Pirated video?

Yep, sure looks like it. Quite blatant, too.

I think Rick used to laugh and say, "go ahead, steal my stuff!" but I suspect this crosses that line.

"Reported" the post above, even though there's nothing wrong with this thread (it's not spam) - but just to bring this to the webmaster's attention. They can decide what/if anything to do about it.

Go Traveler is legit, as they do have a license to stream the Rick Steves’ Europe TV show. Thanks for your concern, though. We appreciate your flagging content like this, just in case!

Stefanie

Forum Moderator

Sorry to be a Karen. That being said if it was pirated, the video quality is exceptional : )

Looks like this one is actually coming through pretty clearly. Hard to tell at first glance whether it’s fully authorized or not, but given the quality, I’d lean toward it being a legit stream. Either way, always good to double-check and flag things like this so the right people can confirm.

Hard to tell at first glance whether it’s fully authorized or not, but given the quality, I’d lean toward it being a legit stream

Did you not read the response above by Rick Steves’ staff? It is a legitimate stream.

Rick's videos are everywhere, not only here on his site but also on Youtube. Not at all hard to find.

And there's always PBS.

Motor Trend do a similar thing of streaming lots of episodes on Youtube. They'll do an "eighties throwback weekend" with lots of segments streaming at random from that era. I have an affection for bad eighties cars, and enjoy those more than the reviews of the nice stuff. It's fair that RSE has licenced his videos out, and someone's doing it legit for those that want to watch that way.

Of course. But if you take more than a few seconds to actually look at the video linked above, it quickly becomes evident that something is funky.

RSE staff say it's OK so that settles it. But it sure looks like a quick 'n dirty, low-effort hack, not something I would expect from the original source.

First of all, the video is named "Rick Steves - Mediterranean Treasures", and its description blurb says "Embark on a sun-kissed journey across the Mediterranean with Rick Steves, exploring ancient ruins, vibrant coastal cities, and timeless cultures. From the romantic streets of Granada to the bustling bazaars of Istanbul, each episode reveals a unique flavor of..."

Fine, but the video above this description appears to be taken from an episode on Sweden, no wait, it's Finland...no, it's someplace else, and the video doesn't start with an introduction or a title or anything, it awkwardly cuts to Rick, already narrating something, sitting in a church, or outside a sauna (it appears to start in random places) - not exactly a "sun-kissed Mediterranean" kind of place. It's like whoever put the video together either couldn't find Sweden or the Mediterranean on a map, or they didn't even look at what they were slapping together before they pasted it together and tossed it up online - exactly the kind of careless sloppiness you see from spammers (or AI-generated content).

Watch a few minutes more of the video, and it has snippets of shows from all over Europe - Bosnia, Estonia, Spain, Denmark, Gibraltar, Morocco, Greece, Turkey, Finland...you get the idea. Not really what I'd call "Mediterranean Treasures" but OK, artistic license. Perhaps they paid for the rights to cobble together bits from every episode ever made, re-arrange them in no particular order, and jump around randomly. It's weird, and clunky, but it's not my footage to license, so laissez les bontemps roulez. To me, the whole thing looks like it was grabbed and re-posted one hasty step ahead of the copyright cease-and-desist letter. Granted, they used high def video as their source, but otherwise it looks like a Frankenvideo.

FWIW it's in a Youtube account called "GoTraveler" (which I've never heard of) and has a "GoTraveler" logo superimposed in the lower right corner of the video. Clicking their logo takes you to their Youtube home page, with...lots of videos from Anthony Bourdain, something called "Food Relay" and a variety of other travel- and food-related videos.

In any case, HQ says it's legit, so it's legit. But to me it gives off a very funky vibe which reads like something pirated and passed around. So it's easy to see why the OP posted their inquiry/notification above. None of our business, so we play on.