shk292:
charliebrownnz:
For me to get the breadth of content as netflix us I would have to buy Sky, Lightbox and Quickflicks - which is a huge price increase over netflix US, plus the actual value add they offer is quite low compared to Netflix. And forcibily segmenting the market along geographic lines using artificial boundaries like that is terrible and unethical - and its obvious plenty of people agree with me given the incredibly high rates of piracy or use of unblocking methods that are used. That is one reason why the grey market around unblocking content like this is so huge, and one reason why a huge number of people think piracy is OK.
I'm not too certain of the contractual terms netflix has with the content providers are but I would be surprized if it is just a static dollar amount - so it may not be at zero incremental cost. And regardless - the only way we are going to be able to get a fair service is if we use these methods to make the current model unappealing for content providers by making a fairer model more profitable.
Lets think of this in terms of physical goods, a dvd retailer in Auckland wouldn't be allowed to charge $20 for a cd to an aucklander that walks through the door and then ask for $25 for that same cd to a Hamiltonian queued behind the aucklander - if its not illegal, it would certainly be unethical. The internet has no physical location, so your analogy of two seperate supermarkets is a swing and a miss.
Exactly what he said. If the rights licensing model in use doesn't support selling cross-boundary, and can't extract revenue based on the number of viewers, then it's time to change the model.
How stupid would it be if Pak'n'Save had exclusive rights to sell Heinz, while Countdown had exclusive rights to sell Watties, and grey-importing Heinz sauce was deemed (by some) to be illegal?
The current model is nonsense and we as consumers need to say "No, you're not shafting me just because I happen to live in NZ"
I'm happy to pay UK/US Netflix subs (I currently pay UK rates) and I'm even happy to pay NZ GST. But I'm not going to pay for a 3rd rate NZ service just because they bought "exclusive" rights to some material.
Supermarkets do have exclusive lines - and some on the basis that the price that the supermarket is willing to pay is unacceptable to the supplier. If, using your example, Countdown had exclusive rights to Watties based on the fact that Heinz refused to supply Countdown would Heinz be within its rights to prevent Countdown from importing and selling Heinz products. No. Because its a PHYSICAL GOOD and parallel importing of physical goods is legislated. Intellectual property rights, ie non-physical goods, have not been legally tested to affirm that they may be parallel imported. For some strange reason Netflix is not saying "test me, go on, test me in a court of law". Instead it is enforcing its terms and conditions - out of some unknown moral or ethical or ?legal? reason. Go figure.