American TV in Japan

can you get american television in japan. Like would direct tv work there? Or do they have a special one.

Your best bet (legal method) would be to get cable TV. They offer a lot of English channels (CNN International, Bloomberg, CNBC, etc.) and many of them also have an English sub-channel.

Of course, you can also go the BitTorrent route and download from there.

Your DirecTV dish will not work in Japan unfortunately. Most American network websites (nbc.com, etc.) are also blocked from overseas viewing.

I think you can get Satellite tv from a company in Japan and you get many American programming from there. I think a co-worker of mine was doing that.

I don't think an American satellite will work in Japan because the direction of the satellite isn't aimed towards Japan, so you wouldn't get any reception.

Cable and satellite is way too expensive! unless you watch a lot, just think about all the wasted money spent on all those channels and shows you never watch. I think an on-demand solution is much better, its both convenient (watch what you want, when you want) and cheaper (for most people but depends how much you watch).
beware... on-demand solutions require a good internet connection, hikari fiber is best.

legal:
iTunes
look on iTunes store at the selection of films, TV shows available to buy and/or rent. You can make an account with the US store, just put US as the last line of your Japanese address or when they ask for country put US not Japan. I have used a UK store account whilst living in Japan for years - they cannot check. (Japanese iTunes store has nothing apart from music and apps -dont sign up for it!)

There are many other services like hulu and vudu etc that I have heard of from US with some subscription fee but very few work from Japan as they check your ISP.



slightly less than legal:
(some people download files from p2p sites but there are obvious security and legal risks and it quickly fills up space on your hard drive. I think streaming is favourable for this reason.)

surfthechannel.com
has a wide selection of TV shows and movies with lists of links to various video streaming sites. megavideo probably has the best links to click on but it has a viewing time limit (you can buy yearly membership to remove the time limit or find a workaround). some other links are to youtube (will be split into many parts) or pay sites like iTunes or Amazon etc. This basically puts a organised front onto a disoraganised chaos of various websites that are purposefully impossible to navigate to allow videos that infringe on copyright to go unchecked.

quicksilverscreen.com
similar to previous but listed with thumbnail images showing still clips so you get a better idea of the quality before you click. fairly easy to navigate. better for films rather than tv shows.


Of course check if you can find it on a legal paid on-demand service like iTunes it is better quality and more reliable if you can afford to buy it is always better to buy.
Especially with low budget independent films that are struggling for funding if we stop paying they will stop making.

Another possibility is Slingbox.

http://www.slingbox.com/get/countrySelect?page=/go/home

You have someone at home set it up on their tv and you can watch it through an internet connection on your computer from anywhere. You can even change channels from your computer.

I second the Slingbox. You can read about it in this post:

http://www.japan-guide.com/forum/quereadisplay.html?0+45040

The picture comes in great, we can watch any of our favorite shows from the states whenever we want....w/ zero buffering.

The only cost was the initial investment in the Slingbox and our monthly internet fee. We don't pay for any cable tv, so that saves us quite a bit of money.

A word of caution.....you have to be somewhat technically savvy in order to get the Slingbox set up properly, and so does the person housing the hardware in the states. If you're not one that likes to troubleshoot problems when they pop up, then I say stay away from the Slingbox. But, if you are patient and can get yours set up properly, then you will be in TV heaven!

google with a keyword like "Rent Slingbox"
you can get already setup one for like $20 a month

For hulu and vudu and others, vpn'd do the job. There is free ones but they're usually ineffective. You'll wanna have commercial ones that're more capable. They cost, but still a few bucks monthly to begin with....depending on how well you can find reliable and decent providers.

In countries with internet censorship and blocking like china and some middle east countries, you definitely need them.