Watch the Olympics from anywhere: this actually works

[coderrr]

As I've said in other comments. This is fun and hackerish but it's cheaper and simpler to just sign up for a VPN for a month that has UK gateways. Like https://www.privateinternetaccess.com/ for $6.95

[fl3tch]

That's what I've been using and it works great. Some of their US nodes are slow, probably because overloaded, but I maxed out my 20 Mbit internet connection testing their UK London server.

Edit: I should also point out that a $20 Linode box just for VPN is overkill. If you really want to go the VPS route, there are plenty of sub-$10 VPS providers in the UK.

[kellishaver]

I really wish I could just subscribe to iPlayer. I don't want to subscribe to a cable or satellite service that I wouldn't use (and then pay extra for BBC channels), and I like a lot of their content. I'd gladly pay the BBC money for easy, legal online access to it.

[AffableSpatula]

I'd like to see this happen just so that British taxes aren't being spent providing free coverage to people in other countries.

[davej]

Or you can just tunnel through the ssh connection to your VM, I do this all the time to watch BBC.

    ssh -D 9050 [user]@[vm.ip]

You now have a SOCKS proxy on port 9050. Done!

[irq]

As I stated at the top of my gist (did you read it?) and in other comments here, this simply does not work using the latest Flash in Mountain Lion. In this situation, Flash ignores proxy settings, and streaming does not work.

[DanielRibeiro]

You may also wish to add -C2qTnN[1]. At least -C2 for compression.

[1] https://calomel.org/firefox_ssh_proxy.html

[enimodas]

while you can easily set a SOCKS proxy for your browser, flash will still use your normal connection.

[dcesiel]

Or you could just use the unlimited TunnelBear VPN for $5 a month.

[irq]

And potentially send sensitive traffic through an untrusted third party. Some people are comfortable with that, some people aren't.

[brackin]

I'm not sure about the legalities abroad but in the UK at least it's illegal to watch this stream without a TV licence and they do try and prosecute people if they can find an address attached to your IP, obviously this isn't possible through this method but just a heads up.

Another option which doesn't require a tv licence is TVCatchup.com which legally streams UK TV channels (to the UK only).

Although I will say the BBC interface is far better and allows you to go back to the start if you press play on the live player half way through and of course is ad free.

Regardless, I condone this as NBC should allow everyone to watch online live and if they don't people will go to better alternatives.

[corin_]

Using TVCatcup.com absolutely does require a license - the license rule is about "watching live TV in the UK", it doesn't matter if you're doing it on a TV, from iPlayer or from a third party.

[mseebach]

> they do try and prosecute people if they can find an address attached to your IP

How? Will the ISPs actually just hand those out?

[irq]

edit: original poster was suggesting using a ssh -D SOCKS method instead. He deleted his comment, this was my reply:

This method does not work. You cannot get Flash to go through a HTTP or SOCKS proxy on Mountain Lion.

The very reason that VPNs "tie in at a fairly low level on the network stack" is why my method works.

[wolf550e]

If I don't care about watching it live, can I just get the recording in a torrent?

[icebraining]

Sure, the opening ceremony has more than 8000 seeds: http://torrentz.eu/search?f=olympics

[njs12345]

There are definitely a lot of recordings on Usenet...

[stoked]

I did something similar to watch hulu from Canada awhile back but I had split tunnelling disabled where all traffic goes through the vpn so no messing around with static routes and ips. Also setup a local DNS cache on the VPS and configured openvpn to use the VPS DNS cache when connected. CDN's generally use the ip of the DNS request to determine where to direct your browser to download the media, static host entries would avoid the DNS request though. I no longer have it setup, but I do have my config backed up somewhere. If someone's interested I'll look for it.

[vegardx]

If you're in europe you can watch it live at NRK (Norwegian Broadcasting Corporation), but the commentary will ofcourse be in Norwegian. NRK has excellent coverage, with 7 (9 including NRK1 and NRK2) dedicated channels.

See more: http://translate.google.com/translate?hl=en&sl=no&tl...

[bgentry]

Works great. This way you don't have to send all your traffic through the VPN, only the requests that are used to geolocate you.

You can use the same method to bypass MLB.tv blackout restrictions.

Instead of a Linode box, I use a privatetunnel.com VPN (free starter available) and modify the config:

  route-nopull # (to avoid sending all traffic through)
  route outbound-ip netmask # ex: route 8.8.8.8 255.255.255.0

[idan]

I found this resource to be helpful in actually getting the routes working. In particular, setting up NAT to forward traffic from the VPN to the outside world:

https://library.linode.com/networking/openvpn/ubuntu-10.10-m...

[MrKurtHaeusler]

Or just sign up for a distance learning course from a UK university. Aberdeen gives you a proxy, the OU as far as I know, doesn't.

[irq]

If the BBC changes their IP addresses and I haven't updated the IP list, you can simply adjust your VPN client settings to route all traffic over the VPN connection. Viscosity makes this easy. That will always work, but will cause other Internet services to think you're in England, and make things feel a bit slower overall.

[cientifico]

The same thing that the people need to access "How I need your mother".

After a few years, the easiest solution is to just buy a prxoy. Normally cheaper.

[webmonkeyuk]

I reckon it'll just be a matter of time until the BBC start blocking traffic from IP ranges that look like VPS hosting companies.

[Axsuul]

Hopefully this method won't become too mainstream since it requires some hacking.