post on YouTube.
    
    It might take a tiny bit of their revenue away but I doubt it would make much of a dent, especially for creators that run mostly on patreon anyway.
    
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  - BatrickPateman@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    Patreon and all the other services creators have at their disposal already.
    
    Don’t think most Youtubers can make a living these days solely on YT as revenue, and are already exploring other avenues.
    
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  - scarabic@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    Paying Nebula subscriber here 🙋‍♂️
    
    I can’t stand hearing people whine about wanting everything for free and how DARE people try to make a living so they can eat in between making videos!!!
    
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  - 96VXb9ktTjFnRi@feddit.nl ⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    Direct payment to creators seems like the most simple and efficient method.
    
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  - helenslunch@feddit.nl ⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    Same way they do on YT. Patreon + sponsor spots + merch. They only miss out on ad revenue (which I concede is not insignificant).
    
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  - homesweethomeMrL@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    I just want the videos no creator makes money on. I expect thats about 50% at least. Let’s start there. Put them in the Library of Congress and YouTube will be free to enshittify themselves into oblivion without complaint.
    
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- LunarLoony@lemmy.sdf.org ⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  And while we’re at it, stop calling them ‘content creators’
  
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  - meldrik@lemmy.wtf ⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    What is the alternative name for someone who creates content for a platform?
    
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  - dumbass@leminal.space ⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    I’ll take the name Content Creator over Influencer any day.
    
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  - Ilovethebomb@lemm.ee ⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    Why? What else would we call them?
    
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  - Skates@feddit.nl ⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    Right. Call them youtubers! Wait…
    
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- Mwa@lemm.ee ⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  or odysee ig
  
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  - meldrik@lemmy.wtf ⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    What are your criteria for a good instance? I host one myself, so genuinely curious.
    
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- mostlikelyaperson@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  And then watch the peertube instance die. See also: github.com/Chocobozzz/PeerTube/issues/5783
  
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- sag@lemm.ee ⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  Civvie 11 is a old head. How do I convince him?
  
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  - meldrik@lemmy.wtf ⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    What have you tried so far?
    
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- WhyJiffie@sh.itjust.works ⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  on which instance?
  
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  - meldrik@lemmy.wtf ⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    Tilvids.com is a good start. Fx The Linux Experiment is there.
    
    Otherwise, I host peertube.wtf.
    
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flop_leash_973@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
Youtube will not change until people stop using it, And people do not want to put up with the inconvenience of not having a Youtube type service again for the amount of time it would take for Youtube to change or a viable competitor to take their place, it really is that simple.

Is youtube and Google terrible? For sure, but it only got this way because the only backstop to holding them accountable, the consumer, has proven that they will choose putting up with shitty products and services in the name of convenience 9 times out of 10.

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- UniversalMonk@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  
  Same reasons that ad tiers are gaining a foothold in streaming services like Netflix. The consumer has shown they are fine with it.
  
  Yep, I remember when Netlfix first put it out there that they would start with the ads, and everyone on reddit was like, “Canceling my Netflix right now!!”
  
  Netflix is doing just fine without the 5 redditors who actually did cancel it. lmao
  
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  - A_Random_Idiot@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    the problem is so many people are willing to say they’ll take a stand.
    
    but when the time comes, the mindnumbingly overwhelming majority suck it up, because they must have their precious shiny and can not suffer even the mildest of inconvenience.
    
    Its my biggest gripe in gaming, but its a enormous gripe just in general, with everything. because it doesnt matter if you are talking about appliances, creative software, video games, streaming services, stores, etc.
    
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- Petter1@lemm.ee ⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  Time to pirate YT content and upload to usenet to be automatically downloaded using sonarr
  
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- ironsoap@lemmy.one ⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  While I agree, I have a hard time seeing how people will stop using it until the field changes. Maybe in 10 years it will the the MySpace of the sitcom era, but right now it’s still growing. That growth is giving it carte blanche to manipulate the users as it sees fit. Regulation might impact it, but it’s still a bit of a Goliath.
  
  Compared to 2023, YouTube’s user base has grown by 20 million this year, representing a 0.74% increase. From Global media insights
  
  Also the active user base is 2.7 billion people in 2024 from the same source above.
  
  The alternatives are out there, but just not in the same league.
  
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- AbsoluteChicagoDog@lemm.ee ⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  I see we’re pretending the government doesn’t have regulatory power today
  
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GhiLA@sh.itjust.works ⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
yt-dlp still works.

A spark of hope in a dim world.

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- vividspecter@lemm.ee ⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  I’ve seen it go down in some cases on VPNs, so it could be a matter of time (or they’ll find a solution again and the back and forth will just continue).
  
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- Tangent5280@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  My god, what if its on google’s chopping block next?
  
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LordWiggle@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
You can still watch YouTube without ads using grayjay.app including sponsor block.

Thanks to Louis Rossman

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- polle@feddit.org ⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  Or just use Firefox with ublock?
  
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- Mwa@lemm.ee ⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  grayjay doesnt have return youtube dislike
  
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zlatiah@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
The elites don’t want you to know but “[y]ou may be able to get Invidious working on residential IP addresses (like at home)”

Following their guide gives a local Invidious client, don’t forget to 1) copy their production compose file instead of using the one on git and 2) change “hmac_key”… from my experience setting up cron (crontab -e) to restart the docker container once per day keeps the Invidious docker healthy

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- ShepherdPie@midwest.social ⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  If you do this, I would be fully prepared to lose access to all your Google services along with anyone else who may use Google services on the same IP. Gmail, Play store, Chrome, etc, etc can easily be wiped out with a ban from Google and this can seriously fuck people’s day up if they’ve used Gmail and have 2FA setup on any external account.
  
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- MangoPenguin@lemmy.blahaj.zone ⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  At least until they start blacklisting IPs using Invidious.
  
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rustydomino@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
You can block YouTube ads simply by connecting to an Albanian VPN server.

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- demesisx@infosec.pub ⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  This comment changed my life. Thanks.
  
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- makyo@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  Why does that work?
  
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- Cistello@reddthat.com ⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  Same thing with Syria, Ukraine, Russia …
  
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hollyberries@programming.dev ⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

Right now we have no other solutions/fixes. You may be able to get Invidious working on residential IP addresses (like at home) but on datacenter IP addresses Invidious won’t work anymore.

This might explain why mine has been reliable even though it hasn’t been updated in months. I guess add me to the list of confirmations that it works on residential connections.

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Soup@lemmy.cafe ⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
People can always just stop using YouTube. It’s getting laughable the level of Stockholm syndrome people have for that shit service.

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- LifeOfChance@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  As someone who does a lot of DIY what are my options? I can’t learn from reading and have nobody to show me how in person. Other platforms are so incredibly limited I can’t ever find any content helping me learn something. What other platform is seeking to ACTUALLY compete with YouTube by offering fair compensation and exposure to the masses? It’s so incredibly expensive to try that nobody is.
  
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- xthexder@l.sw0.com ⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  I don’t really think Stockholm syndrome applies here. I don’t watch YouTube out of some irrational bond with the platform. I watch YouTube because it’s literally the only place the creators I watch upload. I would absolutely follow the creators I watch to whatever platform the content is available on. Until then, I’m stuck with YouTube and ad blocking extensions.
  
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- TheDarksteel94@sopuli.xyz ⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  The problem is, there’s just no (good) direct competition. The audience will follow creators once enough of them switch to the same alternative platform. But as long as there’s no platform with a comparable amount of money behind it, most people will continue to use Youtube.
  
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Mwa@lemm.ee ⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
newpiped and freetube will continue to work but piped is also blocked as well

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sga@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
For those who are want something similar to invidious, you can try youtube-local (not my project, I am just a user). It is a minimal python youtube client, and functions similar to other frontends, but runs locally. You lose some amount of privacy (youtube still has a general idea of who is watching with IPs), but it is not very exact, and there is an option to use tor to get the content. You can also enable sponsorblock, or hide yt-shorts.

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solrize@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
Sad to hear. Newpipe is still working fine (as of a couple minutes ago) if that helps.

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Engywuck@lemm.ee ⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
People should learn to live without YT, instead of making an existential drama about it (about its ads, really).

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krdo@programming.dev ⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
For Android users, I highly recommend NewPipe as a YouTube client

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capital@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
Self hosted option is a docker image. Probably not difficult to set up.

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Fijxu@programming.dev ⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
If you have the resources, host your own to help and spread the load across public instances.

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starman@programming.dev ⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
Didn’t Odysee recently removed ads? Anyway, I think I’ll start watching videos on Odysee and peertube, via RSS feeds. At least from youtubers that upload there.

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geography082@lemm.ee ⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
I would suggest the devs to be able to create instances from within tor. It would be slow, but impossible to block. Or from any other network that don’t rely on single IP access to YouTube . Or, make a mesh of collaborative home instances. Google can’t block millions of home IPs. Or use any mesh collaborative network capable of it.

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firepenny@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
So if Google can ban our IP if caught using this, could you now use some type of dynamic IP mechanism every time they ban the IP?

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IcePee@lemmy.beru.co ⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
I wonder if some kind of mesh might work. Maybe like a secret Santa type deal. By that I mean everyone who connects, gets a randomised, anonymous partner or partners. Everyone in the swarm streams for each other.

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Invertedouroboros@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
I’ve also ran into some issues simply accessing youtube through my vpn, but that’s been going on for a while.

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webghost0101@sopuli.xyz ⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
Wow all this bullying is really convincing me to go back to their shitty platform.

If i can’t access my fav creators anymore itl just motivate me to do sm productive, like building web3

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Shortstack@reddthat.com ⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
Oh that’s why no videos would load.

Damn it

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EmperorHenry@discuss.tchncs.de ⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
many instances of piped and invidious still work though

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FeelThePower@lemmy.dbzer0.com ⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
theoretically, they could switch the player to use a nocookie embed.

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