Is integrating yts api "illegal" (lemm.ee)

submitted 4 days ago by IsoSpandy@lemm.ee to c/piracy@lemmy.dbzer0.com

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I am the developer of a project with a small community known as Offflix. Now I recently discovered that Yts has an api, and it is too irresistible for me to integrate it into my project as a simple in app click to download any movie.

So, would doing that and making the code open source be illegal? I am not a US citizen and I am not technically ripping movies, I am just packaging yts's functionality inside my app. Would github flag and destroy me repo if I do this?

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[-] madnerds@lemm.ee 45 points 4 days ago

Probably a bad idea. If you really wanted to do it, you should add plug-in support to your main project, then create a separate repo, maybe under a different account, with the potentially illegal yts download plug-in. That way only the plug-in repo would get DMCAed and could be mirrored by other people, or hosted off GitHub.

[-] xnx@slrpnk.net 10 points 4 days ago

Like how stremio does it

[-] IsoSpandy@lemm.ee 4 points 4 days ago

But even if I developed a plug in, for the plug in to work, I would have to bundle a torrent engine and anything that allows movies/series to be downloaded might get flagged I guess

[-] hendrik@palaver.p3x.de 12 points 4 days ago

I think the way lots of projects handle something like that is to add a plugin system to the main project, and then offer it as a plugin in a different repo.

[-] Majestic@lemmy.ml 9 points 4 days ago

The reason they were banned on leetx is because they sold out their user email lists to an anti-piracy law firm which tried to extort money from people. I wouldn’t trust people like that. I especially would be wary of subjecting users to people like that. Torrent freak has coverage if you care to search.

[-] zbyte64@awful.systems 10 points 4 days ago

GitHub definitely would and has in the past. YouTube-dl is on GitHub and gets a pass because it is used by researchers and archivists, both are fair use. forgejo.org would let you be your own fedi-github and might be worth checking out (could be easier than designing a plugin system and additional repos).

[-] IsoSpandy@lemm.ee 3 points 4 days ago

Codeberg wouldn't mind according to that principle right? I cant fathom how a plug in would work when essentially adding yts would mean bundling a Downloader with a torrent engine and any system that allows downloading movies/series via torrent would get dmca.