Australian Broadcasters, Netflix Competitors Pout Because Netflix Hasn't Banned VPN Users Yet
from the give-the-people-what-they-want dept
Australia has a long and proud history of seeing higher copyright infringement rates, thanks in large part to the country's failure to offer up legitimate, affordable streaming video options. With Netflix officially unavailable Down Under, many viewers there have taken things into their own hands and have started using VPNs to mask their location and subscribe to the service anyway. Cue the rising hysteria from both broadcasters and Australian Netflix competitors, who insist that something has to be done about this flagrant outrage. They're helped by regional paper The Australian, which suggests that these paying users are "pirates":"Highlighting how the TV networks view these people, an article this morning in News Corp-owned The Australian went as far as labeling subscribers as “pirates”, even though they are paying for the service..."There is concern at local networks about the growing impact of the US company flouting international regulations by accepting payments from Australian credit cards, despite maintaining a geo-block that is easily bypassed by VPN manipulation or spoof IP addresses,” the paper said."Granted, if companies were delivering what users wanted, this wouldn't even be an issue. In fact, that would seem to be a much easier solution to this "problem." Instead, broadcasters and Australian streaming provider Quickflix (HBO is an 8% owner) seem to think it would make more sense to force Netflix to ban the use of a very common technology that has innumerable uses well outside of just skirting regional limitations. Some users, for example, are finding that VPNs are one (albeit sometimes inefficient) way to bypass some of the annoying new peering feuds erupting here in the States. Still, Quickfix thinks somebody really should force Netflix to start blocking VPNs before the country starts falling apart:
"Quickflix chief executive Stephen Langsford has accused US online streaming service Netflix of turning a blind eye to copyright infringement in order to get a free ride in Australia, as competition heats up in the TV and movie streaming market..."The studios have licensed Netflix to distribute content on particular terms in the US and other larger markets, they haven’t licensed Netflix for Australia. I have no doubt that the studios are in discussions with Netflix about VPNs because it is blatantly in breach of terms and Netflix is essentially getting a free ride into Australia."It seems like only a matter of time before proxies and VPNs see a renewed focus as public enemy number one by the entertainment industry. Most of the world's graduated response programs, including ours here in the States, can't detect users who are using proxies and VPNs at all. With Australia now contemplating a graduated response program of their own, you can expect the vilification of VPNs to ramp up quickly, even though any laws restricting their use would be met with swift and steep opposition.
Netflix hasn't stated why they've yet to head to Australia yet, but it's either because they want to prioritize larger international markets, or they're having a hard time securing content licensing from Australian broadcasters. Until Netflix does show up Down Under, Australian cable operators like Foxtel are engaged in the kind of brilliant anti-piracy maneuvers we've grown used to, such as locking down HBO's Game of Thrones in an exclusive streaming and download arrangement. Surely that will stop copyright infringement of what's become the most pirated show on the Internet, right?
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Filed Under: australia, streaming, television, vpn
Companies: hbo, netflix, quickflix
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Geo-restrictions on the internet
There is no (should be no) "US internet" or "Australian internet", the internet is a... well, *GASP* international net.
It, and it's infrastructure, maintenance and overseer organizations should be sovereign entities protected by the UN, NATO, whatever.
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Re: Geo-restrictions on the internet
Incorrect. The Internet is a series of interconnected networks. A network of networks. It is not one gigantic network. It is made up of national (and other) networks that are themselves made up of thousands, millions of separate networks that all interconnect. Each ISP is its own, separate network that interconnects with other networks (this is where peering comes in, see the recent stories about netflix peering problems).
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Re: Re: Geo-restrictions on the internet
The infrastructure of the internet is (of course) owned by different countries, but the core design of the internet don't support separation by countries the way you suppose.
You don't normally know or have control over the route of the packets you send and receive, it can cross multiple countries on it's way without affected by the fact (apart from apparently certain countries like to sniff everything...). It's not like you travel by car from Germany to Russia.
If you want your network to be part of the internet, you must have to adhere to certain rules, and these rules and organizations should be independent from any country.
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VPN's
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Re: VPN's
Then you would be a terrorist
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They're just giving me another reason to become a pirate.
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Regards,
~MPAA/RIAA/MafiAA
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Once things settled down, he literally couldn't come up with a reason why accessing a US Netflix account was any different to importing NTSC VHS tapes, region 1 DVDs or region A Blus. Apart from vague notion of "entitlement", nobody seems to come up with any argument other than "if the studios don't want you to buy it, don't buy it", which sits rather uncomfortably with the "we're losing money because people don't buy our stuff" arguments. Actively spending money to prevent people from paying for content they otherwise cannot legally access does seem rather counter-productive.
But hey, now that the argument seems to be switching from people only getting things for free to people not spending their money in the right location, there seems to be some progress. Sadly, as ever, the answer is "fix your outdated business model that depends on market factors that no longer exist" - something that seems to take a decade to get across among all the lies.
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Aus bandwidth
Given how much media Netflix would be exposing to Aussies for the first time, and the lack of any serious competitors, the market penetration for an official launch there would be huge. Adding something like 30%+ of additional traffic to US-based servers for streaming would rapidly bring the Oceanic ISP's to their knees.
I couldn't even place a guesstimate number on what Netflix would have to pay to offer any kind of reasonable quality of service in that environment, not even counting the new licensing deals for regional content that would have to be sorted out.
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Re: Aus bandwidth
So I'm probably gonna get a VPN and Netflix.
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Large companies want the benefits of an open world economy, moving production freely to optimize costs. But they don't want their customers to have the have same freedom to buy where the prices are lower, or the selection is better.
In this case the media companies want to buy their content on the worldwide market, while restricting their customers from doing the same. They want the government to effectively grant them a distribution monopoly.
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_______________________
Well said. That's what it comes down to.
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However now a new business friendly LNP Federal government is is control we have been warned that GST may well be added onto these
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Sledge hammer
Ok, the internet was not invented to make your business models make money for you. No it was designed to allow people to communicate. There was no thought about security, DRM, geo location, profits for record companies or film distribution. It was about allowing people to communicate with each other. And since it wasn't designed to do what you want it to do, you want to destroy it! Is this correct?
Why can't you guys create your own network called the entertainment network cable and charge people tons of money to access your network. I'm sure everyone will subscribe. Make it so consumers have no control over the content. Don't allow consumers to record or time shift or place shift. Make sure to raise rates every 6 months and block programming every time there is a dispute over money. Now that will be popular. But stay the f--- away from our network!
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Re: Sledge hammer
These people just produce entertainment yet they have the power to dictate to governments and write laws.
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Interesting point... Guess which paper News Limited (majority owner of Foxtel) and e Aussie Rupert Murdoch owns..
go on guess.. I'll give you a hint.. it's in italics above!
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The cheapest package is $49/month and the most expensive being $124. For the price you pay the content is not great and riddled with advertising. Quickflix, netflix's competitor in Australia is mostly a postal dvd service and has very little streaming content. They charge $9.99/month for a streaming only plan *but* You also have to pay extra for the latest content. For example Walking dead season 4 $42.99. high speed internet for homes is vehemently opposed my media corporations and liberal government reps due to the threat to the profit margins they pose.
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Pirates!
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But if there is one thing that content producers need to accept as something that is completely true and completely out of their control, it's this: geographical restrictions of any kind are dead. People don't just talk about TV shows and movies around the water cooler in their offce anymore. The true fans, the superfans, the fans who will buy all your DVD box sets and t-shirts and posters and will go to the conventions, the fans that, as a content producer, you desperately want to attract, are online talking to other superfans in other countries. And if you think the superfans in Australia are going to wait six months to watch the episode that all their American friends online watched last night and are talking about, you're badly mistaken. If you don't make it available to them through legal channels, they will find other ways to get it.
And they don't care what the reasons for the delay are. They don't care that back in the 90s, you signed exclusive distribution deals with some Australian TV networks because that made sense at the time and those TV networks haven't got around to making the material available yet. They don't care that you have a marketing plan that depends on staggered releases. They don't care what your excuse is. All they know is that there is something out there that they want to watch, they're willing to pay you to watch it, and you're not giving them that option. So they're going to take the other option.
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2) Why should anyone but the studios feel the need to help the studios? Netflix isn't an employee of the ones complaining(no matter how much the one's whining think or claim otherwise), why should they screw over their own customers just to appease those too stupid to make available what people are clearly willing to pay for if it's made available to them?
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Go on, list those services in Australia. See how purely we are catered to. See how much extra it costs us to receive a fraction of the service.
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If you ever wonder why people think you're a clueless moron with no concept of the facts you're trying to argue - here it is. Go away, do 5 minutes of research into what VPNs are and how they're used in business, then try to deal with facts. I know real facts are more difficult than the AC fantasies, but there it is.
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That's hilarious in it's wrongness. In addition to the uses the other commenters have cited, I use my workplace VPN every single day. They require it to help keep their intranet secure.
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I know this because I had to install a program on my website a few years ago to keep out one persistent and troublesome user who would not get the message that he was not welcome on my web site.
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If Netflix chooses to block proxies, VPNs, and the like, I think that is the way they will do it. All you need is a Windows Server, and Apache web server software, and PHP, and you are good to go.
Netflix would have to switch to Windows servers, since the setup is designed to run on Windows servers, and not Linux or Unix, as Apache is a Windows product.
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It wouldn't matter if it cost them nothing at all to block all VPN users from their service, the point remains, doing so is stopping people who want to pay them from doing so, and intentionally driving away customers and potential customers is never a smart business plan.
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Errr, no, it's not. Apache is the most popular web server in the nonwindows world. It is multiplatform, but originated in the Unices, not Windows.
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Are you stupid, or do you just like to lie?
I can't think of any other reason why someone would claim this kind of totally idiotic, totally wrong "fact".
For the clueless: Apache is a free, open source piece of software developed by the Apache Foundation, is totally cross-platform and is one of the most popular solutions for Linux and UNIX web servers. While it does also run on Windows, you'd have to be particularly ill-informed to think it was a Windows technology.
Perhaps you're thinking of IIS, Microsoft's own web server technology. However, your utterly incorrect claim places doubt on anything else you say, especially since you claim to host web sites yourself. Perhaps you should educate yourself before claiming to know more than others.
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Studios: We don't want your money, you filthy pirates!
-Later-
Studios to politicians/'employees': Despite all we've done, all the laws we've bought, people still refuse to pay us the exorbitant prices we demand. Not only that, in the places where we don't offer our product for sale at all, we're losing literally billions of dollars each year due to people pirating our products.
Politician: I thought you said you aren't offering the products for sale in those areas, how can you lose money from piracy when you were never going to make a sale in the first place due to your decision not sell there?
Studio rep: Here's a five grand 'campaign contribution', now what were you saying?
Politician: Like I was saying, obviously those filthy pirates are costing you billions each year, which can only be stopped by more and harsher laws introduced here, and then crammed down the throats of the other countries.
Studio rep: Better.
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If the world thought that the Thatcher parties were big, just wait until this old fossil goes!
Funnily enough Rupert hates the publicly funded BBC yet bought up the Australian broadcast rights to most of their shows, but then he only did that to stop the local publicly funded ABC to broadcast them after a 50? year run.
He so reminds me of greedy Daffy Duck, - it's mine, mine, mine, all mine.
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As far as "parties" go, wait until the day Dianne Feinstein goes. I have the Fifth Element cover of "Ding Dong the Witch is dead", ready to play on my online radio station when that happens. When Feinstein goes, the parties will be bigger than those of Murdoch or Thatcher will be.
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ACA
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Australian Competition and Consumer Commission
http://www.choice.com.au/reviews-and-tests/computers-and-online/networking-and-internet/shopp ing-online/navigating-online-geoblocks.aspx
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When the court legalised abortion, they bascially said that that there is a constitutional right to privacy, and that applies to just about anything.
So Roe v. Wade would likely have the unintended effect of making any law against proxies, VPNs, or other privacy tools, unconstitutional.
Of course the IP chapters of TPP, ACTA, TAFTA, and the like are all designed to override the constitution, which is why we will likely see VPNs and other privacy tools outlawed after TPP comes into force.
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Nor do they need to, technically we (I'm in Australia) have parallel import laws with the US, meaning we are within our rights to get content from the states instead of local prividers. If anything the geo-blocking should be illegal as it prevents "parallel import".
Our top consumer group actually recomended the use of VPN to get around this sort of geo-blocking. This is all just a case of some-one not wanting to compete, so demanding that the competition be removed.
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So somehow a CEO from a _competing_ company gets to set the terms for how Netflix is _allowed_ to serve the Australian market? Entitlement much?
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When I had to move last year due to bed bugs, and did not have internet right way, I used my VPN subscription to bypass their tethering block that is in the phone, rather than at the network level.
The only problem with that was that I could not use my Netflix subscription, since none of the VPN providers I was using, had US-based servers. All this NSA spying business has some VPN providers spooked, to where they have pulled their U.S. servers.
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I'd like a citation for this claim.
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http://www.purevpn.com/vpn-service/vpn_for_mmorpg.php
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http://www.purevpn.com/vpn-service/vpn-for-hulu-netflix-online-streaming.php
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The Last Word
“Large companies want the benefits of an open world economy, moving production freely to optimize costs. But they don't want their customers to have the have same freedom to buy where the prices are lower, or the selection is better.
In this case the media companies want to buy their content on the worldwide market, while restricting their customers from doing the same. They want the government to effectively grant them a distribution monopoly.