this post was submitted on 30 Oct 2023
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Piracy: ꜱᴀɪʟ ᴛʜᴇ ʜɪɢʜ ꜱᴇᴀꜱ
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Some solutions:
This is the answer. I use Newpipe on mobile and Invidious on desktop. I dont even know what youtube ads look like. I run it all behind a pihole just to be sure. Works like a dream.
Personally, I prefer LibreTube on my phone and Piped on desktop. I also use NextDNS when I'm on the go and Pi-Hole when I'm at home. I haven't used an official YouTube app or website for the last 2 years.
Libretube is usually broken in some fashion (often a fatal one, like failing to load video).
LibreTube isn't broken, it's the Piped instances that have issues. You just need to switch to another Piped instance in the settings. Click on the three dots, then select settings, go to ‘Instance’ and at the top you can hit ‘Choose…’ to change the Piped instance. I haven’t experienced any issues with adminforge.de. kavin.rocks also seems to work well.
I should have realised it was an instance issue. Thanks!
I use newpipe x sponsorblock, invidious, and pinhole as well, but it's worth pointing out to those unfamiliar- pihole does nothing for YouTube ads. Pihole is great for sites that add google ads or random junk to their pages, it has no ability to block ads that come from the same domain as a sites content because it is DNS based.
Also want to submit for Android: just using YouTube in Firefox with uBO extension
I want to avoid solutions that involve using the YouTube app/website (including modded YouTube apps like Revanced or browser addons to use on the website)
ReVanced is not a modded YouTube app. None of these are.
Yes it is? The Revanced Manager app literally takes a YouTube apk and injects patches for ad blocking, SponsorBlock, etc.
Could be luck, but of those I only found Viewtube and Freetube to be responsive at this time of day to a live stream (the others either loaded endlessly or said they couldn't load the page)
That was only of the web/desktop ones.
Freetube seems to support youtube chat as well, which the others don't.
Smart tube next has always worked on TV with live and live chat. Usually newpipe works with live just hard to find the videos, usually end up pasting YT links.
iOS Vinegar Tube Cleaner
Is there a de facto or generally recognized "best" Invidious instance? Like piped.video is for Piped?
There used to be one, but it was shut down. IMO there shouldn't be an 'official' instance, users should be evenly distributed across instances and everything should be decentralized. The same goes for Mastodon or Lemmy, having most users concentrated on mastodon.social or lemmy.ml is not good. Centralization is pretty much always bad, but it's the only model of how services on the internet work that new users coming from centralized platforms understand. It's sad and unfortunate, but we might be able to change that. The more terrible decisions are made by corporations, the more successful will free and open source, decentralized software be. We saw it with Mastodon when Musk bought Twitter, we saw it again with Lemmy when Reddit was fucked by spez.
Host your own it takes a minute to do with docker compose.
Don't forget https://revanced.app/ for Android!
The other options (especially LibreTube) are much better for Privacy as they don't include any Google trackers and LibreTube doesn't even connect to Google servers. It proxies everything through a Piped server, meaning Google never sees your IP address or any other connection details. It's basically anonymized YouTube.
And that's great and all, but some of us really only care about the ads.
Sure, but you don't really lose anything by using privacy-oriented solutions like LibreTube. It's just a really nice YouTube client for Android, it also has SponsorBlock and DeArrow integration, a nice and convenient download feature and many other things
I'm losing my tailored recommendations. And yes, I'm compromising my privacy for them, but I find value in that trade. I suppose I could open the official app, scroll my feed, and still open the videos in another front end, but as long as ReVanced exists I'll take the easier route. And it has sponsorblock and newpipe integration for downloads.
you lose cross-device sync, don't you?
that alone is kind of a big deal...
You can create an account on a Piped instance and use it to sync your subscriptions and playlists. You can also log into your account when using LibreTube on Android. Invidious also allows for account creation, but I'm not aware of any mobile apps allowing to connect to it.
ah, thanks!
that's good to know!
You can even self host a Piped instance. That's what I do. It's really nice, highly recommended!
Youtube Premium? The creators do get more than the standard ad-supported viewer and you don't get any ads.
I get that we're all trying to not see ads without paying money but I do acknowledge their infrasturucture and the feats they have accomplished trying to turn a profit. When youtube vanced was pulled, I did try reVanced for a while but eventually went with Premium.
I'm not saying you should get Premium and give up the fight, I'm aaying consider your usage of Youtube and whether if you can drop it or not. In my case I don't watch TV or movie streaming platforms (not even on demand) and so Youtube is my primary video consumption platform and it made sense for me to pay.
Whether if I'll switch to another country's pricing by using a VPN or not, that's for me to consider.
I absolutely hate Google and won't ever give them even a single penny. If there's a creator I like, I support them through Patreon, Ko-fi, Liberapay or preferably anonymous crypto currency like Monero.
Okay, good on ya. Hate Google on as much as you want.
I don't have an infinite supply of income to be able to support their lowest monthpy subscription tiers of all my favourite creators, which ends up being the same financial issue with paying for multiple exclusive platforms, but for creators instead.
Even if I do support my most favourite of the most deserving creators, I don't have the time to reap their benefits (eg. WIPs, streams, etc) as I already am consuming and enjoying their works that they publicly release. The only exception to this is exclusive content that isn't posted on Youtube - which even then some creators do release them eventually.
You could probably take whatever premium costs each month and spread it around different creators you like each month. That may be more effort than is worth it to you but I'd bet they'd get more money from you still.