YouTube Going Dark On Older Devices

PC Mag reports on changes to the YouTube API, which have rendered YouTube apps inoperable on older consoles, smart TVs, and other video streaming devices. They're doing this because the old version of the API doesn't support some of YouTube's newer features. Newer devices might be able to upgrade — Apple handhelds that can run iOS 7 or later will have no problem, nor will 3rd-gen Apple TVs and devices running Google TV 3 or 4. But earlier Apple TVs and Google TVs running version 2 or earlier will be out of luck.

Comments

Stripped down version

[Anonymous Coward]

So offer people with older devices a version without those features.

Amazing that Google apparently thinks they have so much power in the video market that they can get away with this.

Re:Stripped down version

[Half-pint HAL]

I've got Firefox on Linux Mint, and I don't have any Flash at all. It's pot luck which videos will even play. A lot of new ones cause a message about HTML5 video to pop up...

Re:Stripped down version

[Anonymous Coward]

Go to youtube.com/html5 and select the html5 player, it helped on my machines.

Re:Stripped down version

[geekmux]

So offer people with older devices a version without those features.

Do you recall the last time you saw a "dumb" DVD or Blu-Ray player for sale that did not have "those" features?

Yeah, me neither. Seems they outlawed them.

TVs aren't far behind either, and soon neither will cars. What was a $20,000 base model that had these things called "options" has now become the $30,000 "base" model with all this in-dash/online crap standard.

After all, shouldn't everyone need to upgrade their new car/TV/appliance as often as your smartphone due to obsolescence?

Vendors think so.

Re:Stripped down version

[Viol8]

"Do you recall the last time you saw a "dumb" DVD or Blu-Ray player for sale that did not have "those" features?"

I bought a Sony blue ray player a couple of years back and half the network "apps" didn't even work out the box. Personally I didn't give a damn , I just wanted something to play spinning disks, but IMO it does show the contempt manufacturers hold their customers in these days.

Re:Stripped down version

[arbiterxero]

Yeah the problem with those features being broken is that when they update the keys on BlueRay discs, you're fucked.

You have to buy a new DVD player.

Let's say they DID work..... but sony decided not to bother updating your blueray player because it's >2 years old ....once again you're fucked.

Re:Stripped down version

[MachineShedFred]

Good thing I have a Blu-Ray drive in my PC, and a PLEX server.

If for whatever reason my standalone Blu-Ray player stops working, that's when I plug some other class of device into that HDMI cable. I will not award a company that decides I need to buy a new thing, when the only added feature is that it's younger than the device I already have.

It's not surprising

[msobkow]

That's what happens when you rely on a vendor instead of a ratified standard. Can you imagine the uproar if older HDTV tuners suddenly stopped working with new broadcasts? People were upset enough that the old analogue signals were obsolesced!

Re:It's not surprising

[NotInHere]

This. All this "smart tv" nonsense is only about collecting data and, through "upgrades" like this, forcing people to only use devices which are not older than 3 years.

The EU should consider this too when they are reviewing google: google and all other tech companies should use standards. What would happen if every single railway company would have different track gauges?

Re:It's not surprising

[FlyveHest]

What do you mean if? This has happened in Denmark, when they went from analog to digital terrestrial broadcasts.

First to MPEG2, and latest to MPEG4, a lot of owners of older TVs had to purchase external boxes if they still wanted to receive the national TV signals.

Re:It's not surprising

[AmiMoJo]

When YouTube started there was no standard for streaming video. The only working options were things like Flash and RealPlayer, so they went with Flash. Now they are moving to HTML5 and that's the problem - older devices don't support it.

The real issue is that tech companies are not used to providing software for consumer products. In the UK smart television are covered by the Sale of Goods Act. The Act says that they must last a "reasonable length of time". For a moderately priced television you would expect at least 5 years out of it, more for an expensive one. If it fails before that time you can take the vendor (not the manufacturer, the shop where you bought it) to court and argue your case, and will be entitled to compensation for lost functionality. Say the TV dies after three years, you might get 50% of the purchase price back because it only lasted half as long as you would reasonably expect it to.

Loss of functionality due to discontinuation of service is new but seems to be covered by existing conventions. If part of a product breaks and the vendor can't fix it you can get compensation. That was the basis for the £85 refund on a Playstation 3 some guy got from Amazon when Sony removed the Other OS feature.

I own a high end Panasonic plasma TV. It is the year after the ones that are being cut off, but I was worried for a while. I use YouTube every day on it. If it were to break down and stop showing YouTube, a feature I specifically wanted when I bought it, I'd go back to the shop and ask for compensation, say 30% of the purchase price. Alternatively they could offer me an alternative, like a new TV or perhaps a smart BluRay player, assuming I could add it to my system without breaking my existing set-up. I'd also settle for say £80 to cover the cost of an Amazon FireTV stick.

Re:It's not surprising

[cheekyboy]

I bet you Plex will write a Youtube wrapper/proxy so that html5 source url will transcode back to the old format whatever that is.

Re:It's not surprising

[Holi]

According to the Encyclopedia of American Business History and Biography, at the beginning of the Civil War, there were more than 20 different gauges ranging from 3 to 6 feet, although the 4-foot, eight-and-a-half inch was the most widely used. During the war, any supplies transported by rail had to be transferred by hand whenever a car on one gauge encountered track of another gauge and more than 4,000 miles of new track was laid during the war to standardize the process. Later, Congress decreed that the 4-foot, eight-and-a-half inch standard would be used for transcontinental railway.

Re:It's not surprising

[tlhIngan]

When YouTube started there was no standard for streaming video. The only working options were things like Flash and RealPlayer, so they went with Flash. Now they are moving to HTML5 and that's the problem - older devices don't support it.

No, the problem is not Flash or HTML5.

The problem is that the old YouTube players were much better than the current one, because well, they didn't support ads.

The new YouTube apps support the Google APIs and they return ads, both the pop up and interstitials, while the old APIs didn't support it.

Back when YouTube was in the old days of getting marketshare, and API use is low, it made sense. These days, with Google monetizing stuff, well, they need all youtube players to support ads.

Re:Expected lifetime 3 years.

[a.koepke]

And this is why I never bothered with a SmartTV. Aside from the HD TV tuner, I prefer my TV to be just a monitor. Give me ports and let me plug in other devices which provide smart functionality like a Raspberry Pi or Chromecast or console, etc.

I watch YouTube on my TV. Find the video via the Android App, share it with the Kodi remote app and it starts playing on my TV. Easy.

I sense more regulatory woes coming.

[BarbaraHudson]

Google is already in trouble with the EU. This latest tactic is the sort of stuff that even a convicted monopolist like Microsoft wouldn't pull because it would justifiably piss off a lot of their customers. So why does Google do it? Because it proves once again the people who use google services aren't their "customers". Google is an advertising business. You're just eyeballs that google sells to their customers.

Atari

[Wild_dog!]

Still mad I could never get Youtube working on my Atari 800.
Now this!!!!

Re:Might write a API2 to API2 proxy

[alantus]

Excellent idea, but why even show a still frame of the ad? Show some cute pictures of cats or something more interesting while the advertisement is being blocked.

Here's a business opportunity:

Basic package: pics of cats
Gold package: pics of chicks
Free customer: goat.cx