Well, I'm not boycotting Youtube per se, there's plenty of stuff that I don't need to sign in to see. Lately it seems anytime a singer so much as says shit or fuck they put it behind a wall. Anything that might make reference to the mere idea that people have actual sex, likewise goes behind the sign in wall.

The Collateral Murder videos, whatever you might think of them, were behind that wall. I don't think I should have to tell someone exactly who I am before I'm allowed to consume the news/culture, especially when it's largely not generated by them at all. And while I do kick down money to sites and organizations with which I agree there's nothing truly special or magical about Youtube other than they're big and have Google's legal team standing behind them.

So no, I won't sign in (neither will I use my real name on Google+). Aside from that it's fairly arrogant to assume everyone has a gmail account. I wouldn't have one at all save for my phone and guess how many emails that account has in it... about 3.

I'm someone who is tempted to go off the grid completely on a daily basis, so I certainly understand the urge to tell google to go fuck themselves.

That said, having a real youtube account is handy. Quick and easy access to my favorite let's players for example.

I "subscribe" via RSS. :D

yet he could not watch youtube videos properly using ie but they work perfectly with FF and chrome.

yeah.

IE is shit. and using it just gives a reason for Msoft to not give a f--- again like they did for years before FF came out.

I'll give you the motivation why I created a Youtube account: ability to save the best videos as favorites. Other than that, no need really (unless you want to comment on the videos, or release videos of your own etc.).

I don't know if this was global but a while back Google required me to enter a cell phone number in order to create new accounts for verification purposes. Since I neither have a cell phone nor would want to present my number to potential advertising if I had, I could not create an account at all. I could accept the requirement of having a secondary e-mail as verification but cell phones are a bit too much.

The problem was when they also required all YouTube accounts to be linked to a Google account. I already had my account on YouTube but I couldn't access it for months until they removed the cell phone requirement. All is good now, except for their loss of esteem, but it's a bit unsettling considering Googles habit of making sudden changes. It definitely wouldn't be nice for those using G-mail as their main communication to be locked out because they don't accept new identity policies.

The only time I've seen google ask for a phone number or secondary email it was only for password recovery purposes

I think my GF had this same problem and I'm pretty sure she uses Firefox. She said the 'white bar' didn't show anymore. But a day or so ago she was joyously screaming they fixed it.

haven't seen the cell number requirement. sounds weird as hell... as it reminds me of few evil porn hosting sites i attended which asked me for a phone number.

I had the same problem a while back. Turns out the problem was I'd been putting off updating Firefox for too long. I was using version 3 when the latest version available was 6.

I imagine it's quite likely that that was the OP's problem, seeing as switching to Chrome (or the latest version thereof) fixed the problem.

Fixed. :p

Woohoo! I couldn't care less about Chrome either way. But another person ditching IE is always good.

A single video? What video is that? i'm intrested.

wcg 2010 cs1.6 finals
but watching this now
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HelW7rthFK4&feature=related