>What has been the functionality lost while liberating it?
The main function lost has been the ability to download YouTube videos with
'encrypted signatures'. These videos have a scrambled (not even encrypted,
really) ID used in place of the 'real' video ID in their video page,
requiring a separate proprietary script be downloaded and run from YouTube;
thus, these videos are 'off-limits' until it becomes feasible to reverse
engineer the algorithm used. *HOWEVER*, this only affects those videos which
use it- likely music videos/movies in most cases, which means most should
work fine.
Also lost are the ability to log in to iQiyi, and the integrated update
command. The former is for reasons of freedom also, as it requires executing
some 'SDK' script downloaded from their site in order to authenticate the
user. The latter, admittedly, isn't so much for reasons of liberty as
convenience; frankly, I see no reason to add ANOTHER update utility rather
than just allowing the user to use their main one (with a PPA/repository to
offer up-to-date packages).
>Is Soon.to.be.Free the same person as "Grace Past"?
We are indeed the same sentient being. I can't confirm or deny that I'm a
human being though :).
> Google supposedly has the motto "Don't be evil", but they
>are very evil, while pretending they're good and caring for
>people
It really is a pity that they've ended up like this. Although it might be
naive to presume they were above corporate greed, they did show leadership in
'open-sourcing' Android- surely not being totally oblivious to what potential
profits it could bring- and even acquiring YouTube, given the lack of copy
protection in the service (in 2007, anyway). Perhaps I'm exaggerating the
risk-taking and forward-thinking mindset exhibited. Even if so, though, it's
sad to see how 'corporate' they are now, with the fabled '20% on work, 80% on
your own projects' policy perhaps the last remaining monument to their
innovation-prone startup origins.
