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Quickflix Wants Netflix To Drop Australian VPN Users
ashshy writes 200,000 Australian residents reportedly use Netflix today, tunneling their video traffic to the US, UK, and other Netflix markets via VPN connections. A proper Netflix Down Under service isn't expected to launch until 2015. Last week, Aussie video streaming company Quickflix told Netflix to stop this practice, so Australian viewers can return to Quickflix and other local alternatives. But Quickflix CEO Stephen Langsford didn't explain how Netflix could restrict Australian VPN users, beyond the IP geolocating and credit card billing address checks it already runs. Today, ZDNet's Josh Taylor ripped into the absurdity of Quickflix's demands. From the article: "If Netflix cuts those people off, they're going to know that it was at the behest of Foxtel and Quickflix, and would likely boycott those services instead of flocking to them. If nothing else, it would encourage those who have tried to do the right thing by subscribing and paying for content on Netflix to return to copyright infringement."
Waaaah! We're getting our arses kicked! Make the bad Netflix stop, mummy!
Sounds like a case of tall poppy envy to me.
Why is Netflix not available in Australia?
You'd think that such companies touting themselves as the masters of the new way of doing business would refrain from the very monopolistic manoeuvres they have been criticizing all along. You'd think...
So they want a competitor to cut off customers which they can't serve (or because they can't compete)?
If your service is good and it's what people want, you will survive. If it isn't, and people go elsewhere ... too damned bad. If I was dealing with a company, and their competitor made them stop providing me service, there is no way in hell I'd go with the competitor, since they effectively blocked me from getting the service I do want.
This just sounds like "waah, we can't compete with Netflix, so Netflix needs to stop serving the customers we haven't been able to attract". Screw that. Your "local alternative" may not be as good, and the consumer shouldn't be forced into using your crappy product just because you say so.
I'd be seriously pissed at Quickflix for being self entitles assholes. And I sure as hell wouldn't do business with them.
Why do companies feel they are entitled to our business? I'll do business with whomever I want.
These clowns sound like candidates for the B-ark.
Lost at C:>. Found at C.
It says a lot about Quickflix's service when Netflix via VPN is an actual competitive problem for them.
If your product is so bad that a significant number of users are willing to break the law/tos of a competitor in order to avoid using it you are likely doing something very wrong. Note that I'm from the USA and have no idea about this quickflix thing specifically.
Why would Netflix voluntarily give up its customers to a competitor?
That would be like Linux calling up Windows, "Hey, can you stop selling copies of Windows to customers X, Y, and Z? Our product will fit them better."
The hardest part for Netflix is getting the streaming rights. These rights are sold on a region-by-region basis. They can't move into a new territory until they get enough rights in that territory to justify setting up local servers. Few, if any, content houses offer global streaming rights.
This is the main reason Netflix is making (fantastic) shows of it's own, as they are shows they will always have universal broadcast rights for.
They could always make a section in the registration "What is your true location? (no lying)" with two answers in a dropdown box: Australia, Other. Obviously everyone from Australia is going to answer 'Australia'. This is obviously in the best interest for Netflix and everyone else that thinks the piratebay is hurting them.
If stupid was flammable we'd have already seen the flash and soon would come the boom.
OMG, we don't know how technology works, so we'll just vomit some stupid shit instead.
If people are paying extra, and going to the hassle of signing up with netflix and dealing with the workarounds for paying and actually getting the service rather than just using your service, I think you're doing soemthing wrong.
And that never works well for some reason. Why would anyone think region restriction would be a thing to try now?
There are only 2 options here :
-either you're honest and you'll wait 'til Netflix or some other streaming company arrives in your country
-or you're dishonest and then simply torrent the shows off the net.
the third possibility is the worst of both worlds : try to be honest subscribing to Netflix and at the same time violate geographic restrictions that Netflix puts in place. You're dishonest towards Netflix, and when they legally cut you off you cannot blame them,
It's you that's doing the illegal thing, not Netflix.
Seriously for Netflix or other streaming companies either you legally access their content or not. Trying to pay and evade geographical restriction as far as those companies are concerned make you a pirate. An idiot pirate because you're paying to illegally use their services. Pirate for pirate do it the right way.
You only need a smart dns service.
Seriously though, if your local product can't compare to the cost of a Netflix subscription PLUS a smart dns / VPN subscription you're doing it wrong.
Sigger than your average
So...
"Waaah the customers in the market over which we have a monopoly for now are seeking alternatives."
Yea, Quickflix, fuck the "free market"!
THIS is a streaming service.
SJW's don't eliminate discrimination. They just expropriate it for themselves.
Why would Netflix voluntarily give up its customers to a competitor?
Because it's the easy way, compared to the hard way of QF pressuring the movie studios to withdraw NF's streaming licenses altogether if NF doesn't improve enforcement of territory limits in the existing contracts with the movie studios.
...Quickflix told Netflix to stop this practice, so Australian viewers will be forced to return to Quickflix and other local alternatives.
Fixed that for them.
It must have been something you assimilated. . . .
You know you're fighting weirdos, when your ultimatum is "take my money, or else." But I ask you to consider this: are you sure you aren't a weirdo too? It takes two psychos to escalate to these levels.
People currently go to lots of effort trying to shove unwanted money down the unwilling and highly-resisting pie holes of the media companies. I know, it seems like if only you could just get the right lever, to push just a little harder, then their stockholders would get some profit at your expense, utterly embarrassing the CEOs whose current mission is to prevent revenue and destroy assets.
But what media consumers need to learn, is that NO MEANS NO. You are buying their product without their consent, and as ridiculous as it sounds, yes, they really do have their lawyers looking into how to stop you.
Pirate. When you pirate, they stop complaining and stop resisting, stop fucking with your tools, and stop fucking with your delivery. They'll open for business when/if they decide they're good and ready. Until then, stop fighting. Make friends with the media companies, by pirating their content instead of paying for it. You'll get along much more harmoniously. You'll know they're ready, when you can say "take my money?" without any "or else" and without any reasonable expectation that their response might seriously be "no, we're not a business."
Dear Netflix,
Your service and pricing is better than ours so our customers left us to use your service. Please ban them so we can get them back... Waaaaaa!
Thanks - Quickflix.
What checks are those? Just the regular payment ones to prevent CC fraud?
As far as I know, Netflix doesn't particularly actively use the billing address to restrict services to a particular region - they use IPs for that. That's why for any country where Netflix launches a service that differs from the U.S. one (fewer titles, episodes released much later, etc.), you'll find tutorials popping up on how to get yourself a VPN service that has U.S. IP addresses and even VPN services advertising themselves (directly and indirectly) as being perfectly suited for the job. Hell, you'll find those tutorials for countries where Netflix hasn't even launched at all, and I'd imagine there's tips for U.S. users on getting a VPN to enjoy some foreign titles not available there, too.
Josh Taylor (ZDnet article author) basically has the right idea, but is targeting the wrong people. Yes, geo-restriction is "a form of old-world trade protectionism that is an anachronism", but rather than complain that Quickflix wants others to play by the rules that they're legally bound to, he should complain that Netflix is playing loose with those rules without letting them go entirely. Netflix should offer up the same content everywhere without the need to use a VPN, if they're effectively allowing it, knowingly and willingly, anyway.
This is all because in the 1990s the government allowed FOXTEL to goto the USA, and buy up exclusive licenses to all new and back catalogues from every major media company in America. They spent billions on it and at the time everyone thought they were overpaying.Turns out they very smartly bought themselves a monopoly position in media, one that has effectively locked out all Australian competitors (All the local media services are shit, from the PSN movies, to Xbox Live, to Quickflix.) and the government hasn't had the balls to call them out and break them up for it.
There are a few similar services starting up down here. I had a look at Quickflix because they have a client for my smartTV and TiVo but all they have to offer are old BBC shows which I already own on DVD and their movie selection is woeful even compared with what we can get on AppleTV. Worse, the compression is too high so what they do have looks terrible. If they had the vast array of stuff that Netflix has then they might have a chance but without it they're going nowhere. I don't subscribe to Netflix as I've taken the approach of buying or renting what I want to see but if it was legitimately offered here I would be interested.
"I have the attention span of a strobe lit goldfish, please get to the point quickly!"
"beyond the IP geolocating and credit card billing address checks it already runs" What else can Netflix do? Anyone know? Also Reed seems to be implying Netflix is actually encouraging it. Does anyone know how?
When Netflix eventually deems fit to grace us with it's presence, it's offerings are going to be nowhere near the same as the US version. It's doubtful if it'll be the same price as well. They might crack down on VPN users to force them to move to the Australian version.
Netflix could play cat-and-mouse and block known VPN IPs until customers simply give up (and probably torrent the shows they want).
Most Aussies use the same couple of VPN services, they could easily fatigue the vast majority of illegitimate Aussie Netflix subscribers.
It takes minimal effort for netflix to do this, but they have no reason to until they launch in Australia.
With few suppliers the price goes up. You can see that with a lot of things in Australia, paticularly software with Microsoft, Apple, Adobe etc charging a lot extra because they can.
Travel+Holiday expenses+mac at US price (LessThan) same mac at AU price
Because Australia is a small market with little real competition, all the companies gouge and gouge for all they are worth.
Many companies have 'special australian pricing', even for internet delivered products, because they know they can completely get away with it, and the government consumer "watchdogs" will simply sit on their asses and do nothing.
I'd like to take a sharp knife, and gouge and gouge for all I'M worth: company CEOs, their damn eyeballs out. Those fucking thieving cunts.
It would provide unwanted competition to Rupert Murdoch.
Your second point is not correct or relevant since people are already using Netflix in Australia despite deliberate steps being made to stop them.
It's not like that at all, we have very lax media controls.
I know you gun nuts think it's gone all Thunderdome over here since we restricted automatic weapons, but could you please refrain from making up utter bullshit about us on every fucking topic under the sun?
Not a bad government - they did exactly what they were paid to do :(
One guess who owns AU foxtel, US fox news and is a big political donor.
I originally posted this on Gizmodo Australia - essentially this letter is a great distraction from the poor financial situation Quickflix is in that was described in their annual financial report published on 16/9/14.
This letter probably has something to do with the financial results that they released today which other than revealing a loss of over $10M, also had this gem in the auditors report:
"These conditions [...] indicate the existence of material uncertainty which may cast significant doubt about the consolidated entity's ability to continue as a going concern and therefore, the consolidated entity maybe [sic] unable to realise its assets and discharge its liabilities in the normal course of business, and at the amounts stated in the financial report."
TLDR: The accountants don't believe in the companies viability.
All this while Langsford gets a 9.2% salary increase and a $60k cash bonus that is FOUR TIMES larger than last year - his remuneration totalling $392,413 accounts for 3.3% of the companies operating costs!
Quickflix is attempting to get a legal provider of parallel importation to stop doing business with customers so they can have them... unless i have got the law all arse-about-face, this is anti-competitive.
This is EXACTLY the reason Australia has parallel import laws.
In-fact should not america, having a free trade agreement with australia, also pass parallel import laws to ALLOW the FREEing of trade?
If you can't beat them, outlaw them
There's really not much to see here if you exclude the "Premium" titles. It's a bit how lefties want to make people use public transportation: not by improving public transportation (increasing quality of life), but by making the car less attractive (decreasing overall quality of life). Quickflix CAN be a one or two bucks per month more expensive... but have 90% of what Netflix US has, and add to that a bunch of quality Aussie content, and they'll blow Netflix out of the water. But no, let's take the easy way out again (a/k/a Sit On Fat Well-paid Ass) and attack the alternative.
When the copyright term is "forever minus a day", live every day like it's the last.
It's not that the government hasn't had the balls, it's that Murdoch is one of our Prime Ministers leading our country. Why would our government turn on itself?!
No it was Apple, but Adobe is probably even worse.
Er no, the Government has no say in who is allowed to buy exclusive licenses you douche, they didn't allow or disallow anything, it's not their say.
Christ on a unicycle the Government isn't there to control every aspect of everything
Get lost, Quickflix! I tried your service once and HATED the selection. Get better content and then maybe I'll choose you instead of "tunnelling" to Netflix.
Oh, so globalization is only for the benefit of large corporations, they can setup shop anywhere, purchase stuff from anywhere but the little people have buy stuff where they're told to.
Given Village Roadshow and Foxtel apparently have our AG in their pockets, and Rupert baby owns our PM, I'm sure that many many millions will be spent trying to block VPN's.
Quickflix's two big problems are most of it's movies are on DVD mailed out and they are caught in the let's overcharge the Aussies mentality of the content providers so their offering is tiny.
Foxtel are trying to pretend to lower prices at the moment but are more interested in getting the govt to try the great firewall of Aus and harsh penalties for accessing content that doesn't have the 50+% surcharge they love.
Oh for the days when Governments were of the people and for the people rather than of the highest bidder for the highest bidder.
Wolja Future Tombstone: Shit happened then I died
Utterly wrong. The ACCC found differently recently - follow your own link and you'll most likely see Apple stuff too, it certainly got into the papers. I don't know what they can do about it other than warn consumers that they are being ripped off. Apple, among many others (MS, Adobe, AutoDesk etc) are taking advantage of the supply chain in regions with little competition by price gouging.
It seems to be an increasing trend on this site - smug "corrections" based on either misunderstanding of the post that a person is replying to or deliberate "reality distortion" by fans upset that the object of their veneration is being addressed in less than glowing terms.