I dropped it after the devs response was to be silent about what actually happened "to focus on the f-froid builds". It's still unclear, and because of the way they've set up the GitHub repo, it's still possible for the apk to be compromised.

[–] jdr8@lemmy.world 5 points 1 hour ago (2 children)

Be careful!

Author made an announcement that Smartube may be compromised.

Read his notes.

[–] gaymer@aussie.zone 1 points 48 minutes ago

I don't know people have heard of Odysee. Good alternative for YouTube

[–] trumpetmouth@lemmy.world 7 points 1 hour ago

the author also announced a workaround to get a clean copy

[–] umbrella@lemmy.ml 1 points 1 hour ago (2 children)

can it block ads?

[–] doleo@lemmy.one 3 points 1 hour ago (1 children)

Yes

[–] umbrella@lemmy.ml 2 points 1 hour ago

then i'm sold.

[–] SolarMyth@aussie.zone 2 points 46 minutes ago

It blocks ads and promotional segments by default

[–] edinbruh@feddit.it 1 points 1 hour ago

I've been using it on my Amazon firetv stick, and I'm loving it. I first tried it because I cannot use revanced on the fire stick, but it's actually pretty good.

Also, you can link it to your official YouTube app and control it from your phone

[–] khalido@sh.itjust.works 9 points 2 hours ago

SmartTube is a free and open-source YouTube client for Android TV and TV boxes. It removes ads, supports SponsorBlock, works without Google Services, and is designed for large screens and remote controls.

Note: the developer recently disclosed a build environment compromise and has since rotated keys, rebuilt the environment, and added additional verification steps. Users should update to the latest version and verify sources. GitHub: https://github.com/yuliskov/SmartTube

[–] ToTheGraveMyLove@sh.itjust.works 1 points 1 hour ago

What's the difference between this and FreeTube?

[–] airikr@lemmy.ml 2 points 2 hours ago (1 children)

I used to use SmartTube before using yt-dlp and Jellyfin which was maybe 2 years ago.

Have SmartTube removed the direct connection youtube.com for subscriptions?

[–] bad_news@lemmy.billiam.net 2 points 2 hours ago

No, but as a result of behaving like the official client it is more robust than yt-dlp or Freetube when Google does crackdowns on third party clients. It's a tradeoff of privacy v robustness, but it still has no ads and sponsorblock. It's a way more acceptable option for normies and works well on GoogleTV (which is going to be spying on what you're watching and phoning that home to Google anyway).

[–] illusionist@lemmy.zip 2 points 2 hours ago

It works great!

You just can't save local playlists like with newpipe so that I can't save anything on my TV