MiFi

The YouTube-video downloader I made is my favorite way to do it.

Sometimes it is appropriate to have the original files for a given YouTube video. I may want to work with the video file, put it on my iPhone, send it directly to someone, or save it because I expect YouTube or its original uploader to have it removed for copyright violation or its controversial value.

YouTube doesn’t make this very easy. There is no download button. And sites like KeepVid often feed the flv files that I don’t want. JavaScript bookmarkets are reliable but, like KeepVid, don’t name the videos for me. After using any of these things I’m left with half a dozen video.mp4s in my Download folder.

I heard you’re not supposed to complain on the internet, so I started making my own in Python [download]. It downloads the standard iPhone-quality mp4 file to the same folder and makes the filename the video’s title. The code is too remedial for licensing terms. Feel free to modify, improve or delete it.

You’ll need to understand the command line to play. I apologize if you already read this whole thing and don’t get it.

To Try:

• Download/Unzip script
• Open a terminal window
• Navigate to the script’s directory
• Execute it with “python saveTube.py”
• Give it the URL of the YouTube video. It will print out the video’s hash tags if the URL is good. It will quit when done and your video will be in the same directory.