Snippet: Older iOS Devices and Second-Generation Apple TV Can’t Use YouTube Apps ☇

Shared on April 21, 2015

Ibrahim Ulukaya from YouTube:

If you’re still using the Data API v2, today we’ll start showing a video at the top of your users’ video feeds that will notify them of how they might be affected. Apart from that, your apps will work as usual.

In early May, Data API v2 video calls will start returning only the warning video introduced on April 20. Users will not be able to view other videos on apps that use the v2 API video calls. See youtube.com/devicesupport for affected devices.

By late May, v2 API calls except for comments and captions will receive 410 Gone HTTP responses. You can test your application’s reaction to this response by pointing the application at eol.gdata.youtube.com instead of gdata.youtube.com. While you should migrate your app as soon as possible, these features will work in the Data API v2 until the end of July 2015 to avoid any outages.

Basically, if you aren’t running iOS 7, the Apple-produced YouTube app will eventually not work. On the second-generation Apple TV, you’ll have to AirPlay YouTube content from some other device. Although it completely makes sense to depreciate old tools, I suspect most of this is centered around showing ads at the beginning of clips.

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