AbemaTV (at least partially) region free

If you want to watch some Japanese TV/broadcasts, abemaTV seems to be a very nice option. It seems to have been mentioned before on here, but it seems that recently at least some of the channels are no longer region-locked.

As an example, the Mahjong channel is freely watchable :slight_smile:

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Indeedy, and the phone app also works for international viewers too! Last I checked, they had

  • Abema News: International Edition
  • Shogi (good for insomnia)

And possibly the most watchable channel…

…where an automatic robot mahjong table does Cool Robot Mahjong Table Trick. Japanese Mahjong rules here for the uninitiated.

Still waiting for that sumo channel to go region-unlocked! Come on Blocker Dog, have at it!

Edit: This is Blocker Dog. If you hit Abema with a VPN, he switches to English… ahem… uh… I hear that’s what he does anyway.

image

ブロッカー犬:「お住まいの地域ではご視聴できません」

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見たいが

:sob:

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:sob:
I guess i should say “it works in the Netherlands, therefore probably the rest of Europe, and maybe elsewhere”

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Let’s see if I change my IP to NL. Wait a sec.

Hyaaa. Still not working. Maybe they recognised it from my Google account instead of my IP

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TunnelBear isn’t smart enough :-1:

(In the US) I’m only able to see the shogi and news-global channels…
…bummer to miss out on “the most watchable channel”.

Edit: Why am I watching in which order people eat the foods in a certain bento box? This is news?

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I’m also from NL but it’s not working for me either :cry:

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As a further update, I just tried to use the App, and that did not work for me, so it likely only works on the website.

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Don’t know about the app but it seems Italians could watch the fishing channel on the web, at least for some time… I just saw a guy who kept talking about “bass fishing” in “Bassin’ road , bass or die”. But I think that ended. I could see for a few minutes a message:

「ただいまCM中です」which I think means “A commercial message is being shown now” [literally “now inside a commercial message”]

And now I can only see the blocker dog, so most likely the blocking isn’t done on the whole channel but selectively on some programs (probably they don’t have the rights to distribute it worldwide).

Maybe that explains why OP could watch it. No one cares about mahjong or shogi enough to restrict its distribution, but they sure care about anime and other stuff so some channels are (always?) blocked.

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Yay it’s catching on! :slight_smile:

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