[GTALUG] Ubuntu need Adobe Flash?

[Blaise Alleyne]

On 19/12/14 01:12 PM, Sergio Durigan Junior wrote:
> On Friday, December 19 2014, Chris Aitken wrote:
> 
>> I can't play videos on the Internet. I get an error that ...
>>
>> "Firefox has prevented the outdated plugin "Adobe Flash" from running
>> on youtube.com."
> 
> [First post, hey guys!]
> 
> Hi Chris,
> 
> Maybe you know that already, but it is also possible to use youtube-dl,
> a Free Software program, to download the video you want from the
> website.  Despite its name, it works with many other websites, not only
> youtube.  And of course, after you start using it and notice that you do
> not need a program that disrespects your freedom anymore, you can
> uninstall flash from your system :-).
> 
> Cheers,
> 

You definitely don't need Adobe's proprietary Flash to watch videos on YouTube
anymore. I ditched Flash on my laptops years ago.

A few better options for YouTube videos:

- I second youtube-dl! It's awesome, highly recommend it. I guess an added
benefit is less tracking than viewing on youtube.com in your browser.

- Also, with YouTube, you can go to youtube.com/html5 to request the HTML5
player (it may not be enabled by default for Firefox, but that page will set a
cookie to force it where available/compatible)

- I do have Gnash installed, which works on YouTube where the HTML5 player isn't
available, or where youtube-dl fails (e.g. VEVO channels). I think the packages
for Ubuntu/Debian would be gnash and browser-plugin-gnash, but it's been a while
since I installed it...