Yes, you heard it right. It is possible to allow safe and filtered access to YouTube on the iPad. This tutorial will walk through the setup, step by step. Click here for the Phone & iPod touch version of this tutorial.
1. Disable the native YouTube app
The first step is to disable the native YouTube app on the device and ensure that Mobicip's Safe Browser is the only way to access YouTube.com on the device. The following is an exerpt from the tutorial on How to Setup Parental Controls on the iPad (iOS 4.2 Edition). If you haven't setup Restrictions on the device before, follow the instructions in the tutorial above first before worrying about YouTube.
From the home screen, select Settings > General.
Select Restrictions. Enter a 4-digit passcode. Make sure you remember this passcode, in case you need to change these settings.
You will see the restrictions screen. Set YouTube to OFF on this screen.
2. Enable YouTube through Mobicip
If you have a non-Premium Mobicip.com account, simply login at www.mobicip.com and change your filtering level to High School. At this time, only High School level allows access to YouTube.com for non-Premium users.
If you have a Premium subscription, you can setup filtered access to YouTube regardless of your filtering level.
- Visit www.mobicip.com, and select Settings > Categories.
- Click on Entertainment/Games to expand the category.
- If the YouTube sub-category is checked, it means YouTube is currently being blocked. Uncheck this sub-category.
- Scroll down this page and click on the YouTube category.
- To block specific YouTube content, check the box for that sub-category.
NOTE: Please remember to click the Save button at the top of the page to save your settings.
That is it! Now launch the Mobicip Safe Browser on your iPad. You will see something like the screenshot below where specific YouTube videos are being filtered by Mobicip.
2 Comments
but how do YouTube videos play at all with native app disabled?
Submitted by Guest on
Before I invest time and $ in the Mobicip software and configuration, I can't figure out (and can't find it explained anywhere) how Flash-dependent YouTube can function once the native app is disabled on the iPad... I had tried a quick-and-dirty (and admittedly inadequate, given the crude filters currently implemented by Google) solution of disabling the native app and locking down safety settings for both Google search and YouTube in Safari -- but while objectionable content was mostly filtered out of search results, NO videos would play because of course there is no Flash, and the alternative enabling of the native app was apparently completely inaccessible. This hasn't been explained/addressed here or anywhere else that recommends Mobicip -- or the other recommendations on forums/elsewhere that suggest simply accessing YouTube through the browser only (REALLY? have they tried it?). Thanks! And sorry if my frustration is bleeding through... just doesn't seem like it should be this difficult. I'd be fine also if the native YouTube app (or a 3rd party software package like yours) offered the option to disable search/browse and only allowed access to pre-approved channels, designated playlists, etc. -- sort of like the parental control software for browsers that allows only a "whitelist" of websites.
Re: but how do YouTube videos play at all with native app disabl
Submitted by Suren on
Excellent question.
When you type YouTube.com in the Mobicip browser, it always gets redirected to the mobile YouTube site, i.e. m.youtube.com. It so happens that m.youtube.com does not use Flash anymore, but uses HTML 5, a new standard for web applications and media that is open and not proprietary. While the iOS platform does not support Flash, it does support (vehemently) HTML 5. What this allows Mobicip to do is play videos on YouTube.com even when the native YouTube app is disabled.
Now, there is a limitation though. When a YouTube video is embedded on another website or page, it is still a Flash application and therefore will not be playable through Mobicip. This is an iOS limitation and we are hoping YouTube will update their embeddable code to support HTML 5 as well in future.
Hope this answers your question.
Mobicip Support
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