> The FSF says youtube-dl is OK now. > https://notabug.org/GPast/avideo/issues/12
I'm glad to hear this, but I wish I could find more information. The most detailed explanation I can find is a comment[1] from Leah saying that the non-free JS is only parsed to acquire the video URL, not executed. This is enough to satisfy me that youtube-dl is fine freedom-wise, so I'll begin recommending it over avideo. However, I'm curious to know why parsing the JS is necessary for some videos and not others. I find that the videos least likely to work with avideo are those of a song, either as a music video or as a video containing only audio and a static image or lyrics. Anything posted by VEVO, by YouTube's auto-generated "- Topic" channels, or from a popular artist's official channel never works with avideo. Videos containing songs that are uploaded by regular users occasionally work. User-uploads of live recordings work more often than album recordings, and the more popular the artist is the less likely it is to work. These observations have led me to suspect that the JS has something to do with the music industry enforcing their copyright restrictions. As long as we don't have to exectute the JS to access the video it is not a problem at this time, but I'd be interested to know what is the purpose of the JS and why it is encountered only for certain videos. [1] https://raddle.me/f/freeAsInFreedom/29832/youtube-dl-is-fsf-approved-now-maybe
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