Bootleg Youtube Premium

Hey there! 👋 If you're tired of paying for YouTube Premium or just want to take back some privacy from Google, this video is a wild ride through one creator's journey to build their own "bootleg" version of YouTube Premium. Let's break down the story, step by step, with all the best quotes and key points highlighted for you!

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1. The Motivation: Breaking Up with Google

The video kicks off with the creator sharing a personal moment:

"So during one of my more recent schizophrenic breakdowns I decided to remove as many Google services from my life as possible for privacy reasons which involved deleting my YouTube Premium account."

• Privacy is the main concern.
• The creator cancels YouTube Premium to cut ties with Google.

They also break down the costs of YouTube Premium:

• "$16 a month when you sign up on an iPhone"
• "$12 a month when you sign up on a desktop"
• "$7 a month when you sign up on a desktop with a student email"

2. What YouTube Premium Offers

The creator lists the perks of YouTube Premium:

• YouTube Music subscription
• Ability to download YouTube videos
• Ad-free YouTube
• Background play on iOS:

  "The ability to exit the app or lock your phone while the video's audio continues to play in the background."

3. Why Is It So Expensive?

The creator speculates:

"I speculate the reason Google can charge such ridiculous prices is because iOS makes it almost impossible to modify functions such as background play without jailbreaking the device or side loading a third party application."

• iOS restrictions make it hard to get these features for free.
• Jailbreaking or developer accounts are required, which are costly and unreliable.

4. Android vs. iOS: The YouTube Vanced Story

On Android, things are different:

"Android, which is owned by Google who owns YouTube, for some reason allows the app YouTube Vanced on their app store. YouTube Vanced basically gives you most of the YouTube Premium features for free."

• YouTube Vanced: Free, but not available on iOS.
• Apple's developer guidelines likely block it.

5. The Ad Shock

After canceling Premium, the creator experiences:

"As someone who's not accustomed to being bombarded with ads, the free YouTube experience gave me a bit of culture shock and after seeing the same crypto shill ad for the tenth time in a row I set out to find a low effort solution to this issue."

• Annoying ads are a big motivator!

6. The Solution: Bootleg YouTube Premium

The creator's answer:

"Bootleg YouTube Premium is my over-engineered yet barely functional response to the greedy practices of Alphabet Incorporated."

What does it use?

• iOS Shortcuts
• A remote Linux server running Apache
• The Python youtube-dl library

"To give you most of the YouTube Premium experience at a fraction of the price."

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7. How It Works: iOS Shortcuts & Server Magic

iOS Shortcuts

• Shortcuts is a visual scripting app on iOS.
• In iOS 13, Apple added the ability for Shortcuts to send commands to a remote server via SSH.

The Shortcut Process

"The shortcut I have for this is only two commands because most of the work is done on the server side."

1. First Command:

   • Contacts the remote server.
   • Passes the user's clipboard (the YouTube link) to a Python script.
   • Can be triggered by double tapping the back of the iPhone (using the "Tap Back" feature in Accessibility settings).

2. Second Command:

   • Redirects the user to a Safari webpage with the ad-free video.
   • Safari allows picture-in-picture and background play, so you can leave the app or lock your phone and the audio keeps playing.

"The link does not explicitly have to be a YouTube link. youtube-dl supports over 370 different websites, however you might get mixed results on the more obscure ones."

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8. Server-Side: The Python Script

"I managed to avoid using a web framework because I was lazy and I figured it would be less computationally expensive, therefore less expensive in general."

• The result?

  "A 175 line monstrosity that I wrote with little respect for best practices or readability, but it works. Kinda."

What the Script Does:

1. Takes the clipboard (YouTube URL) and timestamp.
2. Runs a subprocess to call youtube-dl and download the video.
   • Warning:

     "The Python subprocess module allows you to run shell commands within a Python script and is incredibly insecure when combined with unsanitized user input."

3. Saves the video to the server.
4. Stores video info (title, ID, timestamp) in an SQLite database.
5. Generates HTML pages for the home and library using Jinja2 templates.
   • Security issue:

     "Both of these functions pass unsanitized user input to the SQLite commands."

6. Removes duplicate entries from the database and media directories.
7. Moves files to the Apache web directory.
8. Prints out the URL path to the video for the iOS shortcut to use.

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9. Security? What Security?

The creator is very honest about the risks:

"Yes, anyone who has the IP address can theoretically see what you've been watching, and yes, eventually these pages will get indexed by search engines, and yes, the lack of TLS encryption means that any sys admin can see the URL paths that you're accessing from your device."

But, in the spirit of the project:

"The name of the project is Bootleg YouTube Premium, so in that spirit the only security strategy I've implemented is a prohibition era panic button."

• Panic Button:

  "It's another iOS shortcut that recursively shreds the history database and video files, then shuts down the server like a 1920s speakeasy getting raided by the feds."

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10. Get Involved & Final Thoughts

The creator invites viewers to help improve the project:

"I would like to improve this project so the link to the GitHub repository with more detailed instructions on how to set it up is in the description. I invite you to contribute."

• Affiliate link to the hosting provider (Vultr.com) is also shared:

  "If you sign up using my link you'll get a hundred dollars of free credits so you can like download all of C-SPAN's videos before they purge the clips of Congressmen lying about WMDs in Iraq or something."

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Summary Table

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Final Thoughts

This video is a fun, honest, and slightly chaotic guide to DIY YouTube Premium. The creator's approach is both clever and a little reckless, but it's packed with learnable hacks and cautionary tales about privacy, security, and the power of scripting.

Key Takeaways:

• You can use iOS Shortcuts and a remote server to mimic YouTube Premium features.
• Security is a big concern—this is more of a fun experiment than a safe, polished product.
• The project is open source and welcomes contributions!

"Thanks for watching!" 👋

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If you want to try it yourself or help out, check the video description for the GitHub link and more details! 🚀