[HN Gopher] Show HN: Volcano | Co-watch YouTube videos just by a...
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       Show HN: Volcano | Co-watch YouTube videos just by adding --- to
       the URL
        
       Just follow the super easy steps below to try it right away:  1.
       Open any youtube video and play it in the browser.  2. Edit the
       youtube.com video URL to you---tube.com (adding three hyphens
       between "you" and "tube" in the address bar)  3. Enter and Done,
       Share the URL with others for them to join or live-stream your co-
       watching stream.  (private and visible only to people with the URL
       you share)  Example: Modify
       https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eX2qFMC8cFo to https://www.you---
       tube.com/watch?v=eX2qFMC8cFo and press enter in the address bar.
       Voila!
        
       Author : jithinraj
       Score  : 23 points
       Date   : 2021-08-02 17:10 UTC (5 hours ago)
        
       | vilified wrote:
       | I'm using quad9 as the dns resolver and it's blocking you---tube
       | domain as malicious :(
        
       | jithinraj wrote:
       | Hi HN,
       | 
       | I'm Jithin Raj, co-founder of Volcano together with Sajith Amma
       | (https://vlca.no). We are building a platform for anyone to go
       | live with drop-in video chats by enabling Youtube, Twitch, &
       | Vimeo co-watch features on top of it.
       | 
       | The product is currently WIP. This Youtube hack became popular in
       | our circles and thought of sharing it with the HN community for
       | feedback. This works better on the web and is not fine-tuned for
       | mobile.
       | 
       | We're excited to hear any thoughts, insights, questions,
       | encouragement, and concerns in the comments below! Sajith and I
       | will be monitoring the thread to answer any questions.
       | 
       | Also, feel free to reach out to us by email at
       | founders@volcano.social
       | 
       | Cheers!
        
       | djmips wrote:
       | Bad name. Stop co-opting common words for product names.
        
       | deeblering4 wrote:
       | Is it possible to see the youtube video name and/or url that you
       | are watching?
       | 
       | Maybe I am missing it, but I didn't see that info when trying it
       | out.
        
         | jithinraj wrote:
         | Hi @deeblering,
         | 
         | Thank you for trying it out. The title of the video is loaded
         | at the beginning of the video and disappears as you continue to
         | watch. It appears back whenever you pause the video.
         | 
         | Is the title needed always on top of the video somewhere with
         | minimal intrusion?
         | 
         | I'm live on this URL now:
         | https://volcano.live/youtube/eX2qFMC8cFo/32968583.
         | 
         | Would love to chat and take feedback. :)
        
       | antcas wrote:
       | Okay, trying it out:
       | 
       | https://www.you---tube.com/watch?v=oLeNW7b_2E0
        
         | antcas wrote:
         | Pretty cool, do you have any demo URL's or currently popular
         | streams to try out the multi-player experience with?
        
           | jithinraj wrote:
           | Hi @antcas,
           | 
           | Thank you for trying out. Yes, I'm live on the URL you shared
           | above to chat, if you are still around. :)
           | 
           | Also, do feel free to check out https://vlca.no/chrome if you
           | want to skip the above steps and save some keystrokes while
           | creating your co-watch URL.
        
       | sajithamma wrote:
       | Nowadays most of our meetings happen over this URL, in fact,
       | free, unlimited ;)
        
         | jithinraj wrote:
         | Yay! :)
        
       | thallavajhula wrote:
       | Hi Jithin, this looks nice. Good job. Just a word of advice, a
       | lot of scammers typically use techniques like these to market
       | their scams. I get that this is your work and I'd recommend
       | directly sharing vlca.no links instead. Telling users to insert 3
       | dashes between "you" and "tube", while convenient, can often come
       | off as an attempt at scamming.
        
         | soared wrote:
         | The url hack is common place for legitimate services around
         | YouTube so I think it's fine. I've used two tools that url hack
         | and it's very very convenient.
        
           | jithinraj wrote:
           | Hi @soared! Thank you so much for trying it out, glad that
           | you liked it. :)
        
         | jithinraj wrote:
         | Hi @thallavajhula.
         | 
         | Thank you so much for your valuable feedback and kind words.
         | 
         | This is aimed at the users who don't want to install a browser
         | plugin. We have a Chrome plugin (https://vlca.no/chrome) and
         | page at Volcano (https://volcano.live/embed/home) where users
         | can paste the video URL and get the co-watch URLs too.
         | 
         | Please feel free to check out and share your feedback.
         | 
         | Thank you, once again. :)
        
       | bsldld wrote:
       | > (private and visible only to people with the URL you share)
       | 
       | This is going to be fun!
       | 
       | What happens if I am watching a video with my family using this
       | URL. And someone across the world is also watching the same video
       | with his/her family using the same technique. Now we have two
       | families sharing the same video, isn't it?
        
         | jithinraj wrote:
         | Good catch, @bsldld. When it was just two of us experimenting
         | with this, that used to be the case. It's taken care of now.
         | 
         | Regardless of how many different sets of people are watching
         | the same youtube video, it would still be a private screen
         | where only people with your family's unique co-watching URL can
         | join or watch it.
         | 
         | That way the co-watching experience remains private. It will be
         | a separate private screen for your family and theirs.
         | 
         | Thank you for bringing this up and letting me answer this for
         | others too :)
        
           | dexterhaslem wrote:
           | if i start one up and want to link a friend late to the
           | party, would this make it so they cant join? how does this
           | work
        
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       (page generated 2021-08-02 23:03 UTC)