Easy way to download a YouTube video using Safari
Posted by JohnnyAppleseed | Under Media, Software, Utility Wednesday Jun 11, 2008How often has this happened to you - you shot a really funny video of your cat, posted it to YouTube, then accidentally lost the original and now you want to download the copy back from YouTube? Never, you say? Okay, but work with us here for a minute. Supposing you had done that, there’s a real easy way to download it back to your system, and you don’t even have to use any special software to do it. Here’s how:
First, open Safari and navigate to the YouTube page containing the video. While the video is playing, press the following key combination: Command-Alt-A OR click on the word “Window” in the top menu bar, then select “Activity” from the drop-down menu. Once the Activity window is showing, look for a line that contains this character string: get_video
If you have trouble seeing it, it may help to look for the largest files in the list - it’s usually the largest file shown. It may also help to expand the window so you can see the complete links. When you find the one containing the get_video string, double-click on it and the video should download. Once the download is complete, go to your desktop or downloads directory (wherever your downloaded files are normally saved) and rename the get_video file to something meaningful, but be sure to give the file a .flv extension. The annoying “Mac Nanny” will pop up and ask if you are sure you want to change the extension, and you do.
Now that you have recovered the precious video of your cat clawing the neighbor’s dog, you can watch it whenever you want. You’ll want to make sure you’ve downloaded and installed Perian, so that you can play the .flv files. If you have also downloaded and installed MPEG Streamclip: video converter for Mac & Windows, you can use that to play the video or encode it to another format, or even do some selective editing of the clip (such as trimming off extraneous material at the start or end of the clip).
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