August 14, 2004

Let the Web Games begin.: "The BBC and other European networks are offering live, on-demand Internet video streaming of Olympic events to broadband viewers. But the BBC and fellow members of the European Broadcasting Union are required by their Olympic broadcast contracts to block U.S. Internet users and others from outside their home counties." Anybody know how people in the US can avoid waiting 9 hrs to see that day's events? How do we get around these "blocks"?

posted by worldcup2002 to other at 07:00 PM - 5 comments

I spent about 5 minutes setting this up, and I'm not a technical wizard. You just need to find a free proxy server in Great Britain, set it up in System Preferences (in OS X, but I'm sure it's similar in Windows), then away you go... The BBC servers see a Great Britain IP address and let you in. I was watching an equestrian event, but now I can't find the page with the program listings (you can choose from I think five). Oh well - I was just watching a cricket test for the first time, and although I'm as confused as always, I have to tell you, chappy, the dialogue is quite, quite droll.

posted by dusted at 10:37 AM on August 15, 2004

dusted, get me the proxy server settings, STAT! ;-)

posted by worldcup2002 at 01:14 PM on August 15, 2004

OK, let's share the wealth. I got a list of proxy servers from proxy4free.com, but that's only one result from many pages of results for a "Proxy Great Britain" google search - I'm sure you can find more if their servers don't work for you. Choose a Great Britain proxy server from their list and then go to Network preferences and punch it in. Here's a screen shot (showing the server address I'm using) of the preference pane is Mac OS X. I assume the setup is very similar on a Windows system, but I'm not certain.

posted by dusted at 07:39 PM on August 15, 2004

ho ho ho. Thanks, dusted.

posted by worldcup2002 at 11:31 PM on August 15, 2004

ho ho ho. Thanks, dusted. Christmas is early this year, little WC.

posted by dusted at 11:55 PM on August 15, 2004

You're not logged in. Please log in or register.