• Downloading from YouTube is NOT illegal.
  • But it violates their Terms of Service, and could result in account closure and revocation.
  • But John Emery (joined Aug 2014) has done it on an enormous scale for years, and has never been caught.
    UPDATE 7-28-2018...HE WAS BUSTED. Daaaaaammmnnn.

Excerpts from Youtube's Terms of Service

  1. YouTube Accounts

    1. Although YouTube will not be liable for your losses caused by any unauthorized use of your account, you may be liable for the losses of YouTube or others due to such unauthorized use.
  2. General Use of the Service

    1. Prohibited commercial uses do NOT include any use that YouTube expressly authorizes in writing.
    2. You agree not to use or launch any automated system, including without limitation, "robots," "spiders," or "offline readers," that accesses the Service in a manner that sends more request messages to the YouTube servers in a given period of time than a human can reasonably produce in the same period by using a conventional on-line web browser.
    3. Notwithstanding the foregoing, YouTube grants the operators of public search engines permission to use spiders to copy materials from the site for the sole purpose of and solely to the extent necessary for creating publicly available searchable indices of the materials, but not caches or archives of such materials. YouTube reserves the right to revoke these exceptions either generally or in specific cases. You agree not to collect or harvest any personally identifiable information.
  3. Your Use of Content

    In addition to the general restrictions above, the following restrictions and conditions apply specifically to your use of Content.
    1. The Content on the Service, and the trademarks, service marks and logos ("Marks") on the Service, are owned by or licensed to YouTube, subject to copyright and other intellectual property rights under the law.
    2. Content is provided to you AS IS. You may access Content for your information and personal use solely as intended through the provided functionality of the Service and as permitted under these Terms of Service. You shall not download any Content unless you see a “download” or similar link displayed by YouTube on the Service for that Content. You shall not copy, reproduce, distribute, transmit, broadcast, display, sell, license, or otherwise exploit any Content for any other purposes without the prior written consent of YouTube or the respective licensors of the Content. YouTube and its licensors reserve all rights not expressly granted in and to the Service and the Content.
    3. You agree not to circumvent, disable or otherwise interfere with security-related features of the Service or features that prevent or restrict use or copying of any Content or enforce limitations on use of the Service or the Content therein.
    4. You understand that when using the Service, YouTube is not responsible for the intellectual property rights of or relating to such Content.
  4. Account Termination Policy

    [If a user is caught], YouTube will terminate a user's access to the Service if, under appropriate circumstances, the user is determined to be a repeat infringer.
  5. Ability to Accept Terms of Service

    You affirm that you are either over 13 years of age, or are over 18 years of age AND possess legal parental or guardian consent [,or are over 21 years of age whether you posess legal parental or guardian consent or not].