cross-posted from: https://lemmy.ml/post/40372957
fyi:
- https://github.com/yt-dlp/yt-dlp lets you download videos (from youtube and also hundreds of other sites)
- for desktop, https://mpv.io/ is free and lets you watch youtube (or any other video) at even more and faster speeds than youtube premium does, among many other features
- for android, https://newpipe.net/ lets you play youtube in the background (and download videos, and block ads, …)
- https://ublockorigin.com/ blocks ads everywhere (and yes it does still work on youtube, at least in firefox anyway)


My boss uses a VPN and some other clandestine methods to subscribe via India, so he pays the equivalent of about £3 per month for premium.
I gave it a try, but could never quite manage. You need to fully turn off location services, use an Indian registered Gmail and pay via a credit card of some kind. I think you also need a registered address, but he just used one for a random hotel in Bangladesh.
… Or you could just use an ad blocker
Can you do that on a firestick?
Maybe a jailbroken one. But I have no idea, I’ve never used one.
You don’t really jailbreak them as such to get functionality. You just enable dev options and APKs from unknown sources. You can SSH onto them if you really want to go command line and dig around in the OS, but it’s not necessary.
VPN to Albania. No ads on free YouTube.