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Faustina Trafton

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Aug 2, 2024, 12:34:05 PM8/2/24
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Looking for a VPN app for my iPad, so that I can watch Netflix or other US streaming apps in Europe. Any real world experience and recommendations?
Thanks in advance.
Don't need flames or moral judgments about why I want to watch Netflix (or any other streaming app) while in Europe. I am going to be there for 6 weeks and I be won't visiting tourist sites in the late night and would like to catch up on my shows.

Alternatively, can you just download before leaving US? It saves on streaming speeds, and (possibly) eating up someone else's monthly wifi allotment. (When staying in a short let apartment, this used to be a problem).

I had Hulu and Netflix on my phone and tablet if I had internet access I could watch both of them in France, Austria and Germany. I also downloaded a few shows so I could watch off line. Like you said sometimes in the evening before going to sleep you might like to watch a something.

I have my own VPN setup at home. (It's fairly easy if you are a techie.) Consider asking someone to set up a home VPN for you before you leave. If you have to pay someone to do it, at least you won't have to pay for the VPN, and you will not have to rely on a third party for VPN support. Some home routers already support a VPN. If not, a spare router that supports VPN can be set up with VPN and can be added to your home network. Again, I assume the average person is not tech savvy enough to do this so that you'd need to have someone set it up for you. It wouldn't be worth paying $500 to have it set up, but it might be worth $100 - or buy dinner for a tech savvy friend who does it for you.

Me too. I am currently in Spain and watching Netflix on my iPad most nights. My threshold for dubbed episodes of Bonanza, CSI, Rizzoli and Isles and Crossing Jordan is pretty low and the only English language options are CNN and BBC Global.

I watch a lot of travel vloggers and they all pitch Surfshark (obviously because they are paid to do so). Each vlogger also offers a discount code. Try finding one at Paul Lucas Winging It, for example.

Notwithstanding Netflix's machinations over password sharing, a VPN is not going to be necessary to stream Netflix in Europe. The VPN will certainly allow you to get the US Netflix catalog and your saved list uninterrupted. Plus there are US only streaming services that a VPN would work for.

But the problem with streaming in the US is that the market is structured to the point that every little production house believes their catalog is worth being paid for through their own streaming service and are stingy with licensing in the US. It truly becomes a matter of quantity over quality. The US Netflix catalog just blows. On the other hand the European Netflix catalog is superior with content not licensed to Netflix in the US, is licensed to Netflix in Europe.

My NetFlix works fine in Europe. Watched it last night. Sure, what's available is a bit different, but not much, and it gives me the chance to see things not available in the US. So what could be a restriction can also be a benefit.

We were in Europe twice last year for one month each time (Germany and England) and found that most of our streaming services did not allow us to access what we wanted to watch on our iPhones and iPads. After some online research we chose NordVPN, and it worked well. It allows for multiple devises to be connected at the same time (although we hardly ever used that feature), and had a similar annual cost to the other vpn services. Also the download speed was very similar to that observed without using the vpn.

Using a VPN does not technically violate their terms of service. But legally, they are not allowed to show certain content outside of the country where you have an account, so if you are using a VPN to do that, you would be violating their TOS.

I tried to find the service contract on line, but no luck. I did find hundreds of articles about how to watch content that is not being offered .... which I take to mean, take what isn't being paid for (because neither you, nor NetFlix could possibly afford to buy world wide rights to all the copyrighted material on NetFlix).

And I did find where NetFlix has no problem with VPN that is not set up to fool the system, in which case you can watch programming for which NetFlix owns the rights, but not programming for which NetFlix doesn't actually own the rights.

Yeah, it's like discussing driving 57mph in a 55mph zone. Technically illegal but not something anyone, even law enforcement, is really worried about. Netflix and the companies that license their content to Netflix don't care if a US Netflix subscriber is watching content from their US Netflix account while on vacation in Europe. They don't want people who live in other countries watching it - they want those people to pay to watch via local licensing agreements.

Oh geez. NetFlix may have a ToS against the use of VPNs and proxy servers, but its not a matter of legality. It is a matter of Netflix's licensing agreements with the owners of properties meaning the movies or tv shows are supposed to be offered to certain audiences or countries.

I lived in Liberia, West Africa for two years in the recent past. I watched Netflix almost every day, no VPN. No problem with initial sign-in (I remained signed-in), just a slight difference in what was available to view (for example, I wasn't able to watch The Great British Baking Show, but no problem accessing Seinfeld). Have a great stay!

A US Netflix account works fine in Europe. The lineup is a little different but not drastically different. All the really good stuff us there and you can watch some pretty good content that isn't available in the US.

The geeks here at StreamLocator tracked down a couple of clever websites that use APIs to scour the multitude of international Netflix catalogs. These sites are invaluable sources to provide some fascinating, and often surprising, content comparisons.

For example, if a provider wants to keep a show or movie exclusive to its own channels in their country, they might put such a high price tag on the rights to another provider that it becomes unaffordable.

What mFlix does, and this is great for viewers desperate to watch the unavailable programs, is to provide a list of the Netflix countries where you can watch the missing shows and movies.

Netflix was founded in 1997 by Reed Hastings and Marc Randolph as a DVD-by-mail service. The idea came after Hastings was charged a late fee for a movie rental. Customers could subscribe to receive DVDs by mail. The company later expanded to streaming and now has millions of subscribers.

The company at the time struggled with two fundamental problems in their business model. One was that because the DVD was sent via mail, it would take anything between one day to 4 days for the shipment to reach the subscriber. Even though people were likely to try Netflix, conversion to repeat rentals was low. Secondly, people would far more inclined to rent out the latest releases. For the company to break even on the cost of purchasing a DVD to rent-out, they would have to generate 15-20 rentals for each DVD.

Secondly, to enable maximum utilisation of their DVD content catalogue, the company created their movie recommendation system. Through Cinematch, Netflix would recommend shows for their subscribers to watch. The point for this was to alleviate pressure for DVD rentals away from new releases, to a more uniform renting out of their content library. This solution has over the years become considerably sophisticated, and drives how customers experience Netflix and how the company makes decisions when acquiring new content.

Netflix put further pressure on competition when they announced the launch of their streaming service in January 2007, as Watch Now. At the time the streaming service was expected to be of use only for power users with broadband internet connections, which were not all that common at the time. Users were required to have a 1 mbps internet connection to be able to stream movies, with a 3mbps connection required for streaming DVD-quality films. Subscribers under the $17.99 plan had access to 18 hours of streaming content. Video delivery was through a special browser applet that subscribers would have to install. By 2008 however Netflix had given access to unlimited video streaming for subscribers to its biggest plan .

Prioritising building a robust technical infrastructure has helped Netflix keep their first-mover advantage. Oftentimes the first-mover advantage is squandered by technology companies who have to make way for businesses that solve the problem more efficiently. Netflix, however, by relying on a solid content and technical team, has managed to keep its competitive advantage since the launch of its streaming video service.

As the company started working towards building a streaming video solution, they also started to develop solutions for streaming video through hardware platforms. In 2004/05 the company was considering working with contract manufacturers on DVD disc drives with a video processor, which could download video content over the internet, and then stream it on TV. This model was similar to TiVo, which enabled TV owners to record TV shows on a disc. This was however shelved as competition with Blockbuster intensified and Netflix had to put resources into engaging in a pricing war with the market leader.

In 2008 Netflix began work on a device for streaming videos. Netflix started to work on developing a video player to connect to television, through which streaming video can be played over the internet. However Reed Hastings was concerned that potential partnerships with consumer electronic platforms would be negatively impacted by having their own platform. Roku was subsequently spun out as a separate company.

For much history of Netflix has had to face questions from cable TV providers whose content it would license, movie studios for movie licensing, as it presented a competition to their respective business models. Being perceived as a threat by the device manufacturers with which it was seeking to partner in the early stages of its streaming video business would hardly have severely limited its growth options. For this reason Netflix decided to spin out the Netflix Player team as a separate company.

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