As far as Youtube goes...
Youtube has been doing that non-buffering thing with their latest player to save bandwidth or something. So they don't waste the pipes buffering what you probably may not watch.
Google has increasingly been using CDN -
Content Delivery Networks to stream their audio/video content for a couple months now. All across the world. This has been having an overall increase in loading times across the world because of the volume of traffic, despite that CDNs are supposed to be overcoming this. A lot of people are complaining and pointing the blame at their ISPs.
Couple of half-assed fix-it ideas that seem to work:
1. Enable the HTML5 trial on Youtube.
http://www.youtube.com/html5 This may work but most likely won't help much. If so, ignore and do the following:
2. Windows 7 - Start>>cmd>>right-click>>run as administrator.
copy and paste this in the box and hit enter.
netsh advfirewall firewall add rule name="BYPASSCDNYTUBE" dir=in action=block remoteip=173.194.55.0/24,206.111.0.0/16 enable=yes
Reboot.
Two things: This obviously uses Windows Firewall. It blocks the ip address of the CDNs that Google uses and your computer just pulls straight from the source. I have used this and it works. I have been able to watch full 1080p HD videos without buffering on Youtube for the first time.
And two, this command doesn't work on XP, screw you, get Windows 7. Google it yourself and find out. OK fine, just go in your firewall settings and manually add the range under Exceptions, Ports, Change Scope, Custom List. Apple users suck my ass. There's a fix lower down. If you use another firewall, it's the same deal.
Android, this really works. I am seeing the difference in loading time.
Get AFWall+ (it's a firewall app, you can use any firewall app really and write your own custom scripts) from the Playstore. Install, give it Admin permission in the setting. Enable WiFi and 3G access to all your apps and root and kernel. Save. Enable Firewall. Go in Custom Scripts and write out these scripts:
$IPTABLES -A INPUT -s 206.111.0.0/16 -j REJECT
$IPTABLES -A INPUT -s 173.194.55.0/24 -j REJECT
Save them, make sure you're getting net in your browser. Reboot.
You can also bypass your pc firewall and use your router's hardware firewall iptables for your entire home wifi network. If you don't know how, Google your router name and iptables.
use a # tag above to comment on your define-function so you will know what it does when you go back in a few months.
# Block Youtube CDN ip address ranges
IPTABLES -A INPUT -s 206.111.0.0/16 -j REJECT
IPTABLES -A INPUT -s 173.194.55.0/24 -j REJECT
If you don't see a difference and know that (no humour mods?), just delete the scripts, remove from admin permissions and uninstall AFWall.
Windows 7 removal.
netsh advfirewall firewall delete rule name="BYPASSCDNYTUBE"