I as watching US Netflix yesterday - no issues.

AppleTV3, Unotelly DNS on the ATV, Spark ADSL. Nothing blocked on router.

Its a little like when Sky lost EPL. Competition finally. But then you have fragmentation. I still want Sky for the wife and kids, now I have to pay for EPL. In my example, that's globalisation working. But for some, they need services A + B. Others want A,B,C,E and G. If every item  of content is available in every country, thats great. But maybe that creates another issue, as per Pauls reply. A Netflix monopoly would work, but that creates other issues.

But we best not replicate the other thread that has been closed

My main point was that people are clearly willing to pay extra to get the global catalogs. If the content owners were smart, the money going to the geounblockers could go to them instead.

Paul1977:

I know this has been said in this thread 1000 times before, but this really annoys me. I don't use an unblocker to rip anyone off, I use it because there is so much more content on the US Netflix that just simply isn't available here by any other legal means.

All the comments saying this will simply send people back to illegal torrents are 100% correct.

Some customers will keep Netflix and will be stuck with the inferior local catalogs, some customers will cancel the subscription. The end result is the customers lose, Netflix loses, and (depending on how the licensing fees work) the content owners either gain nothing or lose themselves.

If they really want to hold on to their outdated licensing models, they could do it in a win-win way with only small changes to the licencing model:

E.g. Currently I pay $12.99 to Netflix and I guess about $7 to a geounblocker. Netflix could instead give me the option of paying an additional $7 for access to the US catalog (so I pay Netflix $20 total), give $5 of that to the content owners, and keep $2 for themselves. Customer wins, Netflix wins, content owners win. The only losers are the geounblocker companies, but they would lose in a proper global licensing model anyway.

tdgeek:

 

But we best not replicate the other thread that has been closed

 

Agreed.  I don't want to see it become a media lawyers thread like the last one..

old3eyes:

 

tdgeek:

 

But we best not replicate the other thread that has been closed

 

 

 

 

Agreed.  I don't want to see it become a media lawyers thread like the last one..

 

Hee, no.  But I feel MF might be ok if any chat that was about geoblocking was more positive. Such as suggesting options that could work for everybody.

Im sure that even with the side A and side B that was on the other thread, we would all agree that being able to access everything, pay for it, and avoid the hassle

of managing geo issues would be the perfect solution

trig42:

 

I as watching US Netflix yesterday - no issues.

 

AppleTV3, Unotelly DNS on the ATV, Spark ADSL. Nothing blocked on router.

 

We had US Netflix working fine last night, but got a 403: Forbidden error this morning. Similar setup to yours, but the ATV is v4. Pretty sure that auto-updates its apps, so I'm wondering if there was an overnight update with hardcoded DNS entries.

I've not had any time to play around with it yet, but I may have to block the relevant DNS IPs in my router to see if that resolves it. 

Let the game of whack-a-mole commence!

NonprayingMantis: Actually the studios can only win of geoblocking becomes harder to get around.

I disagree. The studioes will lose, as Netflix will lose subscribers and people will go back to illegal torrents; and as a result Netflix will not be willing to pay as much for the rights when they come up for renewal.

NonprayingMantis: When you subscribe to Netflix USA from NZ the studios receive precisely $0 dollars from your subscription. (Netflix doesn't pay on a per-sub basis, they pay on a per-region flat fee basis e.g. Xm for USA rights, Ym for NZ rights etx
So even if 99% of people who use Netflix USA switch to piracy, and 1% switch to, say, iTunes the the studios will receive more money that they previously did.

Which is why some kind of change the the licensing model would be required.

NonprayingMantis: Not only that, but effective geoblocking gives Netflix the incentive to properly bid for rights for NZ in order to sell to NZers. Currently they can not bother doing that because they know people will just use Netflix USA.
So the studios win there too.

I don't believe that a high enough percentage of NZ Netflix users even use, or know what geounblocking is, for this to make it any more likely for Netflix to by additional rights for NZ. Here on Geekzone we all use geounblockers, but the vast majority would not.

NonprayingMantis: Mth at is why the studios are so keen to get Netflix to stand by their contracts - it means more money for them.

They THINK it means more money for them. But as above it will just push the geounblocker users back to illegal torrents, thus making the content rights worth less. While at the same time not making enough difference for it to be worthwhile for Netflix to purchase addional rights for more countries.

The only solution where everybody wins is a change in the licensing model, but the studios are too short sighted and hung up on the old way of doing things to see it.

tdgeek:

 

old3eyes:

 

tdgeek:

 

But we best not replicate the other thread that has been closed

 

 

 

 

Agreed.  I don't want to see it become a media lawyers thread like the last one..

 

 

Hee, no.  But I feel MF might be ok if any chat that was about geoblocking was more positive. Such as suggesting options that could work for everybody.

 

Im sure that even with the side A and side B that was on the other thread, we would all agree that being able to access everything, pay for it, and avoid the hassle

 

of managing geo issues would be the perfect solution

 

Exactly, I'm not particularly interested in discussing the morality or legality of geounblocking.

Paul1977:

 

NonprayingMantis: Actually the studios can only win of geoblocking becomes harder to get around.

 

I disagree. The studioes will lose, as Netflix will lose subscribers and people will go back to illegal torrents; and as a result Netflix will not be willing to pay as much for the rights when they come up for renewal.

NonprayingMantis: When you subscribe to Netflix USA from NZ the studios receive precisely $0 dollars from your subscription. (Netflix doesn't pay on a per-sub basis, they pay on a per-region flat fee basis e.g. Xm for USA rights, Ym for NZ rights etx
So even if 99% of people who use Netflix USA switch to piracy, and 1% switch to, say, iTunes the the studios will receive more money that they previously did.

 

Which why some kind of change the the licensing model would be required.

NonprayingMantis: Not only that, but effective geoblocking gives Netflix the incentive to properly bid for rights for NZ in order to sell to NZers. Currently they can not bother doing that because they know people will just use Netflix USA.
So the studios win there too.

 

I don't believe that a high enough percentage of NZ Netflix users even use, or know what geounblocking is, for this to make it any more likely for Netflix to by additional rights for NZ. Here on Geekzone we all use geounblockers, but the vast majority would not.

NonprayingMantis: Mth at is why the studios are so keen to get Netflix to stand by their contracts - it means more money for them.

 

They THINK it means more money for them. But as above it will just push the geounblocker users back to illegal torrents, thus making the content rights worth less. While at the same time not making enough difference for it to be worthwhile for Netflix to purchase addional rights for more countries.

 

The only solution where everybody wins is a change in the licensing model, but the studios are too short sighted and hung up on the old way of doing things to see it.

 

 

Give us some suggstions in what the business model could be. You need to retain the overall revenue, as ultimately the content owners need to make that money so as to be worthwhile creating new content

And this issue is not the studios. Its almost everyone. Netflix also produce and restrict their own content, as does HBONow. If it was just the top tier doing this, while those underneath (distributors and end users), it would be a lot easier to enact change. Steve Jobs did that to the big boys in music, but in video media it seems everyone plays the same game. Some distributors only distribute so they are adversely affected as well as us, and are negatively affected by end users geoblocking as well

Interesting thing just happened: Netflix app just failed and told me my account was on hold 'due to a problem with my previous payment.' Netflix via browser continues to work just fine (and of course account history shows me that they charged me only a week ago).

SaltyNZ:

 

Interesting thing just happened: Netflix app just failed and told me my account was on hold 'due to a problem with my previous payment.' Netflix via browser continues to work just fine (and of course account history shows me that they charged me only a week ago).

 

Wow that is interesting. I wonder if they've identified a list of geo-unblocker enabled accounts, and have started taking action based on this.

Glad I decided to not use my personal email address for these services, so if I do need to resubscribe, all I'll lose is our watch history :-)

tdgeek:

 

Give us some suggstions in what the business model could be. You need to retain the overall revenue, as ultimately the content owners need to make that money so as to be worthwhile creating new content

 

And this issue is not the studios. Its almost everyone. Netflix also produce and restrict their own content, as does HBONow. If it was just the top tier doing this, while those underneath (distributors and end users), it would be a lot easier to enact change. Steve Jobs did that to the big boys in music, but in video media it seems everyone plays the same game. Some distributors only distribute so they are adversely affected as well as us, and are negatively affected by end users geoblocking as well

 

But Netflix produced content is available globally isn't it? There will always be exclusives between different services (Netflix, Amazon, Hulu, etc), but I feel that is a different topic.

I like my idea of choosing what catalog you want to subscribe to, and having to pay extra if you wish to view it from a foreign IP. That would however essentially do away with companies having exclusive rights in particular countries, but that could be countered by then making those rights cheaper.

e.g. Current model: Netflix pays $10 for US rights to Breaking Bad. Lightbox have exclusive NZ rights and pay $4 for it. Studio gets $14.

New model: Netflix pays $10 for US rights, plus $2 for "extended" US rights (allowing subscribers of US Netflix to stream to non-US IPs), the cost of the "extended" rights is passed directly onto the subscribers who chose to pay extra to stream a foreign catalog. Lightbox now pays $2 for non-exclusive rights. Studio gets $14.

It would obviously be a little more complicated since the "extended" US rights would be a global license so the $2 listed above would just be the percentage from NZ subscribers (this was to illustrate that the studio was getting the same amount of money).