5 ms·

I am 25 years old. I have never paid for cable and I have numerous shows that I enjoy. I would GLADLY pay to watch some of my favourite shows, Game of Thrones i

I am 25 years old. I have never paid for cable and I have numerous shows that I enjoy. I would GLADLY pay to watch some of my favourite shows, Game of Thrones included. However, as I currently reside in Canada, I can't even watch Hulu - Netflix Canada sucks. I have money; your show is not attainable through monetary means and I will not purchase cable. What is a fella to do? You do not like the answer.

reginaldo 14y ago
Rent a cheap VPS with a provider in the US and install openvpn on it. You can actually get one of those for 5 USD/month. Find them here: http://www.lowendbox.com/ http://www.lowendbox.com/.
- mattwdelong 14y ago
  Actually, I own a server in the US and have the means to set up a VPS. The point I am trying to make is that I shouldn't have to take 10 steps to watch my favourite shows. It should be a two step process. Pay -> Watch. Easy.
  - reginaldo 14y ago
    Oh yes. I agree. And I have suffered to set up an american PayPal account just so I could pay for media services which restrict access based on where your PayPal account is (IMHO, they should not even be able to get this information, but I digress). Then PayPal found out and basically blocked my account, along with the little amount of funds it had. It is just crazy how many conditions they impose instead of just taking my money, then complain when people who are less patient than me just go ahead and pirate the damn thing.
  - ahelwer 14y ago
    If you want it to be that easy, iTunes works well (I live in Canada). Purchasing a single tv show or movie is the same price as a few months of Netflix, though.
  - zanny 14y ago
    Pay -> Watch replaces hundreds of network heads getting tremendous managerial salaries with a few web developers. Not easy, because the people who make the calls are the ones who no longer have purpose in the business, and thus they are trying to bring everyone else down on their sinking ship.
    - w1ntermute 14y ago
      The only real solution is for companies like Netflix to fund the development of shows themselves. Until the IP is in Netflix's hands, things will never change. But once the people actually making the shows see that Netflix is a viable avenue for their content, a sea change will begin.
      - thirdsun 14y ago
        Well, I'm excited about the upcoming Netflix-exclusive Arrested Development season. There's a huge fanbase and it should be a good indicator for how successful an approach like this can be. On the other hand, I'm from germany and that, of course, means that I'll will have to get the show from somewhere else.
        rapind 14y ago
        Lilyhammer was actually pretty decent. I think a second season is already in the works too. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lilyhammer http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lilyhammer
      - zanny 14y ago
        If actors could organize, we could easily see a transition to kick-starter like funding of film and television productions (fund per episode?) that when funded is just publicly distributed via torrents. Absolutely 0 middle men, no costs of distribution at all (unless you count the guy who pays for an internet connection to do the first bout of seeding the episode) and it properly fits into how the pay per unit model fails in digital media.
mpat 14y ago
I don't buy bread. I have sandwiches that I would like to make, but I can't eat a whole loaf before it goes bad, so I don't buy it. I would gladly buy half a loaf, but my grocery store doesn't sell half loaves. If they won't make a half loaf to suit my needs and what I want to pay, I should just be able to steal whole loaves?
- kondro 14y ago
  Except for virtual products this analogy always falls down. Ultimately, the issue here is that content producers don't have simultaneous releases of this content online (for a worldwide standardised fee) because they don't want to. Selling and delivering a virtual product in Australia doesn't cost significantly more than it does in the USA.
- mattwdelong 14y ago
  Literally comparing apples and oranges. More like; I buy a loaf of bread and I am never around to eat it. The whole loaf goes mouldy so I don't buy it. My friend gives me a piece of bread when I want it at 12 am, I would GLADLY pay for it but he doesn't accept money and he only complains.
  - cookiecaper 14y ago
    Actually he is literally comparing bread to piracy. It would be a literal comparison to apples and oranges if he had, literally, compared apples and oranges. "Literal" means "just as the text says it", not "definitely". "Literal" means it is exactly as it is written, it is not an exaggeration, expression, allegory, or analogy; it LITERALLY happened, meaning it happened EXACTLY AS WRITTEN. You probably meant "definitely" or "certainly" comparing "apples to oranges". It's an expression, it's not literal unless he LITERALLY was comparing apples and oranges, where an apple is a fruit from an apple tree, and an orange is a fruit from an orange tree. Such a comparison may sound like "most apples are red and fat around the middle, most oranges are orange and evenly round".
    - Lockyy 14y ago
MCompeau 14y ago
Exactly the same situation here. I can't consume media "legitimately" in many circumstances even if I wanted to thanks to arbitrary restrictions regarding regions and DRM.
randomdata 14y ago
The problem in Canada is that Bell Media owns the Canadian distribution rights to many of the popular programs that aren't already available via services like Netflix. Even if everyone in the USA agrees with you, Bell won't. They have far too much money invested in TV broadcasting technologies, and too little tied up in Internet infrastructure. There's no real upside to them providing you the content online, because not only will they'll lose their broadcasting revenue, but you'll fill up their oversubscribed tubes, making their internet services more costly to operate. A token fee for the program isn't going to offset that.
- chii 14y ago
  And basically, people who would've otherwise paid that "token fee" instead pirates. The tubes get clogged up either way (after all, if they oversubscribe capacity, it will come back to bite them one way or another). All i m saying, and i think most people agree, is that their cost/benefit/profit analysis of the situation hinges on the false assumption that consumers have no way of obtaining the content in their own way (via piracy or waht not). and this is increasingly not the case.
  - randomdata 14y ago
    Very true, but they can get away with tricks like throttling and caps for illegitimate activities. There will always be some pirates no matter what, but most people are way too busy to concern themselves with jumping through all the hoops. It doesn't matter if the pirate would have given you $10 for content when you made $30 off the person who didn't pirate your content. I do agree that the time will eventually come, but it is wholly up to the consumers. So long as we continue to fund the TV infrastructure in a big way, there is no incentive for the business to change.
calyth 14y ago
Wait until you're a Canadian that like some American content, but you're physically outside of North America. e.g. I like Mythbusters, and like to watch their latest episodes sans Ads at HD, in Hong Kong. I would pay something like $5USD to access Discovery. The reverse case also happens, Lots of Chinese Canadians would like to see HK soap opera in a timely manner, but they'd need a VPN to get around to the location detection, and still put up with a bunch of ads with sub-par resolution. Again, I think they would pay $5-10 a month for that type of access. Instead, most pay through the nose through Shaw for a "local" chinese channel, where the shows that they want to watch is at minimum half a year behind. Make it simple. A guy with a valid, paying credit card gets to see the shows they want, from whichever channel they want. Those channel will make money.

reginaldo 14y ago

Rent a cheap VPS with a provider in the US and install openvpn on it. You can actually get one of those for 5 USD/month. Find them here: http://www.lowendbox.com/ http://www.lowendbox.com/.

mattwdelong 14y ago
Actually, I own a server in the US and have the means to set up a VPS. The point I am trying to make is that I shouldn't have to take 10 steps to watch my favourite shows. It should be a two step process. Pay -> Watch. Easy.
- reginaldo 14y ago
  Oh yes. I agree. And I have suffered to set up an american PayPal account just so I could pay for media services which restrict access based on where your PayPal account is (IMHO, they should not even be able to get this information, but I digress). Then PayPal found out and basically blocked my account, along with the little amount of funds it had. It is just crazy how many conditions they impose instead of just taking my money, then complain when people who are less patient than me just go ahead and pirate the damn thing.
- ahelwer 14y ago
  If you want it to be that easy, iTunes works well (I live in Canada). Purchasing a single tv show or movie is the same price as a few months of Netflix, though.
- zanny 14y ago
  Pay -> Watch replaces hundreds of network heads getting tremendous managerial salaries with a few web developers. Not easy, because the people who make the calls are the ones who no longer have purpose in the business, and thus they are trying to bring everyone else down on their sinking ship.
  - w1ntermute 14y ago
    The only real solution is for companies like Netflix to fund the development of shows themselves. Until the IP is in Netflix's hands, things will never change. But once the people actually making the shows see that Netflix is a viable avenue for their content, a sea change will begin.
    - thirdsun 14y ago
      Well, I'm excited about the upcoming Netflix-exclusive Arrested Development season. There's a huge fanbase and it should be a good indicator for how successful an approach like this can be. On the other hand, I'm from germany and that, of course, means that I'll will have to get the show from somewhere else.
      - rapind 14y ago
        Lilyhammer was actually pretty decent. I think a second season is already in the works too. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lilyhammer http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lilyhammer
    - zanny 14y ago
      If actors could organize, we could easily see a transition to kick-starter like funding of film and television productions (fund per episode?) that when funded is just publicly distributed via torrents. Absolutely 0 middle men, no costs of distribution at all (unless you count the guy who pays for an internet connection to do the first bout of seeding the episode) and it properly fits into how the pay per unit model fails in digital media.

mpat 14y ago

I don't buy bread. I have sandwiches that I would like to make, but I can't eat a whole loaf before it goes bad, so I don't buy it. I would gladly buy half a loaf, but my grocery store doesn't sell half loaves. If they won't make a half loaf to suit my needs and what I want to pay, I should just be able to steal whole loaves?

kondro 14y ago
Except for virtual products this analogy always falls down. Ultimately, the issue here is that content producers don't have simultaneous releases of this content online (for a worldwide standardised fee) because they don't want to. Selling and delivering a virtual product in Australia doesn't cost significantly more than it does in the USA.
mattwdelong 14y ago
Literally comparing apples and oranges. More like; I buy a loaf of bread and I am never around to eat it. The whole loaf goes mouldy so I don't buy it. My friend gives me a piece of bread when I want it at 12 am, I would GLADLY pay for it but he doesn't accept money and he only complains.
- cookiecaper 14y ago
  Actually he is literally comparing bread to piracy. It would be a literal comparison to apples and oranges if he had, literally, compared apples and oranges. "Literal" means "just as the text says it", not "definitely". "Literal" means it is exactly as it is written, it is not an exaggeration, expression, allegory, or analogy; it LITERALLY happened, meaning it happened EXACTLY AS WRITTEN. You probably meant "definitely" or "certainly" comparing "apples to oranges". It's an expression, it's not literal unless he LITERALLY was comparing apples and oranges, where an apple is a fruit from an apple tree, and an orange is a fruit from an orange tree. Such a comparison may sound like "most apples are red and fat around the middle, most oranges are orange and evenly round".
  - Lockyy 14y ago

MCompeau 14y ago

Exactly the same situation here. I can't consume media "legitimately" in many circumstances even if I wanted to thanks to arbitrary restrictions regarding regions and DRM.

randomdata 14y ago

The problem in Canada is that Bell Media owns the Canadian distribution rights to many of the popular programs that aren't already available via services like Netflix. Even if everyone in the USA agrees with you, Bell won't. They have far too much money invested in TV broadcasting technologies, and too little tied up in Internet infrastructure. There's no real upside to them providing you the content online, because not only will they'll lose their broadcasting revenue, but you'll fill up their oversubscribed tubes, making their internet services more costly to operate. A token fee for the program isn't going to offset that.

chii 14y ago
And basically, people who would've otherwise paid that "token fee" instead pirates. The tubes get clogged up either way (after all, if they oversubscribe capacity, it will come back to bite them one way or another). All i m saying, and i think most people agree, is that their cost/benefit/profit analysis of the situation hinges on the false assumption that consumers have no way of obtaining the content in their own way (via piracy or waht not). and this is increasingly not the case.
- randomdata 14y ago
  Very true, but they can get away with tricks like throttling and caps for illegitimate activities. There will always be some pirates no matter what, but most people are way too busy to concern themselves with jumping through all the hoops. It doesn't matter if the pirate would have given you $10 for content when you made $30 off the person who didn't pirate your content. I do agree that the time will eventually come, but it is wholly up to the consumers. So long as we continue to fund the TV infrastructure in a big way, there is no incentive for the business to change.

calyth 14y ago

Wait until you're a Canadian that like some American content, but you're physically outside of North America. e.g. I like Mythbusters, and like to watch their latest episodes sans Ads at HD, in Hong Kong. I would pay something like $5USD to access Discovery. The reverse case also happens, Lots of Chinese Canadians would like to see HK soap opera in a timely manner, but they'd need a VPN to get around to the location detection, and still put up with a bunch of ads with sub-par resolution. Again, I think they would pay $5-10 a month for that type of access. Instead, most pay through the nose through Shaw for a "local" chinese channel, where the shows that they want to watch is at minimum half a year behind. Make it simple. A guy with a valid, paying credit card gets to see the shows they want, from whichever channel they want. Those channel will make money.