How Can I Canadianize my IP Address?
Tomorrow I’d like to watch a crucial Canada-Australia football/soccer game at the Women’s World Cup. It’s being broadcast live (at the convenient local time of 10:45am–the tournament’s in China) on CBCSports.ca, but can only be accessed in Canada. The same is true of NHL hockey, which I’d like to watch this fall.
The CBC blocks the rest of the world from watching sports programs because they don’t have broadcast licensing agreements with other countries. That’s lame, but understandable. It’s frustrating, though, as a tax-paying Canadian who doesn’t happen to currently reside in Canada.
I’m looking for a relatively pain-free means of looking Canadian to the CBC’s Canucklehead firewall. I read through Boing Boing’s anti-censorware page, but nothing there seemed applicable to my particular problem. Any suggestions?
UPDATE: I’ve got a kind offer from a Canada-residing Canadian to offer his machine as a proxy server. Now I’m desperate seeking instructions and/or software which enables him to easily set up a proxy server thingy, and me to connect through his machine.
UPDATE #2: Meh. I got access to a Slingbox from another kind Canadian, but the connection speed was pretty poor on my end. Plus, sports are about the worst thing you can watch on dodgy Internet-powered streaming Web video. There’s fast camera movements and many small objects in motion on screen. Soccer is bad, but in my experience hockey is the worst.
Ultimately, the Canadian women failed to advance through to the quarter-finals. A disappointing result for our national team.
September 19th, 2007 at 3:52 am
It’s funny - I spend all my time trying to get a US IP addy, and you want a canadian one ;-)
I got this: http://www.freewebproxylist.com/CA_WebProxies.html from a google search that included words: ip web proxy canadian ip address
Not sure if the link is good - but there were ALOT of results. Good luck being a Canadian! ;-)
September 19th, 2007 at 4:34 am
Jules: Thanks for that, but in my experience free proxies tend to be pretty unreliable. This is doubly-so for something bandwidth-intensive like watching video.
I’m willing to pay to make this happen. Not a ton, but more than zero cents.
Incidentally, why do you want an American IP address?
September 19th, 2007 at 5:52 am
Likely for the same reason I do: because of video services in the states that do the same thing. I can’t access free previews or episodes of shows online because of my IP assignment. Amazon, for instance, has the Bionic Woman preview available through their Unbox service, but not if your IP is non-US.
September 19th, 2007 at 5:53 am
I would imagine he needs a US IP address for the same reason as you. Trying to watch country restricted video. A lot of the US network sites will only allow US residents to watch full episodes on the web.
September 19th, 2007 at 8:25 am
The Slingbox is still available to you if it’s being broadcast on TV.
Also, if you have a friend at UBC who is willing to hand over his or her login info, you can set up a proxy through the UBC Library. I think that would do the trick. Details here: http://www.library.ubc.ca/home/proxyinfo/
November 3rd, 2007 at 5:44 am
is it possible to have that slingbox adress to watch a canadian university football game this afternoon, i’m in france and i would like to see that Montreal-Laval playoff game
Thanks !
April 10th, 2008 at 5:25 pm
Thanks for the info. I regularly like to look at porn sites that are based here in Moscow and listen to my favorite Pittsburgh radio station, both of which are blocked in Russia.
May 13th, 2008 at 11:36 am
Was there ever a conclusion on this thread? I want to download tv shows on watch.comedynetwork.ca.