how do you save youtube videos?

raptorkid700 · Nov 20, 2007

is there a free program? i kno of tube sock, but thats not free and the demo is only 30 seconds of vid. i kno there is an internet program but i forgot to book mark it! any help? also i msorry, i did not kno where to put this

mac57 · Nov 20, 2007

There are no free programs that I am aware of. QuickTime Pro seems to the stock answer for folks using Macs.

That having been said, I saved the following from a post on this very topic some months back - have never tried it though:

First, most embedded video files which cannot be downloaded are Flash movies, with extension .flv.

Youtube, Googlevideo, and others all use mostly Flash movies. You cannot right click and download those movies like most others, what you do is this -

1) With the page open, navigate to Safari menu --} Window --} Activity

2) If you did this correctly, a small activity window will appear. ( see pic)

3) Now, how do you find the movie file in the Activity window and download The smart thing to do, which I do, is observe the entry where it shows a download in progress,which steadily goes up, and that is the video.

See the attached pic where it shows 1.2 MB OF 8.5, when a youtube video is playing.

Another way is just to look at right side for the largest file, that will be the video.

4) Once you have found it, double click it. It will download as a .flv file. To play it, you need VLC PLayer, or Perian installed to allow Quicktime to play .flv files.

kirby14 · Nov 20, 2007

I assume there are no legality issues with this since the video is hosted on youtube.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tRTk0RPXtW4

edit: looks like the service is temporarily down. Not sure if it is technical or legal.

Here's another online version from techcrunch:

http://www.techcrunch.com/get-youtube-movie/

NanoBite · Nov 20, 2007

I use Democracy which has changed its name to Miro.

You can do so much with this app ... you just enable the search field so that it only searches YouTube and once it displays the results, just click to download.

It organises the videos within it's own folder hierarchy in your Movies folder and I think the file extension is .flv. Make sure you back them too, as I just lost all of my collection.

Another way is to have a free YouTube account and add any vids as a favourite and then you can see it anytime you want from within the one webpage. You can also create playlists and even embed the vids into your own website if you like.

I just tried the link in the previous post and it's a great simple way to download YouTube vids, you just need the URL for the vid and within seconds it's downloaded to your Desktop. As it mentions, you can use VLC to play the files and just about every mac user should have VLC installed.

Del · Nov 21, 2007

kirby14 said:
I assume there are no legality issues with this since the video is hosted on youtube.

Of course there are - if you copy it without the permission of the owner of the video then you are in breach of copyright laws!

kirby14 · Nov 21, 2007

Del said:
Of course there are - if you copy it without the permission of the owner of the video then you are in breach of copyright laws!

If it is that straight forward, why would Youtube allow the video to stay up?

mikeyman · Nov 21, 2007

kirby14 said:
I assume there are no legality issues with this since the video is hosted on youtube.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tRTk0RPXtW4

edit: looks like the service is temporarily down. Not sure if it is technical or legal.

Here's another online version from techcrunch:

http://www.techcrunch.com/get-youtube-movie/

No legality issues?
There are hundreds of copyright infringing videos put onto youtube everyday.
Even people showing themselfs downloading video games, Im not joking.
Its down to the users to report it or if its part of a film generally the mainstream companies will have it removed.

For the post... Yes you can download videos from youtube...
however legally you cannot.

MACyMouse · Nov 21, 2007

I use Tubesock although not free, it's pretty good for saving to your video iPod

tobywuk · Nov 21, 2007

There are auite a few free little programs that can do it. you can even get fire fox plugins that do it and save the flash file on your computer. i cant remember the names of any programs off hand, just google it.

fiveightandten · Nov 28, 2007

The only thing you need is Safari, as described above. That method works just fine. I use it all the time.

-Nick

Big-Foot · Nov 28, 2007

If you have Windows on your machine you can download FireFox / Mozilla browser. Firefox has a Video Download plug-in that will allow you to capture any You-Tube or Google-Video..

koolpenguin89 · Nov 29, 2007

the program is called mpeg streamclip:

http://www.squared5.com/

Its an amazing program, and can eaily do what you want it to do, as well as a host of other features. Best of all, its FREE!

goobimama · Nov 30, 2007

I love tubesock. Just queue in the links, and the next morning you find all your videos in the iTunes library.

jrod81 · Dec 6, 2007

how do you use squared5.com??? i have it downloaded but i have no idea how to get a youtube video into the program?

andersmj · Dec 6, 2007

I use www.vixy.net - it can save the file to 5 different formats.

lukenn · Dec 28, 2007

use TubeTV its brilliant. Free, reliable and really easy to use. I think theres a download for it on the last page of the video section on apple downloads....either that or just google it. Works for pretty much any website hosting videos.

atoosa · Jan 3, 2008

how do u use safari to save them? please can someone explain to me???

appleisgreat · Jan 3, 2008

lukenn said:
use TubeTV its brilliant. Free, reliable and really easy to use. I think theres a download for it on the last page of the video section on apple downloads....either that or just google it. Works for pretty much any website hosting videos.

I just read through the post and cannot believe no one has mentioned this yet. TubeTV is by far the easiest (not to mention cheapest) way of downloading wideos from youtube and google video...

James- · Jan 3, 2008

yerp that's what I use very very simple and its free

rixx03 · Jan 4, 2008

Try http://www.clipnabber.com ; it might not have the conversion powers of http://www.vixy.net ; but it's a lot more stable. I used Vixy before but there are a lot of times wherein it can't download but ClipNabber can.

Then you can use http://www.media-convert.com to convert your FLV file for free, but you need to be on DSL since it might take a long time on dial-up.