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The ActionScript 3 Player APIs, both in the chromeless and embedded variety, have been available for use since last October. When we released the ActionScript 3 APIs, we announced the deprecation of the ActionScript 2 equivalents. As per our deprecation policy, we will keep the ActionScript 2 Player APIs running through October of 2012; however, we wanted to announce a change in the videos available for playback that will affect those still using the ActionScript 2 chromeless player.

As of early January, 2011, some videos that YouTube and our content partners would like to monetize will not be playable using the ActionScript 2 chromeless player because it does not have the ability to show ads. If you attempt to play back such a video, an onError event will be fired, as documented in the ActionScript 2 Player APIs reference guide. As a developer, you can handle this event and play an alternate video, or display an explanatory message to your users.

Please note that this change only affects playback in the ActionScript 2 chromeless player. If you are using the ActionScript 2 embedded player (i.e. the official YouTube player with built-in controls) or if you’ve already upgraded to one of the ActionScript 3 players, you can continue to play the same video content you can play today. Also note that you might be using the the ActionScript 2 chromeless player indirectly if you’re using a third-party custom video player to play back YouTube content. Please reach out to the provider of your custom video player if you’re not sure whether this change will affect you.

Cheers,
-Jeff Posnick, YouTube API Team

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Update (February 2012): We're happy to report that PubSubHubbub functionality for YouTube feeds has been restored for the uploads, subscriptions, and favorites feed. When subscribing to a feed URL, be sure that the only URL parameter you include is v=2, e.g. http://gdata.youtube.com/feeds/api/users/GoogleDevelopers/uploads?v=2


Update (November 2011): As mentioned below, PubSubHubbub for YouTube feeds is currently inactive. The engineering team is investigating options for restoring functionality; more info will be posted following those investigations.


Update (October 2011): Unfortunately, we no longer support subscribing to YouTube user events via PubSubHubbub. We suggest using the Simple Update Protocol as an alternative.


PubSubHubbub, for those not in the know, is a server-to-server protocol for notifying interested parties of events they’re interested in. Notifications are pushed out to subscribers via HTTP web hooks, which offers efficiencies over polling-based solutions. With PubSubHubbub, your server finds out about events in near real-time, without having to determine the optimal polling interval or repeatedly fetch individual activity feeds that haven’t changed.


We’re happy to announce that it’s now possible to subscribe to three types of YouTube user events via PubSubHubbub: video uploads, new subscriptions, and video favorites. The subscription requests need to be made on a per-user basis, so you will only receive updates for specific users that you’re interested in.Your code can look for our PubSubHubbub hub address in the href attribute of the top-level <link rel='hub'> element in uploads, subscriptions, and favorites feeds. For example, the feed http://gdata.youtube.com/feeds/api/users/GoogleDevelopers/uploads?v=2 exposes the hub address in the <link rel='hub' href='http://pubsubhubbub.appspot.com'/> element.


More details on the PubSubHubbub can be found in the specification document. If you’d like your server to receive YouTube user event updates via PubSubHubbub, this list of libraries is a good place to start.


Cheers,
-Jeff Posnick, YouTube API Team, in conjunction with the PubSubHubbub Team