The thing I need that I currently use YouTube for is a place where I can store long, large videos (think around 2 hours). I want to be able to link to these videos, and disallow anyone who doesn’t have the link from seeing them. I have a lot of personal videos at this length and at a much shorter length that I want to be able to keep saved both for myself and to be able to share with various friends and acquaintances. YouTube has filled this need and still does, but I’m looking to move off of it. I’ve looked at some alternatives and few of them worked out for me because they don’t support long/large enough videos.
If you want privacy and control over who sees your stuff, I’d look into storage platforms that support live video playback, rather than video platforms. And if you have a LOT of videos, you’ll likely end up paying a small amount per month.
If you’re sharing videos that don’t have any copyright concerns or issues, then something like Google Drive, Dropbox, or Box should work.
If you want something FOSS, I’d say you’re limited to self-hosting with something like NextCloud, OwnCloud, or SeaFile. A more plug-and-play (but not FOSS) self-hosting option would be a Synology NAS.
A lot of my videos get copyright concerns and get flagged on YouTube because there’s copyrighted music playing in the background, or it’s me or a friend performing a song. We’re not some cover band doing this for money, it’s literally just us doing it for our own pleasure and maybe sending it to a few of our friends. Whether the song is in the public domain or not, it always gets flagged. Part of why I want to move off is because I think this affects whether I can redownload my video or not. I’ve been using YouTube as a place to offload videos for awhile, so I probably won’t be able to redownload a lot of my videos.
I really don’t think I’m in a position to self-host. Thank you anyways!
Ah I was afraid of that, having copyrighted music will make things a little more difficult. I know Google Drive scans for that type of thing, not sure about Dropbox or Box. You could try Mega.io or another non-US service that doesn’t care what you upload.