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Freetube is the best way to watch YouTube (www.popsci.com)

submitted 2 months ago by Flatworm7591@lemmy.dbzer0.com to c/piracy@lemmy.dbzer0.com

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I'm not sure it's the "best" way, but it's a solid alternative, and receives rapid updates when YouTube moves to break things.

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.today/post/15571129

I'm using this all the time myself. There is no login to YouTube required and it supports adding subscriptions and doing everything important you can do on YouTube.

And the best part is no ads whatsoever.

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[-] jared@mander.xyz 46 points 2 months ago

SmartTube is pretty great for android TV.

[-] Eeyore_Syndrome@sh.itjust.works 19 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago)

Yaaa.

And I use Enhancer for YouTube™ on desktop Firefox on my Bazzite PC.

And Tubular on my Android phone.

[-] ClusterBomb@lemmy.blahaj.zone 5 points 2 months ago

Switched to PipePipe because Tubular is not updated as quickly as Tubular, the dev said it's not on the top of their list. Also PipePipe has some more features such as playing the video faster while you leaveea finger on the screen.

[-] weirdo_from_space@sh.itjust.works 2 points 2 months ago

I prefer PipePipe as well, it's great It gets frequently updated.

[-] LucidBoi@lemmy.dbzer0.com 2 points 2 months ago

For people who are okay with using YT's official frontend, I couldn't recommend Enhancer for Youtube™ more.

[-] Blizzard@lemmy.zip 2 points 2 months ago

It's annoying though that you can't save videos to lists or subscribe to channels without logging in to youtube account.

[-] dan@upvote.au 1 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago)

It's using the YouTube API, so that makes sense. The developer likely wants to keep the app focused and reduce the amount of feature creep, hence reusing YouTube's standard subscription and list systems rather than building their own. That's also what the majority of users expect - if someone subscribes to a YouTube channel on one device, they'd expect to be subscribed to it on all devices.

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[-] Nougat@fedia.io 35 points 2 months ago

Other benefits:

Multiple subscription profiles, so you can organize your subscribed channels into groups. "I want to watch stuff about cars and motorcycles - I choose 'Motoring.'"
SponsorBlock
No stupid recommendations to drag you into despair, hate watching, and misinformation.
Ability to never show shorts.

Downside:

Max 1080

[-] lord_ryvan@ttrpg.network 8 points 2 months ago

Seeing how I invested in an 144Hz monitor instead of a Hi-Res one, I see no issues here!

Will check it out!

[-] wheeldawg@sh.itjust.works 1 points 2 months ago

I still don't think that I've ever seen a 4k image or video. plenty of morons out there sliding the quality up to 4k and going "Look at how good it looks!" whole I know full well their screen is at 1080 and I internally cringe.

But yeah, late 2024 and I've still never even seen a 4k screen to my knowledge.

At least not in person and not rebroadcast to a 1080 TV. So it doesn't count.

[-] dan@upvote.au 3 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago)

I still don't think that I've ever seen a 4k image or video

Have you not watched a recent movie? Modern midrange to high-end TVs have been 4K for a while (eg my 2019 LG OLED is 4K) and it's pretty common for movies to be released on 4K Blu-ray.

Good 4K looks great. Not the low-bitrate streams from services like Netflix, but the 60Mbps+ streams from Blu-ray remuxes (for example, via Real Debrid or downloaded via usenet) or from Blu-ray disks themselves.

You've definitely seen a 4K image. It's equivalent to 8.3 megapixels, and good cameras have supported at least that resolution for a long time. Even the nearly 15-year-old Samsung Galaxy S2 had an 8MP camera.

[-] wheeldawg@sh.itjust.works 3 points 2 months ago

I don't think you understand what seeing a 4k image or video means. You can't see a 4k image or video without a 4k screen. Maybe a 15 year old camera can capture it, but you can't see it, even with today's phone screens.

The only TV I've ever owned was like 19". The only real-size TVs I've ever watched are my parents' and the one my roommate had in the living room.

And just because they've been available since 2019 (according to you- I honestly can't remember when they started showing up lol) doesn't mean they were common or cheap at the time. And both of those units (the ones I've spent any time with) were bought around 2016 anyway. Not sure what world you live in where everybody buys a new TV every 3 or 4 years, but it's not a universal thing, or even the norm. Where having an SDTV might justify a midnight trip to go get a real TV, the need for 4k is less than 0.

So no, I am quite sure I've never seen a 4k image or video. Because I've never owned it has access to a 4k screen. That in and of itself is enough to verify that much, without having to worry about how modern it is, it what it was shot with, or recorded on, or how it was downloaded, or where/how it was streamed or any of that confusion.

No 4k screen means I've never seen anything that could only be on one.

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[-] TwilightKiddy@programming.dev 6 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago)

You can add mpv to FreeTube as an external player. With yt-dlp, it supports playing YouTube videos directly and in any quality. It also has a plugin for SponsorBlock integration.

[-] corvus@lemmy.ml 4 points 2 months ago

Yeah, I use MPV as a external player and it's great because you can highly customize the way you watch videos. I like equalize the sound and through a MPV script I save the video from cache with a keystroke if I liked it. Sadly watching with subtitles stopped working some weeks ago.

[-] Sir_Kevin@lemmy.dbzer0.com 3 points 2 months ago

There is also an Android fork which works amazingly well.

[-] Contort3860@links.hackliberty.org 3 points 2 months ago

Here.

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[-] Melody@lemmy.one 14 points 2 months ago

I'm certainly concerned that now that this software has been covered in PopSci; that it will certainly suffer a needless onslaught of DMCA and other lawsuit-related shenanigans. >_>

[-] y0kai@lemmy.dbzer0.com 14 points 2 months ago

Out of curiosity, what's is better about it than YouTube?

Vanilla YouTube is obvious, but I've got ublock origin , sponsor block and that thing that renames stuff to non click bait.

It all just works and I don't get adds and I keep all my sub's and still get useful suggestions.

On android i just use revanced.

So, what's the pull of downloading a 3rd party for Linux / PC?

[-] Flatworm7591@lemmy.dbzer0.com 18 points 2 months ago

For me it's not just about ads, it's also about surveillance. With FreeTube you can have subscriptions without needing a linked YouTube account, and all the subscription/watch history data is stored locally. So, it's a good opt-out of Google/YouTube surveillance. And you can import/export subscriptions if you need to transfer to another device. I happen to use FreeTube for this because it is frequently updated and I like the setup, but other options exist - I'm not really promoting this option over other options, just raising some awareness about it.

[-] y0kai@lemmy.dbzer0.com 7 points 2 months ago

I've tried a few different front ends for fun in the past and they're fun to tinker with, I'll admit. I don't think I used freetube.

Also it was some months ago, but the biggest issue I found was that I couldn't sync watch lists. I could add subs and things but if I watched something on my phone, whatever front-end on my computer would tell me I still hadn't watched that video and recommend it.

Is there a way around this? Because, that's a huge deal breaker for me. As an end goal, I want less Google in my life, but there are certain inconveniences I am unwilling to tolerate (however seemingly small lol).

Anyway, I may start tinkering again soon. Thanks for the reply!

[-] Flatworm7591@lemmy.dbzer0.com 3 points 2 months ago

I don't think there's currently a way to automatically sync watch history across devices, but I'd love to be wrong about that tbh, because it would be handy.

[-] cyberwolfie@lemmy.ml 2 points 2 months ago

Syncthing is your friend. Freetube stores playlists, history, settings and subscriptions as .db-files which you can sync between devices. Android version also allows access to these files if enabled in settings.

[-] Arioch@framapiaf.org 3 points 2 months ago

@Flatworm7591 @y0kai all from above plus you have a full view of your subscriptions in chronological order and you can organize your subs how you want (per subject for exemple)

[-] recarsion@discuss.tchncs.de 3 points 2 months ago

that thing that renames stuff to non clickbait

Sounds like something I'd use, what is it called?

[-] y0kai@lemmy.dbzer0.com 8 points 2 months ago

Sorry, I'd have said the name initially, I've just got one of those brains that doesn't always cooperate when it's needed.

Anyway, it's called "Dearrow" and it's pretty cool. Check it out!

[-] Hax@lemmy.dbzer0.com 2 points 2 months ago

Sweet suggestion, definitely adding this. Sick and tired of click bait titles.

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[-] boredsquirrel@slrpnk.net 13 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago)

Grayjay and Freetube are both fine but different.

For some reason, Freetube currently works well, Grayjay needs iOS fallback and barely works.

Grayjay follows the bigger, already implemented idea of combining multiple platforms. This is a great UX and smooth fallback when Youtube blocks again, or permanently.

Accounts can link multiple platforms, so switching is easier.

It also allows commenting, livechat, on the platforms and has on the polycentric protocol, connecting all others.

Also, it has Sponsorblock integration.

[-] Contort3860@links.hackliberty.org 2 points 2 months ago

Freetube does have SponsorBlock and DeArrow integration as well.

[-] boredsquirrel@slrpnk.net 2 points 2 months ago

Oh cool didnt know that

[-] Fitik@fedia.io 2 points 2 months ago

@boredsquirrel@slrpnk.net I like GrayJay, even tho I find their integration of PeerTube quite lacking.

@Flatworm7591@lemmy.dbzer0.com

[-] boredsquirrel@slrpnk.net 2 points 2 months ago

Yes, I also dont understand why Peertube works so badly. It is one of the platforms with the most quality content, but its decentralization really makes it require an app.

sepiasearch.org helps here, to connect all instances and index them

[-] Fitik@fedia.io 3 points 2 months ago

@boredsquirrel@slrpnk.net Same, PeerTube has so much good and interesting content, this content just doesn't get exposure because of bad discoverability

@Flatworm7591@lemmy.dbzer0.com

[-] atro_city@fedia.io 9 points 2 months ago

You can donate to them, can't you?

[-] Flatworm7591@lemmy.dbzer0.com 9 points 2 months ago

Thanks for the reminder: Donate link

[-] Blizzard@lemmy.zip 9 points 2 months ago

... on computer.

[-] Contort3860@links.hackliberty.org 8 points 2 months ago

Unofficially on Android too.

[-] Blizzard@lemmy.zip 4 points 2 months ago

Now that's more like it. However for android Android (phone, tablet) I already have NewPipe I'm happy with. Does FreeTube work well on Android TV? I use SmartTube and it's good but it's not perfect.

[-] BearOfaTime@lemm.ee 4 points 2 months ago

Grayjay seems to be more stable than NewPipe

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[-] B0rax@feddit.org 3 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago)

There is no shortage on frontend alternatives for PC… but somehow I have yet to find anything worth mentioning for iOS

[-] anarchist@lemmy.ml 3 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago)

iOS

I'm sorry but there likely never be a long-term alternative for free software such as this on that platform. Neither you nor the developer has much say on how to use it.

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[-] street_cat@pawb.social 4 points 2 months ago

I use grayjay but this looks great for finding new stuff to watch and customizability!

[-] rustyfemboy@lemmy.blahaj.zone 3 points 2 months ago

I've been using FreeTube for a while and it's great. It allows me to customise my feed to only include content from my subscriptions and filter out any recommendations designed to keep me on the platform for as long as possible.

[-] sqgl@beehaw.org 2 points 2 months ago

Isn't this exactly like the original YouTube?

They get users to provide free content with the impression it is a genuine grassrots community then when the site becomes popular enough they cash in. imdb was like this too.