Unblock-Us and non-Netflix Subscribers

I was asked at work a few weeks ago about Unblock-Us and decided that perhaps it was time for another blog review on it especially now since Unblock-Us has updated their website recently. The person who asked me did not have Netflix but I had mentioned that I watched an entire episode of an American show from an American broadcaster's website (CBS). He was looking for a service that would allow him to watch certain videos from television websites (ABC, CBS, NBC, etc.) without getting the prompt that the video was not available for the region.

I use Unblock-Us mostly for Netflix as you can see from some of my previous blog entries on Unblock-Us but I also use it occasionally to watch some of the television programs that I've missed for whatever reason (didn't/couldn't record it on my Tivo, etc.).

Because Unblock-Us is not a VPN service, it doesn't change your computer's IP address but changes the DNS (Domain Name Server) that your computer/devices use in order to access certain websites/applications, it will only allow you to watch videos from certain websites. For a list of the websites that Unblock-Us supports, you can click *HERE*.

Accessing the videos on the websites is seamless. After configuring your computer/network to use the Unblock-Us DNS servers, there is no configuration that you have to do. With Netflix and Unblock-Us, there is a country selection that must be done on the Unblock-Us website. However, with the supported websites shown in the above list, the website will think that you are in the respective country. You would access the CTV videos at http://www.ctv.ca as if you were in Canada and you would access CBS videos at http://www.cbs.ca as if you were in the US.

Because the cost of the Unblock-Us service is roughly the same cost as VPN service, I told my friend that he should probably look into getting a VPN service since he wasn't a Netflix subscriber. A VPN service would also allow for better access to videos since it would not be limited to only the Unblock-Us supported websites. A VPN service would also work for other websites (ex: Google, etc.) which restrict IP addresses to a particular host country. The only thing to watch out in terms of the VPN service is that I've heard that the response rate (bandwidth) for a lot of VPN services are not very good for streaming and I've never really experienced any issues with Unblock-Us and bandwidth as long as my regular internet bandwidth was fine. For me, I find accessing videos from certain websites to be an added benefit from my Unblock-Us subscription since I use Unblock-Us mainly for my Netflix subscription.

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