Welcome to Fractal Forums

I usually can't watch people's videos here because I have issues with YouTube videos (or, really, any online video).  They tend to get stuck in download or don't play smoothly.  If you have similar problems, you can use this site to download YouTube videos to your computer in .flv (flash video) format to watch locally.

http://downloadyoutubevideo.org/

It's not illegal or anything, either.  Google ads are on the site, so I have to assume it's legit.

The Rev

I would advise people thinking of using this to do so with caution.  These youtube download sites are always kind of shifty.  This site does seem to have and excessive number of ads. I wouldn't be surprised to find some lurking viruses as well.

Although, it may be safe.  Maybe you should download a few videos and report what happens ;D (To be clear, I was just joking.  Any damages done to your computer as a result of using this site are not my fault.)

I've already downloaded about half a dozen videos without any problems.

The Rev

Another alternative:

I'm a Mozilla Browser fan. I use an addon called Video Download helper

https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/video-downloadhelper/

It must be useful to a few users , latest downloads  to-date total  84,574,527  :)

I also recommend the same.  I have used this to download many movies from various streaming sites and it always works fine.  It puts a little icon to the left of the address in Firefox that automatically updates when there is a video to download.  Click the link, download, done.  Much better than the other site you need to copy/paste links into.

Jason.

That's awesome.  Thanks for the info!  Do you know if they have anything like that for Google Chrome?

The Rev

There was an extension for Chrome that made downloading YT videos simple. It got yanked for violating the TOS, I suppose.

But - Chrome can make use of Greasemonkey scripts, I think it's even a built-in  now.  I use this script in Chrome to add a slick drop down that lets you grab the MP4 version of the video at the highest rez available:

http://userscripts.org/scripts/show/25105

Sorry, but all previous comments are completely inferior to the Userscript "YousableTubefix"
Not only does it let you download videos, but it extends the capabilities of YouTube.

It's a Greasemonkey Script, so it works for Firefox, Chrome, Opera or any other browser which supports the Greasemonkey Add-on.

http://userscripts.org/scripts/show/13333

Features

    * Download the video as FLV or MP4 in many formats: use the download button (see Note 1).
    * Resize or expand the video automatically or manually, to any custom size.
    * Remove ads and any unwanted YouTube section; like video annotations and captions, video information, header and footer, etc...
    * Change the default video quality to any of the available ones (like 720p or 1080p). The video quality availability is autodetected and the script can change to the best available one automatically.
    * Automatically expand the video description, category and tags.
    * Prevent only video autoplay, or both video autoplay and autobuffering (video and user channel pages).
    * Change the Flash Player Quality and wmode attributes to play the video with less CPU use.
    * Autocheck for script updates once a day.

@Side B, FYI: video download helper has the same features, from the drop-down-list I can chose from Flv, to mp4, to 1080p.

I'm also not a Fan of Google Chromes data mining, activities.
I also use CCleaner each morning.

Who suggested that you should use Chrome?
I use Firefox...

And video download helper has not got the same features...
YousableTubefix has more features than just downloading, it improves the YouTube experience and let you tailor some parts that should be standard.