October 5, 2009
Circumventing Geographic Restrictions
A large number of web services are geographically restricted, such as Hulu, Pandora and Spotify. The reasons are usually to do with content licensing restrictions, or because US visitors (or visitors from other advanced economies) are of a higher value from a monetization perspective. A web application can only guess at the location of a visitor based on an IP address and other information, such as browser language and regional settings. TechCrunch reports.
... The nature of the web means that geographically restricting web services is next to impossible, because those who are technically adept have known how to find and use proxy servers (both open and private) and VPN services to masquerade as being from another country.
The demand for such services has become so popular that more apps are being released that make this process almost as easy as installing any other application.
If you find yourself outside of the USA and wanting to watch Hulu, outside of the UK and wanting to checkout the BBC, or wanting to rig a web poll, check out tips from TechCrunch.
Related:
-- Hide My Ass gets around region-restricted videos
-- How to Watch Hulu Around the World
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