> I could never install a working version of minitube.

It's been a year or so since I tried to get Minitube working, so my
memory is a little hazy, but IIRC the problem had to do with Minitube's
use of Google's API. From [1]:

> Google is now requiring an API key in order to access YouTube Data web
> services. Create a "Browser Key" at
> https://console.developers.google.com and enable the Youtube Data API.
> 
> The key must be specified at compile time as shown below.
> Alternatively Minitube can read an API key from the GOOGLE_API_KEY
> environment variable.

The developer presumably has their own API key with which they compile
their binaries, so their prebuilt binaries probably work, but in order
for a user or distro to build it themselves they need their own API key.
When Google made this change, it broke the versions of Minitube in
distros' repositories, because it would get built without an API key and
then wouldn't work.

I remember reading that Debian at one point got Minitube working by
using their own API key. A problem with this approach is that when a
Debian user uses Minitube Google will know from the API key that they
are a Debian user, which it seems to me would expose the user to
fingerprinting. Trisquel has few users compared to Debian, only a subset
of whom would use Minitube, so to me it seems like this approach would
put Trisquel users at risk of fingerprinting. If you build Minitube
yourself using your own API key then the fingerprinting will be even
more precise, which is a problem since freedom 1 requires your to be
able to build from source.

I recommend using a program that uses youtube-dl or Invidious's API
instead of Google's API. GTK-Youtube-Viewer[2] has similar functionality
to Minitube.

[1] https://github.com/flaviotordini/minitube
[2] https://github.com/trizen/youtube-viewer

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