Watch Instant Movies in Europe?

[John]

I'm thinking about joining NetFlix, but we live part of the year in Europe. We will use a U.S. address and credit card, and we understand that disks can't be shipped to Europe, but we could still enjoy our membership if we can get streaming videos. We know that some streaming sites (like ABC TV) block streaming video to Europe. We'll join if we can get instant movies from NetFlix when we're not in the U.S.

[jampony]

That would be a really good question to ask NF customer service (1-888-638-3549). And if you want to be nice, you can come back and let us know what the answer was. :)

[John]

Well, I wanted to send an email, but apparently you have to be a member to do that. Thanks for the phone number - I'll try it later this week and let you know what I find out.

[Evil Herbivore]

instant watch is only available in U.S. due to restrictions & laws from the studios.

[John]

I was afraid of that.

Thanks for the reply.

[jampony]

Don't forget that you can put your Netflix account on hold. While that doesn't help you rent movies in Europe, at least you wouldn't be paying for a service you weren't using here. And maybe you could find a similar service in Europe, one that would allow to put that account on hold, too.

[Knaldskalle]

Several European companies have seen the light and copied the Netflix concept. Most of them are small and local to that particular country.

"Lovefilm" is available in the U.K. (.com), Germany (.de) and Scandinavia (.dk, .no, .se) and claim to have 450,000 subscribers (vs. 7 mio Netflixers). I don't know if they allow putting accounts on hold.

[John]

Thanks for the tip. If found glowria (http://www.glowria.fr/) in France, but it's more expensive than NetFlix. I haven't figured out yet whether they allow you to suspend your account. We also have VOD on our TV service, but that's 4-5 Euros a pop. Too bad NetFlix doesn't serve Europe - they would blow the competition away.

[Watson]

Consider a US-based paid service which offers a secure tunnelling proxy, i.e. a VPN. These are becoming more popular (and thus more affordable) because they provide some security when using wireless hotspots and they also provide (relatively) anonymous websurfing and even p2p. I use one which is very fast and easy to use, but it gives me an IP address in Europe and I must disconnect from it to watch instant movies. But if you can find an affordable US-based service which will give you a US-based IP address you should be able to get around Netflix's (and other sites') restrictions. If you reduce your Netflix plan to the cheapest which has unlimited instant movies then the total cost might not be much more than what you pay now. Worth a thought, that is what I would do if I were going to be out of the country for an extended period of time.

[John]

Ah, hadn't thought of that. Did a quick search on Google and found several candidates. I'll try one out when I get back to Europe and let everyone here know how it turned out.

[michael bailey]

There are instant movies in Ruope - at least in germany there are. 2 weeks ago i downloaded a movie - the only problem is in Germany they dub ALL movies instead of keeping original language and using subtitles and I have not found an english language download site.

[John]

Good recommendation. I just signed up with them, and it works like a champ.

[StephW]

I used to have netflix in the US and I also just moved to France. I am thinking of signing up with witopia as well. Are you still happy with the service? Which one dd you go for the $39.99 a a yaer? do you find a difference with the internet speed? (read somewhere it could affect speed). Thanks!