YouTube looks out for content owners, disables video ripping
When YouTube announced last week that select videos would be available to download, it meant little to the savvy YouTube surfer. After all, they've been able to do that for years thanks to Firefox scripts and tools provided by various websites.
Turns out they weren't more savvy than YouTube. The Google-owned site has been making changes to its code recently to lock out third-party download tools.
Is this an attempt by the big, scary corporation to shut down the little guys who are trying to do the world a favor by making permanent copies of streaming videos for the convenience of offline viewing? Not exactly.
YouTube's terms of service has long had a clause barring users from employing outside tools to rip videos from the server. It's probably no coincidence that TechCrunch's video download tool was rendered useless just one day after YouTube announced it would begin offering paid and free video downloads.
A YouTube spokesperson says it's a matter of content ownership. YouTube never offered the ability for a channel owner to ...
... sell or give away downloads before. But now that it does, people can use third-party ripping tools to get free copies of videos that content owners want to either sell or not make available for download. No, the timing of YouTube's download service probably wasn't a coincidence.
TechCrunch's tool, although the highest profile takedown, wasn't the
only one to bite the dirt. Of the ones we tested, the following no
longer work: KeepVid, SaveVideoDownload.com and the Download YouTube Video script for Firefox's Greasemonkey extension.
One website managed to skirt YouTube's claws until Wednesday. But even KickYouTube is now broken.
Many of these tools seem to be caught in a game of cat and mouse as they try to
work around YouTube's back-end tweaks. We'll see who gets tired of the
chase first.
-- Mark Milian
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KeepVid still works. Why are you reporting otherwise?
Check it out. I just checked and downloaded an flv from you tube with keepvid.
Worked great for me.
Posted by: Josh | February 20, 2009 at 12:16 AM
At the time of writing (Feb 20 2009) I was able to download YouTube videos with KeepVid. There has been a long cat and mouse game between YouTube and the download providers, and there have been previous attempts to prevent offline viewing through downloads. Things could still change if YouTube ups its game again.
Posted by: Ian | February 20, 2009 at 01:51 AM
Actually, KickYouTube seems to be back in business...
http://www.techinreallife.com/2009/02/you-tube-aims-to-stop-stream-copying.html
Posted by: Pcash | February 20, 2009 at 04:40 AM
Nothing's perfect, but I have clients who have been pretty angry because pirates have been ripping their videos and selling them through other sites, or adding advertising to them and remarketing them as their own. Maybe this will help.
Anything to reduce theft, as long as legit users don't get the shaft, is cool by me.
Posted by: Patrick | February 20, 2009 at 08:17 PM
For the tech minded, the problem for YouTube is hiding the URL of the video file. if this can be found, the video can be downloaded. Some websites have succeeded in preventing downloads of their videos, for example the BBC uses its own player which will defeat all known ripping tools at the present time.
Posted by: Ian | February 21, 2009 at 12:59 AM
It is very disappointing. OK I understand for music clips and movie trailers... but hey, how about common videos, like product reviews or cellphone reviews for example? I live in a country where broadband is still a luxury. Heck, I even read that even in U.S. broad band penetration has not covered majority population either! I say yes for music clips since they are copyrighted. But for common, and sometimes funny videos, please enable downloading..!! I always wonder why the bigger corporations are, the more stupid they are... Google and YouTube are not friends of the people anymore.. they've became truly industrialists!
Posted by: Beta | February 23, 2009 at 08:15 AM
if you can see it or hear it, it can be ripped or recorded. stop making the internet becomine proprietary and cumbersome to attain interoperability for simple things.
people will always find a way to copy content, wether it be 'protected' or not, when will people let this set in? no matter what is done to try to protect this content, it can never be, if it is meant to be viewed.
All this does is make simple things like what i was trying to do this evening, (save a popular, seen-by 10 million people, youtube video for playback on an non-internet enabled device) a pain and unnecessarily difficult.
Going one step further here, you will find that the low resolution videos on youtube are .flv, flash based videos, which, lo and beyond only a handful of media playback devices can actually work with (yay proprietary!).
Lets say, keepvid.com didnt work (It in fact, DOES work... nice researching..) and youtube had their way... a quick google search would have you figure out how to capture your video or find someone else who had already. Now you are left have to convert it yourself, to a format you need for your player.
This is Web2.0? Do consumers/WE really want more of these problems compounding on each other making the devices we increasingly use, more and more difficult to inter operate?
Posted by: dur mcdurson | February 24, 2009 at 05:15 PM
Like it or not, the content on YouTube is not open source. The copyright on a home video of a skateboarding dog still remains with the person who shot the video. There is nothing much wrong with recording YouTube videos purely for personal use, but YouTube is currently facing lawsuits for copyright violation from Viacom and other organizations. Advertisers are reluctant to invest heavily in YouTube while it is seen as a copyright free for all, so YouTube's future prosperity requires some adherence to the copyright laws.
Posted by: Ian | February 25, 2009 at 03:05 AM
darn..I went to download something with keepvid and realized something was up when the file was 0 bytes. Ultimately, the way of the future for saving content won't be downloading the file (because they will keep making it harder) but people will move towards capturing what goes through their graphics device and sound mixer. There's programs now that can record what is on your screen (Snagit for example) and also capture audio. Put those together and you can capture anything. Honestly there's probably a program already like this, I'm just not as up to date as I should be.
I use Snagit for other uses but it's not good for capturing high quality vids yet in my opinion because the quality kind of sucks. Im sure there's a much better option out there by now, what I use is a little outdated.
I'll look around
By the way, does anyone know if youtube will let people have their videos available for download for free? The examples I've seen were charging $1, but I'm sure theres many people out there who would gladly give their videos out (activists, for example, spreading the message sort of stuff).
Posted by: chris | February 27, 2009 at 05:05 PM
Here we are at 28 February 2009 and KeepVid seems to be out of action again, along with TechCrunch. However, downloadyoutubevideo dot org is working. This is a situation that could change on a daily basis as both sides battle it out.
The ability to offer official downloads on YouTube is currently a trial service available to partners only. There are some free downloads, for example at UCTV, the YouTube channel of the University of California. "Claude Shannon - Father of the Information Age" can be downloaded as an MP4 video.
Posted by: Ian | February 28, 2009 at 12:33 PM
March 3 2009: KeepVid is working again, but TechCrunch is still down. It is unlikely that YouTube can disable the download tools completely, so people should look around if a particular one does not work.
Posted by: Ian | March 03, 2009 at 01:46 AM
Riiiiight... Google is just looking out for the little guy LOLOL!
ARE YOU CRAZY? Google proudly declares it has one priority over all others -- sell ads!
This means, it is nothing more than a business. And businesses by nature strive to make money by forcing their product down our throats. In this case, it's about forcing us to use their website and video player.
Next time you hear Google sayin "we legitimately need this feature for X", consider this: Would a free open source project like Wikipedia put a feature of that type in the top of their priority list?
The answer will always be NO. They are selectively targeting any option that can help in their vendor lock-in.
BTW, the supposed "cat and mouse game" mentioned in the article doesn't exist -- every time you view a video it is downloaded to your computer. With a simple set of instructions on how to retrieve it (or a program that intercepts the download), any one can keep the file on their computer forever.
Posted by: bit | March 08, 2009 at 01:02 PM
Oh, and here's a tool that does it http://nirsoft.net/utils/web_video_capture.html
Posted by: bit | March 08, 2009 at 02:43 PM
Looking in Temporary Internet Files for cached videos is a hit and miss affair, and may not always be successful. Download tools like KeepVid are easier to use, and are the main threat to YouTube.
Posted by: Ian | March 09, 2009 at 03:05 AM
I want you guys to check these amazing mixes, that were made by mixing youtube videos, and tell me if you still think copyright should prevent something as beautiful as this from happening.
http://thru-you.com/#/videos/3/
Posted by: bit | March 12, 2009 at 09:43 AM
Here is an alternative solution for downloading vids from tube,myspace etc
http://www.videaki.com/en/
Posted by: mike | May 03, 2009 at 09:31 AM