Niconico

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Niconico
Niconico logo
Wwwnicovideojp-full.png
URL http://www.nicovideo.jp[IAWcite.todayMemWeb]
Status Online!
Archiving status Not saved yet
Archiving type Unknown
IRC channel #archiveteam-bs (on hackint)

Niconico (http://www.nicovideo.jp/), formerly known as Nico Nico Douga is a Japanese video sharing site similar to Youtube managed by Niwango, a subsidiary of Dwango. As of December 2014, Niconico is the ninth most visited site in Japan. It has a unique comment system where the comments are overlaid directly over the video, synced to a specific video playback time. The site is known for its anime related content and memes. The video files are H.264 with AAC audio, there is currently no support for HTML5 video and users must be registered and signed in to watch (or download) videos. Due to the limited server capacity, Niconico restricts access to the website to free users at peak times (7 p.m. to 2 a.m.) by forcing them to stream lower quality versions of videos or blocking access entirely to newly registered users. An English-language version was added on October 17, 2012, replacing the Niconico.com website, featuring a new player and translation tools allowing users to translate video descriptions into English or Chinese.

Scripts

  • nicovideo-dl is a small command-line program (similar to youtube-dl) to download videos from www.nicovideo.jp. It is implemented in Python. It is platform-independent and should work on Unix/Windows/Mac.
  • Nicofox NicoFox is a Mozilla Firefox extension for video website Nico Nico Douga. It contains a Download Manager, which can download videos from the website with their comments. (Nicofox will burn in comments into the video file with no way to watch the saved video with comments disabled, if that feature is enabled. Not recommended for serious archival.)

There are several other generic scripts and browser extension that can download videos from video sharing sites that will work with Niconico, but they can't download videos with the comments overlaid over the video.

Recommended way to archive niconico videos using nicovideo-dl

This method will require you to have an account registered on niconico. To get the highest quality video possible, you will need either need to buy a premium subscription (540 yen a month) or only download videos outside of the peak times (7pm - 2am JST). One way to tell if you're getting the higher quality download is that they usually have a .mp4 extension, whereas lower-quality downloads result in a .flv file.

nicovideo-dl --username "YOUR-USERNAME" --password "YOUR-PASSWORD" --get-comment --raw-comment --title http://www.nicovideo.jp/watch/sm20338084

This will grab the video and the comment XML file. The XML file can be converted into an ASS subtitle file compatible with most video players using the danmaku2ass script by m13253.

Site reconnaissance

"As of October 31, 2011, Niconico has over 23,690,000 registered users, 6,870,000 mobile users and 1,390,000 premium users."

Vital signs

Seems stable.

External links