Apple TV...Useless in Japan

Well, at least you have it better than Finland. We can't even get the Pixar Shorts here. Steve did promise that we'd (europe) get some video content at the beginning of this year. We'll see what happens.

Joshua.

Both of you mention things that are frustrating for sure!

Sure wish that we had world access to iTMS music and videos.

NZ can't get movies or TV shows on iTunes because none of them on the ITMS are finished showing on free-to-air TV here in NZ!

yeh Apple Tv is pretty much useless in every part of the world except the US, unless other countries start to get tv shows and movies. eg. Australia, Asia & Europe

Why does apple need rights to offer services to different countries when normal web-sites can be accessed, and music downloaded wherever you live?

I'm getting one I have over $1000 dollars worth of iTS content. I just buy US gift certificates off eBay

Cough Bittorrent Cough Cough

kashimo said:

I was excited for the AppleTV but since I live in Japan I find it useless.

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You mean you can't import any CDs into iTunes in Japan? iPhoto doesn't work in Japan? Mac The Ripper and Handbrake don't work in Japan? I am so sorry.

On the other hand, you're lucky you're not one of those poor Americans with 400 DVDs on a shelf who have to pay through the nose to download them again.

internationally known on the microphone

Can't you just buy American iTunes cards off Amazon using the international feature? I buy stuff from Amazon's UK and Japanese sites all the time with my American account. I've been considering buying iTunes cards from other countries this way so I could use other country's iTunes stores.

dextertangocci said:

I'm getting one I have over $1000 dollars worth of iTS content. I just buy US gift certificates off eBay

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I live in the UK, soi have considered doing this to, but don't you have to have a US iTunes account to redeem them, and to have that you need a credit card??

Japan is not alone - here in the UK we have no movie or TV content. There therefore seems little point in getting an aTV here either. There doesn't even seem to be any sign of movie of TV content here either - even our own national public broadcaster, the BBC, has signed up with a file sharing service to offer a download service of its huge and rich TV catalogue but only in the US! I think film studios and TV cos are failing to acknowledge that Europe now contains 500 million souls, a market some 66% bigger than their home US market. In a number of cases we can't even buy PAL DVDs of US stuff over here even though it has been available in US for ages so what hope is there for downloads? As a business person I usually sell my products and services to whoever is willing to buy at a profit!

kashimo said:

(24 would be huge here).

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I've been wondering, what is the deal with Keifer Sutherland and Bruce Willis over there? They're insanely popular. There is (or was) a 24 energy drink, Keifer did some ads in the styl of 24 for something, and Bruce Willis did some ads for Subaru and had a Legacy (Liberty in AU) trim level named after him (Touring Bruce).

Seriously, WTF?

Counterfit said:

I've been wondering, what is the deal with Keifer Sutherland and Bruce Willis over there? They're insanely popular.

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Every country needs their own Hasselhoff. (or two)

kashimo said:

I bet this problem is not only in Japan.

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The sad part is, Canada is just north of the USA, we get basically the same TV shows via cable and satellite, but they're not available on the iTunes store.

However, since Apple TV can get your content via iTunes, you could get an Apple TV for your ripped DVDs (and have a movies jukebox just like the old-generation iTunes+iPod did for music).

Sounds frustrating. I hope that Apple provides you with the content that you want in the near future.

In the meantime, you can consider getting MS Vista Premium or the Media Center Version of XP to record your shows. I've used both of them with pretty good success. (I know it's not the same as OS X).

timswim78 said:

Sounds frustrating. I hope that Apple provides you with the content that you want in the near future.

In the meantime, you can consider getting MS Vista Premium or the Media Center Version of XP to record your shows. I've used both of them with pretty good success. (I know it's not the same as OS X).

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I live in Japan too (for the past 7 years) and I can tell you that Japanese TV sucks big time - Even if you can understand it like me - its all the same crap....Japanese Talent eating something or talking about their love life or endless soap operas for old women.

People have stopped watching it here (TV ratings have been dropping).....I have Skyperfect TV which is satellite here in Japan but most of the programs are 2 to sometimes 12 years late !! eg: 24 is on season 4 and law and Order just started.....The problem here is that FOX especially release the DVDs first then put the show on free to Air then Satellite....

so really there is no point in getting an Apple TV (and another reason is my house is small) - BUT Apple did make a mistake in the fact that they don't have a DVR in OSX because its a key feature in Windows computers here...Thats one feature that they should focus on because I can't see TV on itunes Japan being released or making a big splash here at all...unless its for your mobile phone.

DVR is what is needed - big time !!

Uh...

So, what you're saying is that Apple TV can ONLY play movies that are bought and downloaded from the iTunes store? And that makes it useless outside the US?

Uh...I think you might be a tad wrong here.

i don't think we have tv shows even in canada. or movies. shorts i think so.

natemonster said:

i don't think we have tv shows even in canada. or movies. shorts i think so.

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Television hasn't made it to 95% of Canada yet. Movies are still are novelty, and even then, there's a live piano player.

Mac the Ripper and Visual Hub would make Apple Tv useful for international buyers.

kashimo said:

I was excited for the AppleTV but since I live in Japan I find it useless.

Apple has yet to negotiate anything to sell TV shows or movies here.

iTune and iPod sales are lagging as people don't want to buy songs with credit cards online but through their phones. (This is where iPhone comes in) But I think people would be willing to buy TV shows and movies online.

We can buy Pixar Shorts but no Disney. We can't get any TV shows. If we did I would be buying tons.

I bet this problem is not only in Japan.

Is Apple negotiating with companies to sell their TV shows and movies overseas? (24 would be huge here).

As I see it, Apple is just focusing on the US and forgetting the world.

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I could be wrong, but doesn't EyeTV sell in Japan? EyeTV has all kinds of ways of getting content on to an iPod/AppleTV. I recommend all potential buyers of apple TV also budget in the price of an EyeTV product. The best ones to buy are 3rd party analog recievers with a built-in MPEG4 encoder chip, like the Plextor PX-402U, so you have nothing more than a drag+drop to iTunes. EyeTV should also release an update after appleTV ships to contain an h264 export to appleTV's HD format for users of EyeTV's HD product line (I own and am very happy with the EyeTV 500, an ATSC and ClearQAM receiver for mac that plugs in via FireWire). I am curious, can Japan use EyeTV's DVB-T products? If so, you have a solution to your problem, at least as far as HD TV shows go, movies are still an issue, unless broadcast OTA.

Funny enough, I own an xbox 360 and so have no plans to purchase an apple TV, because the 360 is the same price, and does 2x more! I can use my old PC to either transcode to WMV or simply use Vista Media Center Extender. You can do something similar with Connect360 and Flip4Mac WMV studio pro HD, worth about $140 here, 16,474.465 yen over there, as of the time I post this. Of course, all of this hinges on getting a 360, something that until MS revs the CPU will be noisy and big, a problem for Japanese homes as I understand it... oh well, you can always play Blue Dragon too. Do not forget 360 also has an HD-DVD drive, which you can buy if you feel you must charge in to the next-gen format war without waiting to see if HD-DVD or Blu-Ray even wins, unless Sony's PS3 appeals to you (Like if the movies you tend to watch appear more on Blu-Ray than on HD-DVD).
PS3 also can do media playback streamed over home networks, and plays more formats than 360, but I don't feel like paying for the same cost of a gaming PC I can build myself and plug in to my HDTV, and Sony's lineup does not appeal to me until FFXIII comes out here in the US, by which time hopefully the PS3 will be less than $250, the price of the Wii. I am ignoring HD-Blu-DVD until it all settles down and I can get that universal player or whatever for $100.

joshjohnson said:

I could be wrong, but doesn't EyeTV sell in Japan? . I am curious, can Japan use EyeTV's DVB-T products? If so, you have a solution to your problem, at least as far as HD TV shows go, movies are still an issue, unless broadcast OTA.

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Thanks for the advice mate but once again Japan decided to go it alone AGAIN on a format. The HDTV signal is different here - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ISDB-T (well to be fair - NHK has been experimenting with HDTV since the 70's)...So EyeTV is sold in Japan but only the analogue one.....We can buy japan based ones (well only one for the Imac - but its not so good compared with the Eyetv)

So I guess we have to wait more

kashimo said:

I was excited for the AppleTV but since I live in Japan I find it useless.

Apple has yet to negotiate anything to sell TV shows or movies here.

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I live in the US but have not use for and don't intend to buy videos from iTunes but still I may get an Apple TV. Why? I have my own cameras and want to get work that I made unto the TV. Currently if I have HD content there is no way to view it other then on the Mac's screen. I'd like to use the big 1080p LCD in the living room

I assume everyone has this same problem. What to al those millions of people wh own video camera and DSLRs do with all their images?