While calling the commentThreads API with a channelId is a parameter. I'm getting commentsDisabled (403) error - which refers to "The video identified by the videoId parameter has disabled comments." However, as I indicated I'm using the channel ID.
I tested some other channels - that do have disabled videos - and I did not get that error.
I get it on a few specific channels.
Please advise.
TLDR: There isn't anymore any way to retrieve community tab comments.
Here are some channel ids in line with what you were stating:
Answer: 403 The video identified by the <code><a href=\"/youtube/v3/docs/commentThreads/list#videoId\">videoId</a></code> parameter has disabled comments.
However there is a video with comments: https://youtu.be/3F8dFt8LsXY
Answer: 403 The video identified by the <code><a href=\"/youtube/v3/docs/commentThreads/list#videoId\">videoId</a></code> parameter has disabled comments.
Furthermore there isn't any public video with comments (checked by algorithm based on the "uploads" playlist)
channelId field isn't about videos so videos restriction shouldn't change visibility of the community tab (that's comments from this section that we retrieved with the channelId field)
The channelId parameter instructs the API to return comment threads containing comments about the specified channel. (The response will not include comments left on videos that the channel uploaded.)
On both channels above, they have their community tab disabled.
However after tests on "normal" channels like officialpsy there isn't any error in the answer however there isn't any comment either.
If you are looking for community tab comments I would recommend you to use allThreadsRelatedToChannelId which works but will also return you comments left on videos.
However even allThreadsRelatedToChannelId doesn't seem to work anymore for community tab comments https://www.googleapis.com/youtube/v3/commentThreads?allThreadsRelatedToChannelId=UCMD4joGtfFO5DoH_GeRP4Cg&key=YOUR_API_KEY
