Don’t see why, if anything more people should know about it so shared content can become more redundant as people download it across the world. YouTube is a fairly brittle hub sometimes with all the takedowns.
I suspect the GP is concerned Youtube will take steps to block it.
This scares me a bit too, I watch basically all Youtube content via Youtube-dl. I have a script that runs every night on Mac, so that new content automagically appears in my Movies folder.
Personally, I subscribe to YouTube channels via RSS (a little known but existent feature). Then I download all the videos I want to watch with `youtube-dl -a -`. No buffering, any video window size I want, finer-grained speed playback in VLC, and no Google account required.
Launchd + bash script. The channels and playlists to download from are managed in a text file. I really need to get around to throwing this up on Github, I’ll see if I can find some time to do that in the next few days and let you know.
If Youtube ever decides to employ encrypted media extensions or similar, youtube-dl will effectively cease as a useful tool. The analog loophole will always exist but that’s not something I want to use day-to-day.
I have been a user for many years and it feels like the distro package works at least 51/52 weeks a year, so I'm not sure it's an issue more than with any other package.
youtube-dl has an update command built in that bypasses the distribution's update system. Works even on Debian stable.
You could argue this is bad because it bypasses the distro release system, but then, Youtube also updates itself without the distro's approval, so the software that interfaces with it must as well.
Not to mention "they can download our stuff but have to use a CLI" makes rights holders feel like it's a niche application that can't threaten their bottom line so don't worry about taking steps to prevent it.
What needs to stay under the radar are the dozens of downloader sites and GUI apps that offer the same functionality and ten times the convenience.
I feel the same, but at the same time, it's a similar process as with adblockers; it's an arms race of obfuscation. If you can view a video in your browser, then it principally follows that you can save it to your hard drive. (Similarly, if you're displaying an ad, it follows that you can not display an ad.)
youtube-dl being more known isn't that hazardous, as long as there's a community of people ready to confront the latest ballast sent to make people's lives more miserable - which there is so far, and I'm honestly incredibly grateful for that.
