How Tubara Works: APIs Explained Simply

What's an API?

Think of an API (Application Programming Interface) as a waiter in a restaurant. You (the customer) don't go into the kitchen and cook your own food. Instead, you tell the waiter what you want, the waiter takes your order to the kitchen, and brings back your meal. Similarly, Tubara doesn't store millions of YouTube videos on our servers. Instead, we use YouTube's API - a "waiter" that lets us safely request specific content from YouTube without you ever leaving our protected environment.

How Tubara Uses YouTube's API

When your child clicks a channel in Tubara, here's what happens:

You approve the channel in the Parent Dashboard (e.g., "Blippi") Tubara asks YouTube's API: "Give me the latest videos from Blippi" YouTube sends back the information (video titles, thumbnails, links) Tubara shows these videos to your child in our safe interface When clicked, the video plays using YouTube's player, but your child cannot leave Tubara or click through to YouTube

Crucially:

Your child never sees YouTube's homepage, recommended videos, or comments. They only see the specific channels you've approved, displayed in Tubara's safe interface.

Privacy-Enhanced Mode We use YouTube's privacy-enhanced embedding (youtube-nocookie.com). This means:

✅ No tracking cookies unless your child actively interacts with a video

✅ No personalized ads based on browsing history

✅ No profile building across websites

✅ No clickable links to leave Tubara

Think of it like watching TV through frosted glass - you get the content, but YouTube can't see much about who's watching.

Payment Processing (Stripe API) When you upgrade to a paid tier, we use Stripe's API for payment processing. This means:

✅ We never see your card details - Stripe handles everything securely

✅ Your payment info never touches our servers

✅ Bank-grade encryption protects all transactions

It's like using a cashier at a store - we just get told "payment successful" without seeing your card.

Why This Matters

Safety: By using APIs, we create a walled garden - your child gets YouTube's incredible educational content without YouTube's risks (autoplay, inappropriate suggestions, comments, ads). Privacy: We're not storing or downloading videos, just safely requesting them when needed. Less data on our servers = better privacy protection. Reliability: When YouTube adds new videos to an approved channel, they appear automatically in Tubara - you don't need to do anything.

In Simple Terms

Tubara is like a secure viewing window onto YouTube's educational content - you control what's visible through that window, and your child can never open it to get out. APIs are the technology that makes this secure window possible.