Wrong YouTube channel downloaded when grabbing geoblocked channel

[ivan]

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Make sure you are using the latest version: run youtube-dl --version and ensure your version is 2016.07.05. If it's not read this FAQ entry and update. Issues with outdated version will be rejected.

• I've verified and I assure that I'm running youtube-dl 2016.07.05

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• Searched the bugtracker for similar issues including closed ones

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• Bug report (encountered problems with youtube-dl)
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If the purpose of this issue is a bug report, site support request or you are not completely sure provide the full verbose output as follows:

Add -v flag to your command line you run youtube-dl with, copy the whole output and insert it here. It should look similar to one below (replace it with your log inserted between triple ```):

# PYTHONPATH=. python3 -m youtube_dl -v 'https://www.youtube.com/user/kananishinoSMEJ/videos'
[debug] System config: []
[debug] User config: []
[debug] Command-line args: ['-v', 'https://www.youtube.com/user/kananishinoSMEJ/videos']
[debug] Encodings: locale UTF-8, fs utf-8, out UTF-8, pref UTF-8
[debug] youtube-dl version 2016.07.05
[debug] Git HEAD: 4080530
[debug] Python version 3.5.1+ - Linux-4.4.8-std-1-armv7l-with-Ubuntu-16.04-xenial
[debug] exe versions: ffmpeg 2.8.6-1ubuntu2, ffprobe 2.8.6-1ubuntu2, rtmpdump 2.4
[debug] Proxy map: {}
[youtube:user] kananishinoSMEJ: Downloading channel page
[youtube:playlist] UUWeg2Pkate69NFdBeuRFTAw: Downloading webpage
[download] Downloading playlist: Uploads from SQUEEZIE
[youtube:playlist] UUWeg2Pkate69NFdBeuRFTAw: Downloading page #1
[youtube:playlist] UUWeg2Pkate69NFdBeuRFTAw: Downloading page #2
[youtube:playlist] UUWeg2Pkate69NFdBeuRFTAw: Downloading page #3
[youtube:playlist] UUWeg2Pkate69NFdBeuRFTAw: Downloading page #4
^C
ERROR: Interrupted by user

# PYTHONPATH=. python3 -m youtube_dl -v 'https://www.youtube.com/user/kananishinoSMEJ'       
[debug] System config: []
[debug] User config: []
[debug] Command-line args: ['-v', 'https://www.youtube.com/user/kananishinoSMEJ']
[debug] Encodings: locale UTF-8, fs utf-8, out UTF-8, pref UTF-8
[debug] youtube-dl version 2016.07.05
[debug] Git HEAD: 4080530
[debug] Python version 3.5.1+ - Linux-4.4.8-std-1-armv7l-with-Ubuntu-16.04-xenial
[debug] exe versions: ffmpeg 2.8.6-1ubuntu2, ffprobe 2.8.6-1ubuntu2, rtmpdump 2.4
[debug] Proxy map: {}
[youtube:user] kananishinoSMEJ: Downloading channel page
[youtube:playlist] UUWeg2Pkate69NFdBeuRFTAw: Downloading webpage
[download] Downloading playlist: Uploads from SQUEEZIE
[youtube:playlist] UUWeg2Pkate69NFdBeuRFTAw: Downloading page #1
[youtube:playlist] UUWeg2Pkate69NFdBeuRFTAw: Downloading page #2
[youtube:playlist] UUWeg2Pkate69NFdBeuRFTAw: Downloading page #3
[youtube:playlist] UUWeg2Pkate69NFdBeuRFTAw: Downloading page #4
[youtube:playlist] UUWeg2Pkate69NFdBeuRFTAw: Downloading page #5
^C
ERROR: Interrupted by user

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Description of your issue, suggested solution and other information

Some YouTube channels are fully geoblocked, e.g. https://www.youtube.com/user/kananishinoSMEJ is accessible only from Japanese IP blocks. Downloading that channel with youtube-dl outside of Japan results in youtube-dl grabbing an unrelated channel.

Possibly related to #5904

[ivan]

It looks like

            channel_playlist_id = self._html_search_meta(
                'channelId', channel_page, 'channel id', default=None)

fails to find anything and it falls back to

            if not channel_playlist_id:
                channel_playlist_id = self._search_regex(
                    r'data-(?:channel-external-|yt)id="([^"]+)"',
                    channel_page, 'channel id', default=None)

and extracts an unrelated channel ID.

[yan12125]

Yep. It finds channels under the section "Related channels"

[ivan]

I have an even-more-paranoid version of a fix that involves extracting both <meta itemprop="channelId" and <link rel="alternate" type="application/rss+xml" title="RSS" href="https://www.youtube.com/feeds/videos.xml?channel_id= and making sure they match, would you take a PR with that?

[yan12125]

Haven't investigated. The fallback part is exactly a fix for #5904. Maybe @dstftw knows more for why not use the video.xml approach.