TV downloading, piracy, and region coding.

[SenseOfTumour]

I'm wondering, and I'm sure there's reasons, but I'm just one guy... but why on earth has there not been a worldwide 'Hulu' style site?

Surely it'd be quite simple to log in, stating your location, and then the server could run off, collect a bunch of ads to screen, relevant to your country, and then slot them into the TV shows.

Something like this would quite possibly halve piracy overnight, especially in the UK where the majority of piracy is based around Brits not wanting to wait six months to see the latest 24, Wire, or whatever. Even the Daily Show gets pirated a lot because in the US it's on 5 times a week, and we get a single episode compilation.

Hell, I think a lot of people would happily pay $5 to 'rent' a single view download of the latest movies, if it was simple, and not too locked down in DRM.

I was discussing a few topics in:
http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/18.316494-Music-videos-and-Youtube-and-takedowns-and-pirates-oh-why

but I figured this deserved it's own space rather than confusing the issues over there.

I'm not trying to be entitled, as if things were freed up in this way, there'd be more ad revenue for the companies, and more DVD sales as things were released for sale, and more entertainment available for everyone.

 

[Crazy Zaul]

It would be really useful but I guess the country is too small for it to make any money or surely some1 would have done it.

 

[SenseOfTumour]

It would be really useful but I guess the country is too small for it to make any money or surely some1 would have done it.

I aint so sure, if a country's big enough to have adverts and TV, it's big enough to support this.

We have the BBC iplayer, along with ITV, Five, Sky, and 4onDemand over here, and have you seen the size of the UK?

All it'd take is a little work with the ad companies, to make a batch of ads available for each area.

Then of course, someone to make sure the shows aren't breaking local laws, like the Daily Show not being able to be shown in the UK because they had footage of our Parliament debates.
Yes, America can take the piss, but we can't see it.

 

[Porygon-2000]

Its a lot worse than just the UK, doncha know? In Australia, we can hardly stream anything official from anywhere. No funimation, no Hulu, no BBC, nada. Really, all we have is the ABC iview, which can be temperamental at best. And I don't have a large amount of knowledge about the rest of the world, but I'm fairly sure the selections are similar...

It would be so wonderful if there were a global streaming service, but lawyers will be lawyers, and licensing rights would sink this before it even began

 

[Reaper195]

I have to download TV shows simply because most of them which are into their sixth or whatever season have yet to even start broadcasting in New Zealand. So fuck those against that form of piracy. If I want something and I cannot get it because the legal way makes it unavailable....I'm going to torrent that fucker quicker than it would take to come while shagging Jewel Staite.

 

[CrystalShadow]

Well, if you go on youtube you notice funimation shows Anime in the UK, and several other companies show them in other countries.

But... You also notice the frequency with which you hit the message "sorry, this content is not available in your country."

And... Here we get the real problem.

Now, I'll stick to Anime here, because it's slightly simpler, but I'm sure a similar problem crops up with other shows:

The copyright/licensed distributor is not necessarily the same in each country.

Furthermore, the licence for web streaming is independent for that of Television broadcast.

Take Fullmetal Alchemist, and the remake, fullmetal alchemist:Brotherhood.

The series are of course, Japanese. So the copyright lies with the Japanese companies that created the series.

The english translation of both was done by Funimation. - You would therefore assume that Funimation also has the distribution rights.

Well, as their Youtube stream demonstrates, this is true in the US, and in the UK, they also are allowed to stream the original series.

Yet brotherhood, despite having been dubbed by funimation is distributed by Manga Entertainment if you get it on DVD...
They also have the rights to stream it online in the UK. (Which, unfortunately, they only did 2-3 episodes at a time, unlike funimation which has the whole series online.)

Now, you'd think that's complicated enough right?

Well, if you move over to mainland Europe, a third company, Pannini, has the distribution rights to the series in about a dozen countries (such as italy and sweden).

Oh, and if you're in Australia, the rights belong to Madman Entertainment.




----

What this illustrates is the major problem for anyone wanting to create a world-wide video site.

To stream one Japanese series, in all of maybe 20 countries, you already need to negotiate with 5 different companies.

Now multiply this by all the series, films and shows you might want to stream which undoubtedly have similar issues, and you start to see why this is such a problem...

 

[CrystalShadow]

Its a lot worse than just the UK, doncha know? In Australia, we can hardly stream anything official from anywhere. No funimation, no Hulu, no BBC, nada. Really, all we have is the ABC iview, which can be temperamental at best. And I don't have a large amount of knowledge about the rest of the world, but I'm fairly sure the selections are similar...

It would be so wonderful if there were a global streaming service, but lawyers will be lawyers, and licensing rights would sink this before it even began

Hmm. Don't mean to double-post, but in just researching this for my previous post, check this out:

http://www.madman.com.au/videos/view/1483


And, since I'm not in Australia or New Zealand, it came up with the following notice.

"Sorry Guys, Full Episodes are for Australia & New zealand users only.
if you're from the us we're guessing this might be the first time you've seen a message like this, sorry."

(No, I'm not making that last bit up.)

There's also channel 10, which I used to visit because for a while I could watch Good News Week from here... Until they blocked it to people outside of Australia.

Ah, international licensing.

Anyway, I've found there are often more sources than you'd think. You just have to know where to look, and figure out who actually has the rights in your country.

(As with the Funimation/Manga Entertainment/Madman Entertainment devision that seems to cover a lot of anime - Ironically I've got DVD's here that show these 3 companies all contributed something to it. Being in the UK, my DVD's frequently seem to start with a 'Manga entertaiment' logo, followed by funimation (who did the translation, after all. - nobody is going to translate something just for the UK), and finally, you find the 'Madman entertainment' logo popping up right at the end since they seem to do the DVD menus for most of this stuff...)

 

[Ilikemilkshake]

It would be really useful but I guess the country is too small for it to make any money or surely some1 would have done it.

You realise thats a load of nonsense right?
For one the UK is 4 countries with a total population of about 62 million, England being the largest with 51 million.

The last series of the UK X Factor had average viewing figures of 14.1 million... are you saying that none of these American shows wouldnt kill to have those kind of ratings ontop of their US audience?

Anyway the reason it hasnt been done is because of licencsing and distribution issues but yeah you're right it would be better for everyone if everyone could watch it.

 

[Phishfood]

As far as I can tell the big issue is the licensing, which is the cause of the delay in the first place.

However, I have to wonder if they are really bothered about people pirating TV. All the convictions I hear about are for 6 songs, or for people who have more media pirated than I have seen in my life.

What I would like to see is all the silly restrictions removed from the iplayer etc. Why not let me watch that ep of doctor who from last year?

Still, it drives me up the wall when I get the "Check out this trailer for " only to click it and get "You are not an american, fuck off" on the site.

 

[Some_weirdGuy]

Its a lot worse than just the UK, doncha know? In Australia, we can hardly stream anything official from anywhere. No funimation, no Hulu, no BBC, nada. Really, all we have is the ABC iview, which can be temperamental at best. And I don't have a large amount of knowledge about the rest of the world, but I'm fairly sure the selections are similar...

It would be so wonderful if there were a global streaming service, but lawyers will be lawyers, and licensing rights would sink this before it even began

Hmm. Don't mean to double-post, but in just researching this for my previous post, check this out:

http://www.madman.com.au/videos/view/1483


And, since I'm not in Australia or New Zealand, it came up with the following notice.

"Sorry Guys, Full Episodes are for Australia & New zealand users only.
if you're from the us we're guessing this might be the first time you've seen a message like this, sorry."

Checked it out just then, only has the first two episodes. Seems to be their thing actually, as the list shows a bunch of anime's but only ever episode 1 and 2 of them.

 

[CrystalShadow]

Its a lot worse than just the UK, doncha know? In Australia, we can hardly stream anything official from anywhere. No funimation, no Hulu, no BBC, nada. Really, all we have is the ABC iview, which can be temperamental at best. And I don't have a large amount of knowledge about the rest of the world, but I'm fairly sure the selections are similar...

It would be so wonderful if there were a global streaming service, but lawyers will be lawyers, and licensing rights would sink this before it even began

Hmm. Don't mean to double-post, but in just researching this for my previous post, check this out:

http://www.madman.com.au/videos/view/1483


And, since I'm not in Australia or New Zealand, it came up with the following notice.

"Sorry Guys, Full Episodes are for Australia & New zealand users only.
if you're from the us we're guessing this might be the first time you've seen a message like this, sorry."

Checked it out just then, only has the first two episodes. Seems to be their thing actually, as the list shows a bunch of anime's but only ever episode 1 and 2 of them.

Ah... Have you checked youtube by any chance? They seem intent on hiding the fact, but it's sometimes a surprise what's available legitimately there.

I'm in the UK, so it's not the best comparison, but I found a company called nozomient had some weird stuff up. Also, (in the UK at least, channel 4 and 5 repeat their content on youtube).

But most importantly, Funimation has been putting up most of their content on Youtube as well. (www.youtube.com/funimation).

There's no guarantee any of it works at all in Australia (because I don't think funimation ever promised streaming to Australia), but since funimation had their own streaming site that worked in the US and the UK, only to have it's UK streaming disabled entirely...
It seemed for a while it was US only, until it became clear that their youtube channel actually worked in the UK.
Now, even then maybe 30-40% of the shows are disabled, but compared to funimation's actual website, where 100% of the content is blocked outside the US...

Anyway, I have no idea if their youtube channel works at all outside the US, but it's worth a try.

Speaking of youtube and anime, try the following and see if any of them have working content.
(Some of these are US only, some clearly work in the UK, others worked for a little while but where then disabled, and one is intended for mainland Europe. But you never know, you might just get lucky.)

I have no idea if any of it works at all in Australia, but I know for a fact they at least work in some countries outside the US.




Known to have working content for the UK:
http://www.youtube.com/user/FUNimation
http://www.youtube.com/user/nozomient

Up until recently, I thought this only worked in the US, but there seems to be at least some episodes that work elsewhere
http://www.youtube.com/user/MANGAentertainment

Their UK channel meanwhile... Has no episodes at all.
http://www.youtube.com/user/MangaUK



For parts of mainland Europe:
http://www.youtube.com/user/fmabrotherhood
http://www.youtube.com/panini
http://www.youtube.com/user/paninionscreen


And, while the content may vary quite a bit by country, this is always worth remembering:
http://www.youtube.com/shows

(Looking through the animation section led me to discover nozomient's channel for instance. As well as other rather amusing things like Dilbert, the series, and Biker Mice from Mars)

Now, I'm in the UK, so I can't really tell you if any of this has anything watchable in Australia, but it's stuff outside the US at least.

Also, be persistent if you check youtube channels like this; Just because one series is disabled, don't assume they all will be.

I mean, I just discovered something that plays in the UK on Manga Entertainment's US channel, even though based on prior experience I had already dedided none of the shows on that channel could be seen outside the US...

Then again, also be aware that sometimes this is an oversight. for instance the FMAbrotherhood channel for Europe initially worked in the UK (even though it had no english subtitles available), but a week later it had been disabled.


Still... I have no idea if any of that is helpful to you, but it's something worth checking out, at the very least.

 

[Crazy Zaul]

Apparently the the reason is cos they tried it in Canada and then here but ITV, 4 and 5 wouldn't let them cos they would rather you spend your time watching the crap they make, and therefore making them money than watching better stuff from other countries.

 

[Porygon-2000]

Da Snippity

Ah, quite true. Thanks for pointing me in the right direction! I'll admit, I don't stream as much these days because of other things I got happening. But now I know I at least have more options. I wonder what the situation is in other countries though...

 

[Dags90]

International copyright law is a pain in the ass. You have to file for international licensing agreements. It's a mess. It's a miracle that shows even cross borders at all, even on TV.