New Free App Lets You Stream Any Video From the Internet Archive on iPhone, Apple TV

Every so often, something amazing drops in our laps. Today, that’s the free Eye Yay app. An independent developer created it as an interface to play any video from the Internet Archive on your iPhone and/or Apple TV.

Because this player only pulls from videos uploaded by users, your viewing options are a bit limited. It’s not like the videos are well organized. The quality varies, depending on the source file.

While there are plenty of really old movies and TV shows, you can also use the app to watch recent videos uploaded to the archive (some popular TikTok accounts are mirrored and saved here).

When I downloaded the app, I found myself able to view things like:

• The breakthrough sketch comedy series “Monty Python”
• Three Stooges, Charlie Chaplin, Laurel & Hardy, and Buster Keaton films
• Hysterical old educational films
• “Reading Rainbow”
• Popeye cartoons
• Looney Tunes cartoons
• The landmark minseries “Roots”
• The genius comedy series “Fawlty Towers”
• Jim Henson’s weird, dark series, “The Storyteller”
• All 18 episodes of a totally forgotten 1984 Jason Bateman sitcom called “It’s Your Move”
• MTV’s goofy claymation series “Celebrity Deathmatch”
• The movie Disney wishes it could bury: “Song of the South”
• Aaron Sorkin’s bizarre drama about a “Saturday Night Live”-like comedy show, “Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip”
• The insane social experiment reality show where they throw a bunch of unsupervised kids into an Old West town: “Kid Nation”
• The long-forgotten original animated “Simpsons” shorts from “The Tracy Ullman Show.”
• The “RoboCop” cartoon
• Thousands of anime titles
• Lots of old game shows like “Jeopardy!” “Press Your Luck” and “The Price Is Right”

Granted, a lot of these videos may have dubious reason to exist on a public domain platform. The 1998 movie “Blade” is not remotely fair use, but it’s up there. Ditto for the entire run of “Roseanne” and “Friends” Somehow, old episodes of “Saturday Night Live” and dozens of Disney movies haven’t been taken down yet.

If you find the search results somewhat limited, the Eye Yay developer recommends going into Settings, and turning off Safe Search and/or Hide Items with Unknown Copyright. You will need to be careful – some folks have uploaded adult videos to the archive. It’s a bit of the Wild West of the old internet.

You can also use Eye Yay to play audiobooks, podcasts, or music that has been uploaded to the archive.

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Another very cool Eye Yay feature: you can download content so you can catch up on the 1995 MTV Movie Awards while you’re on a plane.

While Eye Yay is free, you do have the option to pay a one-time $29.99 fee to unlock the Supporter Edition of the app. That includes features like:

• Managing downloaded files
• Adjusting download bandwidth
• Blacklisting topics/uploaders
• Custom bookmarks
• Sleep timer
• Minimize to menu bar (macOS)

All in all, Eye Yay is an awesome tool to enjoy the often-clunky Internet Archive on multiple screens. If you have an Apple product and you’re willing to do some digging, Eye Yay could be your doorway to a fun new pastime.

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