This may be relevant: "Don’t mark it as private or disallow embedding on YouTube, or we won’t be able to see it. Please note that because of how our system is built, YouTube’s view count will not increase even though we do watch your video." [1]

[1] https://www.ycombinator.com/video/

How can they watch a video without its view count increasing? I am really interested.

Does anybody know if youtube-dl increases a video's view count?

why not ? :)

Because Youtube uses some measure of actually played video time to count a view. Depending on how it is implemented, downloads likly do not trigger that (since data loaded doesn't mean it was watched)

Hm, seems like that would leave a mechanism open for blocking those kinds of sites. One reason I can think not to is if other apps, like YT for Roku, have to access the data directly and then process the relevant view count/ad stuff client side

I guess the video count is updated by the player and youtube-dl does not use this player.

Also, YT view counts may not be as straightforward as you imagine, as they are a hot metric for advertisers.

It's worth noting that YouTube is optimising for the opposite: they want to prevent artificial view count inflation. Therefore, this behaviour (the view count not increasing when the videos are automatically accessed) would make sense.

If you're interested, an interesting measure for difficulty is how much companies charge to "buy youtube views" (e.g, $16 per 1000 views is ~8x the cost you'd pay for typical CAPTCHA solving).

Given that they also mention needing embedding to be enabled, I suspect they're using an inline player on another site. IIRC, only plays on youtube.com are counted towards video view counts.

> IIRC, only plays on youtube.com are counted towards video view counts.

This appears to be untrue. [1, 2] It seems that embed views count, except possibly where autoplay is enabled (presumably because the video might be shown when no one is watching).

1: https://www.alliedpixel.com/2019/09/do-embedded-youtube-vide...

2: https://boostlikes.com/blog/2014/08/youtube-video-views-embe...

Why would you write something wrong like this in such an authoritative? Wouldn’t it be better to do 5 seconds of research instead of spreading fake news?

I don't think there's a way to watch a video on YT without the count being incremented. Actually, the only way is if you watch your own videos with some frequency (not defined anywhere I could find).

I checked, they are both unlisted and embedding is enabled.

Thanks for the suggestion.

Did you read the second sentence, though? It seems like it applies here.

Is that actually technically possible? I don’t think so

Why not? YT view counter is famous for being stuck on some low value like "300" when thousands of people are watching. It just isn't something worth updating in real time.

That’s a thing from like 2015 that was in place to to make sure that the views were real. I’ve uploaded videos that have gotten 10s if views. Really, how hard do you think it is to make a counter?

> Did you read the second sentence, though? It seems like it applies here

I guess I didn't! :)

That's interesting because I looked around to see if that was possible and did not find it to be so. I wonder if they have some back door access to YT videos due to, well, being YC?

Interesting.

.. more likely, the youtube view counting algorithm doesn't include embedded views.

In general, it does. https://boostlikes.com/blog/2014/08/youtube-video-views-embe...

Someone outside of the startup world asked me "what is YC" and my reply was "the accelerator that rejects you."

My impression from having applied, and from knowing founders at various stages (some of whom went through YC, others who were rejected at various stages, one rejected at interview 5+ times in a row!), is that there is such a high volume of applications now that the person you get matched with to review yours is a total shot in the dark. If it isn't someone who "gets" your industry, you'll kind of just be thrown to the back of their pile. There is a lot of serendipity to who advances. I have heard some insiders complain that their recommendations aren't really taken seriously.

YC was the only accelerator who rejected us. We did a different one (at a true "idea stage") and it went great. Make sure to apply to others like Techstars, Capital Factory, Masschallenge, Betaworks, Boost VC, the list goes on. If it's a numbers game now, then whether you get picked for any particular accelerator is probably more a function of the total number of applications to that accelerator than anything else.

If you're super early stage, I'd recommend trying to find out if there are any accelerators sponsored by your local government, they tend to have way less applications since they're only pulling from a local pool.

There is probably a value-add to YC besides just money, but there are literally hundreds of accelerators that have copied the model at this point. If you really have something, the venture community that YC taps will notice regardless. It's always better just to take the cash and build IMO.

Good advice, thanks.

> If you're super early stage, I'd recommend trying to find out if there are any accelerators sponsored by your local government, they tend to have way less applications since they're only pulling from a local pool.

Not sure how to self-characterize. We've probably invested somewhere in the order of $300K of our own funds in this to get where we are. Keep in mind this is hardware (+software), which means the monetary scale is very different.

We are at the stage where we are going to start showing our pre-production prototype to potential customers sometime next month. Frankly, the closer we get to a sale the less interesting VC money or an incubator becomes. In other words, if I close a $5MM sale next month (which is in the realm of possibilities) there is no way anyone is getting 7% of the business for $150K.

> There is probably a value-add to YC besides just money

Definitely. Not interested in money for the sake of money. Money by itself is useless and easy to waste.

> Someone outside of the startup world asked me "what is YC" and my reply was "the accelerator that rejects you."

I don't take that as a negative but rather more as a reality. They get so many applications it is inevitable that the vast majority of applicants will not be accepted. That's just reality.

YC is a 1% acceptance rate - so there bound to be plenty of complaints and horror stories.

> literally hundreds of accelerators

Yeah. But $150K/7% is a superb cool deal. A couple of alternatives give you $100K. And then its down to "$25K stipends" even pay-to-play (e.g. OnDeck?!). Am i wrong ?

YC also has (perceived?) network value, u r competing with full-traction or YoY-revenue-growth companies. SAD !!

I read somewhere on yc website that they only look at the video if they find the application/applicants interesting enough. So there is that.

Yeah, that's what I was referring to when I mentioned filtering based on the text portion of the application.

That's alright. We are moving forward on our own and haven't been waiting for investors at all. Our project is likely to end-up in the news by the end of May (hopefully because we booked orders). We were also asked by the White House to submit technology details. So...we are moving forward, which is good.

We also applied and show 0 views. Will get the boot today by midnight per YC website. That hasnt stop us from indulging in a little fantasy where Seibel, Director of YC is offering us an interview :-)

https://toonclip.com/player?key1=802d8d51ec

You can also create your fantasy by forking the above animation.

just some visuals:

https://i.imgur.com/bzRWC7N.png

shows 9 impressions but no views.

on the video, it shows 8 views (i added one when i checked it):

https://i.imgur.com/tt73jOn.png

so, a lot of the "artificial view count inflation" stuff and embeds might make sense.

I applied several times and they never did. :)