Tech & Biz

YouTube Stops Stream Copying, But One Site Didn't Get The Memo...

by Pcash | February 19, 2009 at 08:27 pm

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Making good on a promise originally made in a statement to CNET, YouTube put measures in place last week to stop third-party stream ripping of its videos.

However, it seems like at least one service is not going along with the program.

As reported by the LA Times' Technology Blog, YouTube made some changes to their code that disabled several video ripping tools, including TechCrunch's download tool, which they wrote about on their own blog.

The move, which some believe was initiated on Feb. 13th, was an apparent counter to free downloading of it's videos, which threatened to undermine the sale of video downloads that they began offering on Feb 12th.

In the LA Times report, one of the video services that they claimed to be disabled was KickYouTube, but it seems like the service has already circumvented YouTube's copy protection. On the frontpage of their site, they brazenly display, ironically, a YouTube video titled "Kick You Tube-Download Videos From YouTube."

In the video, there is a demonstration of their new procedure for copying videos, which now involves right clicking a link and saving the video to your computer. Perhaps the most nervy part of the whole thing involves the background music in the video. It says "Don't you tell me I can't do it, Don't you tell me that I'm through." I think that says it all...for now.