YouTube is giving me a message to “sign in so we know you’re not a bot

[Charles R]

This has just started happening and it’s a real headache. I get this error message when I’m signed in. I believe it results from YouTube silently expiring sessions and not managing session state correctly between separate tabs/windows. So I have tab groups with lessons I’m working on, like one page currently is 15 tabs, in order, and I put a good bit of effort into getting this organized. Right in the middle of playing I get this error. I go back to YouTube and, yes, I am still signed in. I refresh the offending Active Melody tab to no avail. I close the tab, and since I’m in Safari (Apple OS) not Chrome I don’t have the nice reopen closed tab. I have to go back to Active Melody, re-find the lesson, and drag it back to where it was in my tab group. This is a huge distraction since I’m focussing on what are for me hard guitar challenges, and irritated by YouTube’s fraudulent error message, and by the fact that my Active Melody creds should suffice, and that this is a violation of my rights in the sense that I am signed in and YouTube in putting their technology failure (session management fail) on me. Does anybody have any ideas? I sent an email to tech support but they didn’t have a solution.

[Mark T]

Hi Charles – I’m having exactly the same problem 😖😖. Haven’t found a solution yet, but am getting increasingly irritated by it. Cleared cache and browsing history; signed into YouTube – and can play stuff from their site, but go back to AM and it starts happening again! Most odd 🤔🤔.

[sunjamr]

I’ve been hearing about this happening to some people lately. Here’s my theory: If you open Youtube in your browser and click on a video but just leave it open, then open a new tab and do the same thing multiple times, you are asking Youtube to remember all your open tabs. So you are sucking down some of Youtube’s vast storage capability, as compared to most people who only open one video at a time, and Youtube is thinking you might be a bit greedy. Web crawlers and bots also do this, and it costs Youtube money. If you are a bot, Youtube wants to throw you out of the system. But how does Youtube know whether or not you are a bot? It just asks you.

Sunjamr Steve

[KenG]

I had the same problem. When I was trying to post my video for the September challenge.

The cash and that seem to issue, but then it started happening again. I don’t recall, but I think I may have gone to chrome and that resolve the problem but I could be wrong. I will check it and respond again.

It’s annoying enough to me that I may just set up an account on Vimeo

Never Stop Learning. Ever.

[Mark H]

Charles R wrote:

I’m in Safari (Apple OS)

What version of macOS, and what version of Safari?

[Charles R]

Mark H
Safari: Version 17.6 (17618.3.11.11.7, 17618)
Mac OS: Monterey 12.7.6
Both are up to date; there are later versions of the OS but not for this laptop.

[Mark T]

I’m bang up to date:

MacBook Pro:
Chip Apple M2 Pro
macOS Sequoia 15.0.1

Safari
Version 18.0.1 (20619.1.26.31.7)

Also – responding to Steve’s comment – good thinking, but I only have a single Tab and Window open.

Cheers all 👍🎶😎

[Mark P]

Question: Are you using a VPN? If the answer is yes, then your VPN provider may be getting blocked by youtube.
Why do some websites block VPNs

For my personal internet use I’m not using a VPN and I never get the “sign in so we know you’re not a bot” message no matter how many tabs I have with youtube opened. I don’t sign into my youtube account and can’t remember the last time I did. If I switch to my work computer where VPN is required I get the “sign in” message every time. It also seems that there are cases where even if you do sign-in embedded youtube links don’t work.

Unfortunately their service isn’t “free”. The cost is their ability to gather info about you. To the company, using a VPN is like using the service without paying. IMO, it’s not the only reason they block VPNs but it is one of them.

Mark P

[Charles R]

Hi, no, not using a VPN. Home internet, IP is given by a DHCP lease I think.

[Mark T]

Thanks, Mark, but no, I don’t use a VPN. I’ve found a way around the problem, but only by watching the embedded videos on the iPad – awkward, but it works.

I’ve also tried opening a new YouTube Tab on the Mac, rather than trying to play the video embedded, and that sometimes works – however, I get a new Tab for each video, that I then close as I don’t want mounds of open Tabs that I don’t need.

A friend suggested installing Chrome – but I’m not prepared to go down that road.

Thanks all 👍🎶😎

[Andy N]

I’ve been getting this too on my iPhone using safari (not that I think the browser has anything to do with it). This has all the hallmarks of a software bug and bad one at that.
I get it occasionally with no obvious pattern to the video links it picks on. Going to play something quickly in YouTube will sometimes fix the problem but sometimes only for a short period. I’ve managed to get the same video to both not-play/play/not-play/play in a matter of minutes.

You shouldn’t actually have to sign in to YouTube to use it, never had to in the past although all media channels constantly want you too to harvest your data.

[Charles R]

Yeah, I am not sure it’s a bug as opposed to a feature. YouTube and corporations like it don’t clean up their technology when keeping it messy like this helps them impose themselves on users. Gives them extra layers of reassurance that they can always identify you to harvest your data. I totally agree with you that you shouldn’t actually have to sign in to YouTube and I think the whole error incident and report is fraudulent on their part.

[Charles R]

I also agree that the browser has nothing to do with it. Although it would be nice if there was a plugin that could provide a workaround.

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