Netflix to crack down on VPN streaming...

[Cavesa]

I am all for intellectual property being protected by reasonable laws. The laws as they are applied these days are not reasonable.

It is not theft, if I have no way to buy something just because I live in a second rate country. It is discrimination. The choice is to be a neanderthal or to pirate. Or am I supposed to buy a paper book, wait for the copy (often damaged before being packed, it has happened to me repeatedly) to arrive, and then retype it into computer to have an ebook? It also cannot be considered theft and judged the way it sometimes is being judged, because vast majority of the people watching a pirated copy would not buy the DVD or go to the cinema. Much less profit is being "stolen" than the system claims. And they wouldn't buy the DVD not because it costs money. Because DVD's do not belong to 2018, they wouldn't buy punched cards either.

I am all for intellectual property for a reasonable amount of time, without changes to the laws being retroactive, without companies that use 90% of the money for their profit taking basically taxes for use of works even by authors not wishing to be represented by them and for orphan works.

Yes, it is about the distribution rights and those are wrong. A global company should have global access. Or at the very least, EU should start finally fulfilling the promises, and make one digital market for all (I highly doubt the Germans or Brits have just as bad Netflix as we do). Following their logic, I cannot view legally the new Ministerio del Tiempo on rtve.es, because they sold the rights to Netflix, but I highly doubt I can watch it on the stupid Czech Netflix. I am to pretend it's 2001 and buy a DVD, really?

I would have stayed similar to most czechs, if it wasn't for piracy. With trashy education (you cannot imagine the differences between people settling for the Czech stuff and the ones trying to incorporate the international sources too), bad knowledge of one language at most (tv series are the key to success, not overestimated teachers), and with horrible opinions. I would love to pay for the content now, but I am not allowed to.

And I am angry at the EU for still keeping the market divided and expecting me to either settle for ancient devices like DVDs, or to limit myself to what content do the stupid czech providers buy rights to and sell damaged by the Czech translation.

Give me access to the global culture, education, and entertainment, and I will have fewer reasons to get out of this stupid country. I am culturally not Czech, and I simply want what the EU has been promising. One market with equal rights for the customers. Until then, it is hypocrisy to fight against piracy.

[Tucuruvi-Jabaquara]

Many providers restrict regional preference according to the country where your credit/debit card is issued in.
Not in a million years, VPN would be useful when watching in Brazil...

[cathrynm]

Oh yeah, for me I had a glorious week where somehow I was able to watch some animated movies in Finnish with native subtitles on Netflix, and then they must have caught me. They make me a criminal for wanting to get the Finnish dubs for movies here in the USA.

And I would just say -- the whole thing makes no sense at all. I discovered, that at least some of the big 3D animated releases, maybe all of them, have excellent Finnish dubs. I can't believe there's any legal rights issue watching the Finnish dub of 'The Bee Movie' the USA? Where's the legal rights issue here?

[cathrynm]

VPN is otherwise, pretty useful for other, non-Netflix Finnish TV, as the sites I go to are blocked, but don't seem to block VPN as of yet. The trick is you need to clear your DNS cache before going to the sites.

[Cainntear]

I can't believe there's any legal rights issue watching the Finnish dub of 'The Bee Movie' the USA? Where's the legal rights issue here?

Why not? The original work is in English, and the people involved are paid. The someone else makes the Finnish translation, and then they get paid from a share of the profits in the Finnish-speaking market. Netflix USA paid the US distributor, and they didn't pay for the Finnish dub.

Not only that, but localised versions often have different video tracks -- aside from titles and credits, there are minor edits made to satisfy local censors or classification boards. This not only means that multiple languages means massively more server space, but now you've got to put your film back through the certification process as it is not the same edit.

And all that for what...? a couple of dozen customers? It doesn't make any commercial sense.

[Cainntear]

It is not theft, if I have no way to buy something just because I live in a second rate country. It is discrimination.

While I have sympathy with your main point, you still have no automatic right to be able to buy whatever you want -- people are allowed to refuse to offer goods for sale.

It also cannot be considered theft and judged the way it sometimes is being judged, because vast majority of the people watching a pirated copy would not buy the DVD or go to the cinema. Much less profit is being "stolen" than the system claims.

I'm sorry, but that's a spurious argument. Everyone has a choice between watching or not. If I'm going to watch, I should pay. If I'm not willing to pay, do I really want to watch it?

Yes, it is about the distribution rights and those are wrong. A global company should have global access.

The film and TV industry is not global, and Netflix licenses its material from them..

Or at the very least, EU should start finally fulfilling the promises, and make one digital market for all (I highly doubt the Germans or Brits have just as bad Netflix as we do).

I agree with this part wholeheartedly.

[Cainntear]

P.S. This is not to say I never kid myself on and break the rules myself...

[Cavesa]

I think you don't get the main point. It is about discrimination. Imagine you were offered only coffe cups with a hole instead of normal ones just because of your address. Of course you would be willing to pay for a normal product, just not allwed to. Would you try to get a normal one any way possible or just shrug like "well, it is my fault to live in a bad place, I deserve to have hot coffee all over me all the time".

But I understand why people from the better countries see it differently. The priviledge.

It is not theft, if I have no way to buy something just because I live in a second rate country. It is discrimination.

While I have sympathy with your main point, you still have no automatic right to be able to buy whatever you want -- people are allowed to refuse to offer goods for sale.

Of course. And when they refuse to sell some people based on nationality, it is called discrimination and most countries actively fight against that. You cannot just refuse to make someone a coffee just because they are from a certain country, can you?

It also cannot be considered theft and judged the way it sometimes is being judged, because vast majority of the people watching a pirated copy would not buy the DVD or go to the cinema. Much less profit is being "stolen" than the system claims.

I'm sorry, but that's a spurious argument. Everyone has a choice between watching or not. If I'm going to watch, I should pay. If I'm not willing to pay, do I really want to watch it?

This is the normal argument that the advocates of people prosecuted for streaming use and with success. You cannot assume that the people would have paid for the product and not chosen not to watch. It's like thinking that people with a library card would have otherwise bought all the books. Of course not. They would choose not to buy the stuff, and as a byproduct be much stupider.

And the thing with VPN and the geoblocking: I would LOVE to pay! , and many others would. Just in the language I want! And that is normal. Actually avoiding a damaged version (=dubbing) is one of the main reason why people download or stream movies. Because a paying customer has fewer rights and worse quality of service (the stupid dvd, the languages, the unskippable annoying warning ads against piracy).

That's all I want. Treat me equally. The same quality of service for the same serive. There is absolutely no real reason, why allowing me to pay would bring additional costs to the provider, the internet is worldwide.

Yes, it is about the distribution rights and those are wrong. A global company should have global access.

The film and TV industry is not global, and Netflix licenses its material from them..

Or at the very least, EU should start finally fulfilling the promises, and make one digital market for all (I highly doubt the Germans or Brits have just as bad Netflix as we do).

I agree with this part wholeheartedly.

But that is the problem, that the tv industry pretends not to be global only in some cases. The dubbed versions of the Hollywood movies are global, the spoilers on the internet are global, the internet is global, that's what this century is about. We get all the problems of globalisation, so let us all profit from it as well. Also, the tv and film industry doesn't mind my money from a foreign country, when I buy the products damaged with an unwanted translation, but they don't want my money for a better service?

EU is the best start, if it finally starts working. One digital market and also many other unifications of it.

[Xmmm]

I think you don't get the main point. It is about discrimination. Imagine you were offered only coffe cups with a hole instead of normal ones just because of your address. Of course you would be willing to pay for a normal product, just not allwed to. Would you try to get a normal one any way possible or just shrug like "well, it is my fault to live in a bad place, I deserve to have hot coffee all over me all the time".

But I understand why people from the better countries see it differently. The priviledge.

Yeah, it's all about the privilege.

First Channel in Russia geo-blocks me massively. I can watch their documentaries but none of their dramatic series or films. RAI out of Italy geo-blocks me the same way.

So I watch second-tier Russian stuff on youtube and Netflix originals dubbed into Italian. Somehow, I'm still alive.

[golyplot]

I do wish that media companies would get their heads out of their asses when it comes to licensing and foreign works. But foreign language learners are a small slice of the market, so they have no incentive to do things properly. Still things are a lot better than they used to be at least.

By the way, the argument about server space doesn't make sense, because Netflix already has to store the foreign versions of everything on their servers somewhere since they are a global company. They just either can't or won't make them available in "unintended" markets.

P.S. Sometimes the differences between markets are not so subtle. For example, Netflix released a Chinese movie, The Guardian Brothers, in the US. But from what I've read, the American version is 40 minutes shorter than the original Chinese version. I'm sure at least part of the Chinese diaspora would have been interested in watching the original movie.