Show HN: I made an app that helps you find where to stream movies and TV shows

335 points · danilotanic · 21 days ago

I often found myself searching for that one movie or TV show not currently available in my country. Whether it was on Netflix, Apple TV, HBO, or any other platform, the effort to pinpoint the precise country of streaming availability routinely became a burdensome task. Realizing the need for a streamlined solution, I created one. Now you can effortlessly find your desired content and simplify your entertainment journey beyond borders.

166 comments

serial_dev · 20 days ago

Improvement ideas: let the user set their country. If I live in Germany, and I don't want to bother with VPN, knowing that a TV show is available in Argentina and 30 other countries is not important.

Also, I don't think this takes care of the case where some seasons of a show is available but not the others. Maybe that's also the reason for false negatives in some cases (others mentioned this).

Another thing: be able to search by subtitles and audio. In our household, we speak three languages, and I can't watch shows in 2 out of 3 with the standard location. It's also great for people learning languages (common VPN pitch).

Overall, great stuff! The mobile view's information density is very low, I can see 1.7 tiles, so I always need to scroll.

Tapping on the tiles doesn't do anything apart from changing the background.

Some more preset selections would be nice like "Sitcom".

Recommendations based on the selected movie would be also great, for example when I'm watching HIMYM, I'd not mind seeing where Friends is available (it's basically the same jokes but a decade apart with different actors).

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soci · 20 days ago

At first, I thought you built a justwatch.com clone. But, after a quick inspection I realized you solve a related but different use-case where the user already paid for the streaming service holding the rights to the media, but not necessarily match the user’s country location. By enabling the user to check in what countries the media is available you also unlock a new business model based on VPN affiliation programs (brilliant!) instead of streaming service affiliation programs like justwatch does. I wonder if both revenues models are complementary in the long run.

It’s nuts that watching media from another country for a streaming service I pay for is as easy as changing my IP to the desired country. Does it really work in this way?

Also, I hope you can provide some light on whether you are gaining any traction and unlocking vpn subcriptions revenue.

Suggestion: let the user select from what country it connects And/or automatically detect it. I’m in Europe and it’s confusing it offers me to stream from my own country using a vpn.

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eps · 20 days ago

From what I see this looks like an affiliate link farm for NordVPN.

Every single movie I tried shows up as being not available in my country with "Stream with NordVPN" slapped next to it. Even though they are available just fine.

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oefrha · 20 days ago

> the effort to pinpoint the precise country of streaming availability routinely became a burdensome task.

Which is why bittorrenting, TPB and shit are making a roaring comeback (if it ever faded).

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highwaylights · 20 days ago

This is really neat. I hope you dont mind some feedback as I’ve used a few web apps like this in the past and have a fair idea of my own needs as a user that you may or may not find useful:

I think your app would really benefit from letting me pick the country upfront (I.e. in the header). After this it would be useful to see the streaming options as soon as I’ve selected a movie or tv show with one-click, and with the free options at the top of the list.

Beyond that, it would be nice if you could link me directly to the streaming site’s player page so that I can begin watching right away.

Another really neat use for this would be an app for Android TV/Roku/Apple TV that lets me browse and link directly to content. They all have their own implementations of this but they’re pretty inconsistent when it comes to gaps in supported services.

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