Hulu Blocks International Access Via Witopia 256
An anonymous reader notes, and excerpts from, an article at PC Authority: "It's human nature that people always want what they can't have — which is why there's so much interest around the world in accessing the US-only Hulu site. Hulu offers a range of television shows for streaming, including Family Guy, The Daily Show and House along with a few full length movies. ... If you're outside the US, the easiest method for accessing Hulu that many people are discussing online, is using a US-based VPN, which tricks Hulu into thinking their computer is within the US. Initially Hulu started cracking down on free VPN services such as Hotspot Shield, but now it's turned its attention to Witopia — which costs $40 or $US60 per year but offers a faster, more secure and more reliable service than its free competitors. Initially Witopia's LA gateway remained unaffected, but now Hulu has blocked this as well."
Re:So much (Score:2, Interesting)
Well actually it does, it's just that media corporations aren't getting the message. They fought tooth and nail to maintain their control at every step in the advancement of media technology. The problem is that there are no technical limitations preventing these shows from going global, it's purely limited by the media corporations' need for control over their media. People can still access these shows through other means, they jsut aren't legal means. Which is really too bad; the media companies had an opportunity to expand the reach of their media to a world-wide audience and they can't think past their fears of piracy and supposedly low revenue opportunity from doing so.
Re:"But if you don't want our money, fine" (Score:5, Interesting)
What about just advertising the brand? If IP = US ad for McDonald's new heart attack burger. If IP != US, then just a general ad for McDonalds.
Or you can advertise products that people would never buy. For example, on CNN I see ads for Boeing all the time. I am not in the market for a new 787, and I bet that 99.9999996% of the viewers are not as well.
Re:How it probably works... (Score:5, Interesting)
Ads can be targetted based on IP. If your IP isn't hidden behind a VPN, that is.
I'm starting to wonder when the content industry will realize that their competition in the form of piracy is higher quality, free, and easier to use.
Re:Dear content producers... (Score:4, Interesting)
I don't understand how "region coding" and "region blocking" has survived this long. It is *inherently* anti-globalization and is probably the poster child example of how "globalization" is really a crock of shit designed only to benefit multi-national corporations and NOT the consumer.
More complex than that (Score:3, Interesting)
On a side note, I find totally rubbish the laws about forcing dubbing and subbing, and if Hulu was available in France/Germany, I would use it instead of tpb. But right now I don't have a choice, and it just piss me off.
Re:"But if you don't want our money, fine" (Score:3, Interesting)
Or ... they could just use the same geolocation they use to block IPs outside the US to serve location aware advertising. Don't serve the US add to China. Amazon would probably be more than happy to have its ads served in China though.
They are already using the tech, wouldn't take much effort to support it really.
SOCKS proxy to USA VPS doesn't work for me (Score:3, Interesting)
A few weeks back I purchased a VPS server for the purpose of watching Hulu. I tunneled all my traffic by using SOCKS and many services clearly thought I was in the USA except Hulu.
Hulu seems to be doing client side checks, checking your Locale/time settings I suspect.
I am in Brisbane, QLD, Australia and I belive my VPS was in a Houston datacenter in Texas USA.
Re:Dear content producers... (Score:2, Interesting)
- Can advertisements about Double Whoppers have any value to Europeans or Japanese?
- How about advertising about Bank of America?
- Or the new Chevy Volt?
Hulu's advertisements are aimed towards a specific audience - Americans. They have zero interest in advertising to other areas of the world, because Hulu has nothing to gain from it. Therefore Hulu cuts-off those regions where they have nothing to gain, and you would probably do the same if you owned that business.
You think Europeans don't have Burger King? I'm not a Whopper fan myself, but we can certainly buy them on every bloody street corner. Chevy's might not interest us, but other manufacturers that do sell in both countries (Toyota, Honda, BMW etc.) will find customers on both sides of all the ponds. Bank of America, maybe not. But I'm sure there are international financial institutions that would jump at the chance of a wider audience for little or no extra overhead.
Hulu would have to be massively short-sighted to ignore the potential of foreign markets, especially considering their service is one that can cross territorial boundaries with a minimum of hassle (obviously not none due to licensing, but at least Customs doesn't give a shit).