Tutorial by Bernhard Rieder, researcher and developer at Digital Methods Initiative. Detailed tutorial from the developer.
YouTube Data Tools at Digital Methods Initiative is a set of six online tools that can extract data on YouTube videos, channels, videos, and even free text search queries.
The options include detailed information about ranking, accessibility, comments, networks of channels, featured videos, etc. The network analysis program Gephi is required for the .gdf output files for the Channel Network and Video Network modules.
Important: Please note that the data handling by this service may not be compliant with GDPR.
Developer and researcher Bernhard Rieder has provided an extensive tutorial, explaining how the individual modules in YouTube Data Tools work. It is strongly recommended to view the entire video at least once.
For convenience, here is a list of timed links to specific advice and module presentations in the tutorial video:
Channel Info
- Find Channel ID and other basic channel information.
Finding Video IDs
- Directions for finding the YouTube ID for a specific video.
Channel List
- Information and statistics for channels found in searches or channel lists.
Channel List Search Function
- Find channels relevant to specified topics.
Video List
- creates a list of video infos and statistics from one of four sources: the videos uploaded to a specified channel, a playlist, the videos retrieved by a particular search query, or the videos specified by a list of IDs.
Channel Network
- crawls a network of channels connected via the "featured channels" (and via subscriptions) tab from a list of seeds. Seeds can be channels retrieved from a search or via manual input of channel IDs.
Video Network
- creates a network of relations between videos via YouTube's "related videos" feature, starting from a search or a list of video IDs.
Video Comments
- starts from a video ID and retrieves basic info for the video in question and provides a number of analyses of the comment section. It also downloads all comments for the video, using the rationale for "unaddressed" replies described in the video section for this module.
Note: The tools generate various file types that may be downloaded. The .gdf files are for network analyses in Gephi, the .csv files can be opened in a spreadsheet, eg. in Excel.
Bernhard Rieder requests that users consult the YouTube Data Tools FAQ for issues, and invites bug reports and suggestions.
It is also requested that you cite it if you use YouTube Data Tools in a scientific publication, e.g. in APA style: Rieder, Bernhard (2015). YouTube Data Tools (Version 1.31) [Software]. Available from tools.digitalmethods.net/netvizz/youtube/.
CDMM instruction Video (Danish): Downloading YouTube Comments with YouTube Data Tools
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