Auto-detect my location making Google Play useless! Help please

[lutus]

Hi everyone! I thought to ask you all about something that drives me nuts...

I've been using the Asus transformer for my recent travels, and what I discovered is that the Google Store automatically adapts not only the language, but the ENITRE content of my search, according to my location... how unfortunate !!!

I'll explain - I went on a 3-week tour to Sapin, and at some point I wanted to buy an eBook for a long train ride.. I searched for some, and the only results were for eBooks in Spanish - nothing at all in english!! even the books that are originally written in English appear in their Spanish translation

A month after, I traveled to Germany, and decided to buy a movie via the Google Play. Again in my search results I got only movies in German - and again, even the Holywood movies were ALL DUBBED in German!!! this is insane!

And I'll also mention that the entire interface of the Google Play shifts entirely to Spanish/German, depending on my current location.

I've just ended a chat with google's customer service staff, who wrote me that there is no way around this limitation. Furthermore, I was advised by him to download the movies or ebooks I want prior to my travel to a foreig country.

Well, what an Idiotic idea it is to assume that I would prefer to read/view content in the local language, just because I visit there?!?!

That's a big flaw for me, as an expat - I will not be able to access to stuff written or shown in my native language, unless I fly back and download from there... isn't that completely insane?

Please let me know if there IS a way around this, either by using an app that sorts this out, or anything else... I will be so grateful for your advice!!

 

[funkylogik]

As far as i know there isnt a workaround man. Even using a VPN doesnt seem to affect Play. Certain content isnt legal in certain countries or whatever so google have to make it area specific. Talk to Miketd on here lol. He's in CHINA!

 

[mikedt]

As far as i know there isnt a workaround man. Even using a VPN doesnt seem to affect Play. Certain content isnt legal in certain countries or whatever so google have to make it area specific. Talk to Miketd on here lol. He's in CHINA!

I'm sure it's mainly to do with the rights holders, Hollywood, the music industry and book publishers. Like if they only want German language movies and books in Germany and not English, then Google has to comply. It sucks I know, but then that's the media industry, MPAA, RIAA etc. and their old fashioned business model. Yeh, some books and movies might be illegal in certain countries, and Google has to comply.

You go into a real bookshop in Spain, you're going to find books in Spanish, and presumably the publishers want the online world of ebooks reflect that by geo-restricting where their copyrighted books are available. Same thing for movies, TV shows, music, etc. Thing is, as Funky pointed out, I'm an expat in China and Google doesn't distribute any ebooks, movies or music here at all. All the books I find in a bookshop are in Chinese naturally, and they all have printed on the inside, "For sale in The People's Republic of China only". Distribution rights with the publishers have to be negotiated on a country by country basis, including translated versions, and Google can't break that.

IMO the only thing this geo-restricting of content achieves, is that it turns ordinary law abiding people into thieves.

 

[funkylogik]

Got your name wrong i noticed mate soz :beer:

 

[mikedt]

Hi everyone! I thought to ask you all about something that drives me nuts...

I've been using the Asus transformer for my recent travels, and what I discovered is that the Google Store automatically adapts not only the language, but the ENITRE content of my search, according to my location... how unfortunate !!!

I'll explain - I went on a 3-week tour to Sapin, and at some point I wanted to buy an eBook for a long train ride.. I searched for some, and the only results were for eBooks in Spanish - nothing at all in english!! even the books that are originally written in English appear in their Spanish translation

A month after, I traveled to Germany, and decided to buy a movie via the Google Play. Again in my search results I got only movies in German - and again, even the Holywood movies were ALL DUBBED in German!!! this is insane!

And I'll also mention that the entire interface of the Google Play shifts entirely to Spanish/German, depending on my current location.

I've just ended a chat with google's customer service staff, who wrote me that there is no way around this limitation. Furthermore, I was advised by him to download the movies or ebooks I want prior to my travel to a foreig country.

Well, what an Idiotic idea it is to assume that I would prefer to read/view content in the local language, just because I visit there?!?!

That's a big flaw for me, as an expat - I will not be able to access to stuff written or shown in my native language, unless I fly back and download from there... isn't that completely insane?

You may not even be able to do that mate...
Travellers Beware: Google Play Might Delete All Your Books | Gizmodo UK

Eric Limer -
It