YouTube Clones Explained Something that seems to be growing in popularity is the ability to clone the ever popular YouTube.com website. There are lots of sites that have accomplished this task. There are also lots of options for software. I will cover a few in this intel.
First, before we mention the two I feel are able to clone YouTube's site the best, we need to discuss requirements. Many people think they can just do this for nothing and any old host will work. That is so not the case. There are some required components to pull this clone off.
Courtesy of the phpmotion.com website the requirements are as follows:
Servers - Linux/Unix server
- PHP 4.3 and above (including support of CLI)
- MySQL database server
- LAME MP3 Encoder
- Libogg + Libvorbis
- Mencoder and also Mplayer
- FFMpeg-PHP
- GD Library 2 or higher
- CGI-BIN
- Be able to run background processes
PHP Settings
- open_basedir = (no value)
- upload_max_filesize = 100M
- post_max_size = 100M
- max_execution_time = 1500
- session.gc_maxlifetime = 14000
- safe_mode = off
- Thread saftery = disabled
- enable_dl = On
My Two Choices for Clones
I have looked around at several clones and even found some hacked versions of clones. By "hacked", I mean someone who thought they were a php programmer and threw some code together. I strongly recommend avoiding these if possible. Why? Because my first choice will blow any hacked version away, and it is free. Besides the "hacked" versions do not have any support whatsoever.
My first choice and the recommended choice for those not wanting to spend any money on the software side of the YouTube clone, is PHP Motion. Their website is located at http://www.phpmotion.com. It is free and a very good clone of the YouTube site. It also includes a forum where you can get free support and also has paid support options, if I am not mistaken. In addition it includes a priceless thread on their forum. Recommended hosting providers.
This is getting back to the requirements. As a general rule of thumb, because of FFMPEG, and some other requirements listed above, to clone YouTube, you are going to need either a Dedicated Server hosting plan or a Virtual Private Server hosting plan. Virtual Private server hosting is more or less the shared hosting version of dedicated servers. It is a dedicated server that has mutliple instances of the server OS on one machine. So basically a select number of people share the same machine, so they can share in the cost.
On that thread there are some better alternatives listed. There are a select few Shared hosting companies that will not only allow the FFMPEG installation, but they will also provide a Fantastico automatic installation of it. They are a lot cheaper than VPS or Dedicated Servers and some are even comparable to the price of normal shared hosting like GoDaddy or HostGator's share hosting plans. The one I looked at find to be the best is cirtexhosting. I think their web address is http://www.cirtexhosting.com.
Lastly, I will give my other choice for a YouTube clone. There is a clone called Clip Share that is similar to PHP Motion, but the skins/themes are just out of this world for Clip Share. Their web address is http://www.clip-share.com. This clone isn't free, but in my opinion is very much worth it, for the themes you can get with this company. I suggest checking out their website and just looking at the skins and you will see exactly what I am talking about. Clip Share is so close to a clone of YouTube, that I am surprised they haven't been sued by Google/YouTube. If you can afford it ($99 for the lite version, $199 for the Pro Version), I strongly recommend you go with this option. It is by far, hands down, the best YouTube clone available.
So if you are looking for a free version, go with PHP Motion at http://www.phpmotion.com. If you can afford a better version go with Clip Share at http://www.clip-share.com. As for hosting, I believe Cirtex Hosting is the most economical choice at http://www.cirtexhosting.com. If you can afford a Dedicated server, then that would be a better option, but only if you know you are going to be able to monetize the site quickly, because a Dedicated Server is not cheap, no matter who you choose for a hosting provider.
I hope this has been informative and was able help you. If you have any questions or comments, please don't hesitate to leave a comment on my blog(http://www.jjpmarketing.com).
