Whew..
I don't have satellite at my new place here in Baltimore (trees in the way, first time in something like ten years I didn't check before moving into a place) and so had to try and listen to the Liverpool-Everton derby on the Internet.
Unfortunately, for some reason the Beeb (BBC) has decided not to make the streaming broadcasts available outside the UK. So my task was to figure out how to get the broadcast in spite of this.
Obviously, a proxy server to shield my IP was the best way because the Beeb had to be using a DNS lookup on my IP to figure out where I was. This sort of bogosity will go away in a few years as the Internet becomes more ubiquitious and fault-tolerant, but right now it's still possible.
So I went looking and found the very useful site Stay Invisible. It provides both lists of proxy servers worldwide and information on how to browse anonymously. I don't think they necessarily envisioned bypassing the geographical restriction of streaming broadcasts but it works quite well for that.
The first challenge was to find an anonymous proxy server located in the UK. Not all seemed to work, and some of those listed as being in the UK had WHOIS addresses elsewhere (like Germany).
For those of you who don't know what a proxy server is, it was originally designed for use in large networks. It sits between those in the network and the cloud that we call the Internet and intercepts requests for Web pages. If some user in the network has recently accessed a page - say the CNN home page - it compares the contents of the current CNN home page with the one cached in its memory. If they don't differ, it serves up the one in its memory (images and all) and so you (in the network) receive the page much more quickly than you would if it had to travel over a number of hops in the Internet.
This is basically what the "accelerated" service that AOL offers users is. Of limited utility but if your browsing habits are fairly pedestrian it works decently well.
Of course, as the Internet (and traffic) has grown people are using proxy servers for all kinds of things, such as providing images for large sites and now, streaming audio and video content.
In the end, I had to try something like six different servers, turn off Java in my browser (one can determine the real IP of a machine using a Java applet), and remove my BBC cookie to get the streaming broadcast of the match.
But I did it.. and I got to hear Liverpool humiliate Everton 3-1. The scoreline really doesn't tell the story of the match as Liverpool had to defend most of the first half with only ten men, our captain Steve Gerrard having been sent off for two yellow-card offenses.
A wild derby by all accounts. I just wished I could have watched it rather than listened to it.
I just have to fork over a good $100/month to Comcast for the monthly service and I'm loathe to do that. For what, maybe 8-9 games a month?
I think I'll listen on the Internet.
Posted by artandscience at March 25, 2006 06:53 AM