I’ve been having some weird issues over the last few days with not being able to search for things in YouTube when I’m logged in via SmartTube account.

So I decided to try accessing it directly. Well guess what? It looks like YouTube now requires age verification in AU.

Sorry Google… I’m not uploading my passport, drivers licence or govt id to watch your shit. I am however now very incentivized to use Tube archivist and Jellyfin, plus cron job to scrape your shit with gleeful abandon.

EDIT: Rather than removed about it, I did something and made Smarttube work without a google account. If that floats your boat, have at it. It supports direct import of your saved playlists via Google Takeout ZIP file, subscriptions etc without needing a youtube account.

Also, remember the excellent TubeArchivist exists if you want even more control.

  • rumba@lemmy.zip
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    15 hours ago

    Do be careful about TubeArchivist. If you just go to town on it, there’s a good chance they’ll just block your IP. I don’t get why some get blocked and others don’t. The cell phone tower at my kids school has been blocked, you have to log in when coming from that ip, Waiting outside to pick him up, I have to can and bring my own content :)

    • leadore@lemmy.world
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      14 hours ago

      That happens to me when I use FreeTube. After a few videos, I get an error that my IP address has been blocked.

      • rumba@lemmy.zip
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        11 hours ago

        The blocked my IP some time ago after a binge of yt-dlp. I unplugged my fiber ONT over the weekend and got a new ip, i’ve been more careful with that one :)

          • rumba@lemmy.zip
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            1 hour ago

            I’m honestly not sure, since then, i’ve been careful not to greatly exceed real time vs downloaded time accounting that my wife and kids may be watching as well

        • leadore@lemmy.world
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          10 hours ago

          I’ve rebooted my modem to get a new IP, though I have to wait a while before restarting or I’d get the same one. Usually if I just wait a while (a few hours?), YT unblocks me again. But it’s irritating.

    • SuspiciousCarrot78@aussie.zoneOP
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      15 hours ago

      Yep, that’s a good point. I actually have a battle plan in place (if it comes to that) using a mixture of 540-720p videos (to reduce download sizes) and then AI upscaling as needed using an NVIDIA shield or on site compute.

      They really, really don’t like it when you don’t log in, huh? 🤣

      Fun game of cat and mouse aside, if it all ever goes to shit…I’ll miss niche YT channels but there are other alternatives.

      • rumba@lemmy.zip
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        15 hours ago

        Would be cook if tube archivist was decentralized, so when one person downloaded the video, others could do a peer-tube style p2p on it.

        • SuspiciousCarrot78@aussie.zoneOP
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          2 hours ago

          That sounds like PeerTube with extra steps :) I’m down for it.

          I’ll probably end up using Pinchflat over Tube Archivist myself (a bit lighter to keep running as always on service on my Raspberry pi) but p2p seeding should work just the same.

          • rumba@lemmy.zip
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            59 minutes ago

            Peertube would be fantastic, except you’re exposed, hanging in the wind. we need some kind of abstraction. If google connected up a client and saw all the ips hosting, they’d immediately block us all :)

        • bruh@thelemmy.club
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          10 hours ago

          Would be cook if tube archivist was decentralized, so when one person downloaded the video, others could do a peer-tube style p2p on it.

          that isn’t far in the future where we will literally pirate youtube video to escape youtube’s paywall / login wall

          • rumba@lemmy.zip
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            7 hours ago

            Yeah, if the ad-block gets hard enough, people will use chinese HDMI splitters, stream recorders and a comskip project :)

  • topperharlie@lemmy.world
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    19 hours ago

    Everyone here shitting on YouTube, but the AU government is to blame here really. I’m really scared that we are next on this stupid privacy killing trend (we -> Europe). Without privacy there is no democracy.

    I wish some hacker activitist would make their life goal to dox the christofascist associations’ members and supporting politicians. And publish every fucking detail of them, so they would get to know what risks they are exposing people to on their own skin.

  • LordCrom@lemmy.world
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    2 days ago

    Use a VPN with an exit node in Albania. Youtube cannot force a signin or ads due to Albanian laws.

    I use it daily. Try it. It works

    • Sʏʟᴇɴᴄᴇ@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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      1 day ago

      I did this one day just because Albania was the first country that showed up alphabetically after the exit node in my home country started requiring age verification in many places. Always thought it was dumb luck, not because of anything specific about Albania, TIL. Based 🇦🇱

  • Carl@anarchist.nexus
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    2 days ago

    I’m pretty sure my original Google account is over 18 years old. How is that not considered proof of age?

  • 1984@lemmy.today
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    2 days ago

    Yes let’s send our id cards to an american big tech corporation, what could possibly go wrong there.

      • verily@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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        16 hours ago

        There were more people that you’d expect who basically said the same thing about much of Linux (systemd) receiving age verification mechanics. To me, those arguments in favor of age verification seemed even louder because the change could be dismissed as “optional” and “open-source,” although the layman cannot easily drop or replace a computer operating system, and it would take significant political capital to change the source of systemd back to its pre-age-verification state.

  • SpaceCrystal@lemmy.ml
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    2 days ago

    People just need to stop using American Big Tech bullshit & go with better alternatives.

    • SuspiciousCarrot78@aussie.zoneOP
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      2 days ago

      “People” unfortunately are still captured by existing systems. As much as I like Curiosity, Odysee, PeerTube etc if the content is locked into Youtube, then we need to build bridges, not walls.

      • BigDiction@lemmy.world
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        2 days ago

        I signed to for Nebula last night. It’s only built 20-30 minute form content but i think they did a nice job with the front end.

    • SuspiciousCarrot78@aussie.zoneOP
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      1 day ago

      Cheers big ears!

      PS: I updated the fork overnight, so now you can download your Google Takeout data as a ZIP, import it, wait about 5 minutes, and voila - all your playlists are available locally. You can add to them locally, obviously, but those changes won’t sync back to YouTube. “Likes” and “Comments” obviously don’t work either.

      Sorry, I couldn’t figure out how to do local avatars or progress indicator bar for the import (well, I mean, I could…I just couldn’t be arsed to spend another 4-5hrs doing it, then testing it etc etc).

      Enjoy your pirate youtubez, yarr!