Extension allows interaction on ONE tab at a time, and that tab shouldn't be totally muted! This prevents algorithms to flag your interaction as BOT activity. You can move that tab to the background though while working on your PC. Your daily engagement capacity is 300 min by default. You can change it from 'Settings'. You cannot add videos shorter than 60 seconds. If a user fails to settle an interaction debt, the specific video that received the interaction will be removed from the Video Market for 3 days. You can disable the interaction feature at any time via "Settings"; once disabled, your videos will no longer be available for interaction. If you retract the interactions you have provided, you will receive a violation warning. 5 violation warnings will result in your account being suspended for 7 days. For an interaction to count, the video must play at normal speed - without rewinding or fast-forwarding - in a natural, continuous manner. The extension automatically activates on the YouTube tab you are redirected to from the Video Market. You can only add videos from a channel you own or are authorized to represent. Content that infringes copyright, is unlawful, or is age-restricted cannot be added. Three unpaid debts within 7 days will remove all your videos from the Video Market for 7 days. The extension records data regarding the duration of the videos you watch, as well as likes, subscriptions, and comments. Every interaction you make is credited as a debt to the creator of the video you watched. You can view your debts and credits on the debts page. All debts must be paid within 48 hours.
YouCanTube

How YouCanTube works

Updated: 27.09.2026 11:11

CONTENTS
1. What YouCanTube is
2. Installing the extension
3. Adding channels and videos
4. The market: finding videos to watch
5. The ledger: what you owe and what you are owed
6. How watch time is measured
7. Likes, comments and subscriptions
8. Daily capacity
9. Penalties
10. Warnings for withdrawn engagement
11. Who can watch your video
12. Frequently confusing points

 


1. WHAT YOUCANTUBE IS

YouCanTube is a mutual engagement exchange. You watch other members'
videos; they watch yours. Nothing is free and nothing is bought: every
engagement you receive is written down as a debt you owe back, and every
engagement you give is written down as a credit owed to you.

The whole system rests on one rule:

YOU GET EXACTLY AS MUCH AS YOU GIVE.

There is no ranking to game, no points to buy, no way to receive without
returning. A member who takes and does not give has their videos removed
from the market until the debt is settled.

The browser extension exists because none of this can be trusted to
self-reporting. The extension measures what actually happened in your
browser and reports it. Without the extension running, nothing counts.



2. INSTALLING THE EXTENSION

The extension is not published in the Chrome Web Store. You download a
package that is built for your account alone, and load it in developer
mode. This is deliberate: the package carries a licence file that binds
it to you.

STEP BY STEP

1. Log in and open the Extension page.
2. Create a token. A fresh token is generated for you.
3. Download the package. The download is personalised — the file you
get is not the same file another member gets.
4. Unzip it somewhere permanent on your computer. Do not delete the
folder afterwards; Chrome loads the extension from that folder every
time it starts.
5. Open chrome://extensions in Chrome.
6. If you already have an older YCTube extension, REMOVE IT FIRST.
7. Turn on "Developer mode" (top right).
8. Click "Load unpacked" and choose the folder you unzipped.
9. Click the extension icon, paste your token, and activate.

WHAT BINDS THE EXTENSION TO YOU

- The token binds to ONE computer the first time it is used. Sending
your package to someone else does not work: the code embedded in the
package must match the account that created the token.
- The extension verifies its own files on every sync. If any file has
been modified, the token is locked and you must create a new one.
- Every request to the server is signed. A request that is not signed,
or is signed with the wrong key, is rejected.

WHEN A NEW VERSION IS RELEASED

Extension updates are not automatic, because the package is per-member.
When a version becomes mandatory, the old one stops working: your
videos leave the market and your engagement is not counted until you
reinstall. You always reinstall from scratch — new token, fresh
download, remove the old extension first.



3. ADDING CHANNELS AND VIDEOS

CHANNELS

Add your channel from the "My videos" page. A channel can belong to only one member — if someone added it first, you cannot.

EACH ACCOUNT IS FOR ONE CHANNEL. The channel you add videos for and the channel you are signed in as on YouTube must be the same. If you have more than one channel, you open a separate membership for each: a separate browser profile, its own extension, and a different email address.

When you add a channel you choose its PUBLISHING LANGUAGE and its NICHE. These two are the channel’s identity and are written ONCE; they cannot be changed later. This is not decoration: together they decide whether other people’s videos are open to you. If they could be changed, this would be possible — look like "every niche" all day, watch everything, then pull the channel into a narrow niche and close your own video to that same audience. If you genuinely picked wrong, write from the contact page and we will correct the record.

The channel’s region is derived automatically from your connection. It is never shown on a card; it is used only for audience filtering.

The channel's name, picture and subscriber count are read
automatically. Your subscriber count is measured when you join and
again periodically, so growth can be shown.

VIDEOS

Add videos under a channel. Title, duration and thumbnail are filled in
automatically within seconds.

Rules for a video to enter the market:
- It must be at least 60 seconds long. Debts are written in whole
minutes, so a shorter video could never generate one.
- It must belong to a channel you have added.
- Your account must have engagement turned on.
- Your extension must be up to date.

Videos are placed into LENGTH CATEGORIES by duration, but that is a filter, not a limit: you may watch a video in any category and receive engagement from any member. Balance comes from TIME, not from categories. Because debt is recorded in minutes, watching a 3-minute video earns you 3 minutes — it does not let you claim 2 hours from the owner of a 2-hour video.



4. THE MARKET: FINDING VIDEOS TO WATCH

The video market lists everything available to you. Your own videos are
shown too, marked as yours, so you can see how they appear to others.

OPEN VIDEOS FROM THE MARKET — THIS MATTERS

The extension activates automatically in the tab you open FROM
YouCanTube. A tab you opened directly on YouTube does not count and
will tell you so:

"This tab was not opened from YouCanTube, so nothing is counted
here."

Only one tab counts at a time. If you open several videos from the
market, the most recently opened tab is the active one; the others say
"Engagement is active in another tab". When the active tab closes, no
tab is active until you open another one from the site.

If your browser restarts and the link between tabs is lost, use
"Start engagement in this tab" in the extension window.

FILTERS

Above are the length categories, below them the checkboxes. None ticked means everything.

Open to engagement — hides channels whose daily capacity is full
Not watched by me — hides videos you have watched
No engagement from me — hides videos you have touched
My language — only channels in your own language
Repays my debt — only videos that settle an open debt
Open to me — hides videos whose audience leaves you out

"My language" also keeps videos whose language has not been set, so the
market does not look empty while members are still filling that field.

WHAT THE CARDS TELL YOU

Each card shows what YOU have already given that video: the watch time,
and ticks for like, comment and subscription. Engagement you later
withdrew is not shown. This is the same on the market and on a member's
channel page, so the two never disagree.

A card may also warn you that the owner has already watched everything
you have. Watch time you give them cannot be repaid, so it will not
create a debt — but likes, comments and subscriptions still count.



5. THE LEDGER: WHAT YOU OWE AND WHAT YOU ARE OWED

THE DIRECTION OF A DEBT

This confuses almost everyone at first, so read it slowly:

When you WATCH someone's video, THEY owe YOU.
When someone watches YOUR video, YOU owe THEM.

You are not paying for the privilege of being watched. You are
receiving something of value, and the ledger records that you must
return it.

HOW DEBTS ARE MEASURED

Watch debts are measured in TIME, not in number of videos. If someone
watches 13 minutes of your videos, you owe them 13 minutes — which you
may repay across any of their videos, in any combination.

Likes, comments and subscriptions are counted one by one.

All watch debts are written in WHOLE MINUTES. Seconds never appear in
the ledger.

REPAYING

Open the debts page, go to the member's profile and watch their videos. No video is assigned to you: the choice is yours.

A debt has a deadline. If it runs out unpaid, that video leaves the
market for a while. Repeated unpaid debts close all your videos for a
period.

CAPS THAT PROTECT YOU

- You can never be asked for more likes than the other member has
videos. If you owe 5 likes but they only have 2 videos, 2 likes
settle it.
- The same applies to watch time: if you have already watched
everything that member has, the debt closes. You cannot be penalised
for a debt that is impossible to pay.
- A single video is worth at most its own duration, no matter how many
times you watch it. Re-watching earns the remainder, not a second
full payment.



6. HOW WATCH TIME IS MEASURED

WHAT COUNTS

Time is counted only while:
- the tab is the active engagement tab (opened from YouCanTube),
- the sound is on,
- the video is actually playing,
- playback speed is normal,
- you are not scrubbing through.

Each second of the video counts once. Re-watching the same part does
not add time. Skipping forward does not add time.

The tab may be in the background — listening while you work is
legitimate and YouTube counts it too.

 

SOUND MUST NOT BE FULLY OFF

If you mute the video, drop the volume to zero, or mute the tab itself,
the counter STOPS and tells you:

"The sound is fully off. Turn it on for genuine engagement; the timer
has paused."

It pauses; it does not cancel. Turn the sound back on and it continues
from where it stopped. Likes and subscriptions are also not accepted
while the sound is off.

 

THE DEBT IS WRITTEN WHEN YOU FINISH

Watch time accumulates while you watch, but the debt is written ONCE,
when the watch ends. Previously it grew minute by minute, which meant
the other member started repaying "1 minute" while you were still
watching and their debt kept climbing. Everyone was chasing a moving
target.

Now the amount is settled when you stop, and it does not grow while
the other side is repaying it.

 

THE VIDEO STOPS WHEN YOUR DEBT IS PAID

If you are watching to repay a debt, the extension pauses the video at
the exact moment the debt is cleared:

"Your debt for this video is paid. If you keep watching, the other
side will owe you."

Press play to continue — the extra time becomes a debt in your favour.
You can turn automatic pausing off in the extension window; the
notice still appears.

LIMITS

There is a ceiling on how much watch time one account can report per
hour. It exists to catch impossible claims, not to restrict honest
members.



7. LIKES, COMMENTS AND SUBSCRIPTIONS

These are detected automatically when you perform them on YouTube. You
do not report them; the extension sees them.

- They are recorded once per video. Liking twice is still one like.
- They only count in the active engagement tab, with sound on.
- Comments are checked for quality. A row of dots or emoji is not a
comment and creates no debt for anyone.
- The video owner can see the text of comments left on their videos and
report one that is abusive.

If you later remove a like or unsubscribe, the extension notices. See
section 10.

 


8. DAILY CAPACITY

Daily capacity is how much engagement your videos may RECEIVE in a day, measured in minutes of watch time. You set it yourself in settings.

- When your capacity is full, your videos stop receiving engagement
for the rest of the day. Nobody can create new debts against you.
- This protects you from waking up owing more than you can repay.
- The market shows capacity-full videos lower in the list, and the
"Open to engagement" filter hides them entirely.

Capacity resets daily.

 

9. PENALTIES

Penalties exist for one reason: taking without giving back.

UNPAID DEBT
A debt that passes its deadline removes the relevant video from the
market for a set number of days.

REPEATED UNPAID DEBTS
Several unpaid debts within a window close all of your videos for a
period.

TAMPERED EXTENSION
If the extension's files have been modified, the token is locked
immediately. You create a new token and reinstall.

IMPOSSIBLE CLAIMS
Reporting more watch time than could physically have elapsed is
rejected and logged.

When your videos are suspended, your dashboard says so and shows when it
ends. Nothing is hidden from you.

 

 

10. WARNINGS FOR WITHDRAWN ENGAGEMENT

Giving a like and then removing it — or subscribing and then
unsubscribing — cancels the value the other member received, while their
debt to you remains. The extension watches for this.

THE STEPS

Detections 1 to 5 Warning only. Nothing is closed. Your dashboard
shows "Engagement withdrawal warnings: 2 / 5".
Detection 6 Your account is suspended for 7 days. Your videos
leave the market for that period.

There is no automatic permanent ban.

This is deliberately forgiving. Someone who removes a like by accident
should not lose their account. Someone who does it six times is not
having accidents.

You always see your warning count on your own dashboard, so the
suspension is never a surprise.


11. WHO CAN WATCH YOUR VIDEO

For every video you may set language, niche and region filters. If you set none, the video is OPEN TO EVERYONE, and for most channels that is the right choice: every filter shrinks the pool, and a smaller pool means your video is watched more slowly.

- Language: only channels in the languages you pick will see it. A viewer who does not understand a talk-heavy video will not watch it to the end; this filter prevents that loss.
- Niche: opens the video to channels with the same interest. It is valuable for YouTube’s "who should this be recommended to" signal, but narrowing the niche more than necessary also narrows your audience.
- Region: use it when geography genuinely matters. The region is derived from your connection when the channel is added, and is shown to nobody.
- An address to copy instead of a clickable link: the viewer copies and pastes it, so the traffic arrives directly rather than from an external link.

A member outside the audience sees the video LOCKED in the market: the thumbnail and duration stay; the title, the channel name and the link are hidden. The (i) mark on the card explains why. A locked video is also kept out of search results.

There are two exceptions: you always see your own videos, and your videos are never closed to a member WHO OWES YOU. Without the second one, a member who narrowed the audience after a debt was opened could make that debt impossible to repay.



12. FREQUENTLY CONFUSING POINTS

"I watched a video but nothing was recorded."
Check the badge in the corner of the YouTube page. It tells you exactly
why: the tab was not opened from YouCanTube, engagement is active in
another tab, or the sound is off.

"I watched, but the debt did not appear immediately."
It appears when your watch ends, not while it is running. This is
intentional.

"I watched 115 seconds and only got 1 minute."
Debts are whole minutes. The remaining 55 seconds are held and added to
your next watch of that video.

"I re-watched a video and earned nothing."
A video is worth its own duration once. If you had already been
credited its full length, there is nothing left to earn — move to
another of that member's videos.

"Someone owes me but their video says I cannot engage."
Their daily capacity is probably full for today.

"Why can't I just open YouTube and watch?"
Because the system has to know which tab you mean. Opening from the
site removes the guesswork entirely, and guessing is what used to make
members lose their watch time.

"I get nothing for watching a member who has already seen all my videos."
Correct, for watch time — they have nothing left to repay you with. The
card warns you before you start. Likes, comments and subscriptions
still count.