Rhapsody in Canada?

[mconway]

Is Rhapsody available to Canadians via Squeezenetwork? I went to squeezenetwork.com and it is not listed as one of the available services. When I changed my country to the US from Canada, the Rhapsody tab suddenly was available. From rhapsody.com, Canada is listed as one of the countries available so what's up with Squeezecenter?

Edit. I just had a look at the Rhaposdy signup page again and while Canada is listed under country/region, billing seems to be for US only. This seems a tad ambiguous. If it is not available to Canada then how is it I'm listening to it as we speak through my Denon AVR-3808CI, Rhapsody being one of the new features offered in Denon's recent upgrade pack?

[tedfroop]

Nope. No Rhapsody, no Pandora, no Slacker unless you want to do it illegally. Has to do with copyright issues I have been told.

I better leave it at that. If I get started on the subject I might get kicked out of here....

[mconway]

Well, that sucks. Probably the doing of that dinosaur known as the CRTC. It was only earlier today that I started the free trial on my Denon and it had me hooked almost immediately. Obviously they can't be blocking IP's as it works perfectly on my AVR. Maybe I'll have to look at, ahem, workarounds.

[toby10]

Is Rhapsody available to Canadians via Squeezenetwork? I went to squeezenetwork.com and it is not listed as one of the available services. When I changed my country to the US from Canada, the Rhapsody tab suddenly was available. From rhapsody.com, Canada is listed as one of the countries available so what's up with Squeezecenter?

Edit. I just had a look at the Rhapsody signup page again and while Canada is listed under country/region, billing seems to be for US only. This seems a tad ambiguous. If it is not available to Canada then how is it I'm listening to it as we speak through my Denon AVR-3808CI, Rhapsody being one of the new features offered in Denon's recent upgrade pack?

I don't know if Rhapsody is ISP blocked from Canada. It may be how your Denon connects that allows you to access Rhapsody via your Denon AVR.

I use a Yamaha networked AVR. Most of these hardware devices like AVR's use a single source for all internet radio streams, usually a service called vTuner. vTuner is basically the same as ShoutCast and Live365 except they concentrate on hardware licensing for accessing their radio database.

Yamaha & Pioneer (and I'll bet your Denon) go directly to that manufacturers radio streaming server, where that central server get's all it's "feeds" from vTuner.

Your AVR > your ISP > Denon music server (probably US based) > vTuner

So I'm guessing you may be "tricking" the Rhapsody ISP blocking (if it exists) cuz Rhapsody sees you as located wherever your Denon central server is, whether they use vTuner or not.

[BrockStone]

I believe it is more simple than that.

They let you do the free trial from anywhere. You just can't sign up to the service unless you live in the US. I had the full 30 day subscription on my Squeezebox when I first set it up. Went to subscribe after the 30 days, nope, sorry.

I was told it's due to the accounting/paying of the RIAA that goes on. They'd need to set something up with Canada's equivalent.

[toby10]

I believe it is more simple than that.

They let you do the free trial from anywhere. You just can't sign up to the service unless you live in the US. I had the full 30 day subscription on my Squeezebox when I first set it up. Went to subscribe after the 30 days, nope, sorry.

I was told it's due to the accounting/paying of the RIAA that goes on. They'd need to set something up with Canada's equivalent.

Yeah, it may well be that simple. Here is a link to Denon Canada that specifically states:
* Please Note: Rhapsody Internet Radio Service is not available in Canada.

http://ca.denon.com/upgrade/

Are you able to get a Rhapsody 30 day trial on any device in Canada? Or just certain "pre-authorized" devices like the Denon?

What seems odd to me is if you can get the 30 day trial from anywhere then how is Rhapsody not in violation of their agreement with the RIAA to not allow streaming outside of the US?
I suppose they may have a special agreement to allow this, dunno. But interesting..........

[andyg]

On Oct 12, 2008, at 6:55 AM, toby10 wrote:

>
> BrockStone;349072 Wrote:
>> I believe it is more simple than that.
>>
>> They let you do the free trial from anywhere. You just can't sign up
>> to the service unless you live in the US. I had the full 30 day
>> subscription on my Squeezebox when I first set it up. Went to
>> subscribe after the 30 days, nope, sorry.
>>
>> I was told it's due to the accounting/paying of the RIAA that goes
>> on.
>> They'd need to set something up with Canada's equivalent.
>
> Yeah, it may well be that simple. Here is a link to Denon Canada that
> specifically states:
> * Please Note: Rhapsody Internet Radio Service is not available in
> Canada.
>
> http://ca.denon.com/upgrade/
>
> Are you able to get a Rhapsody 30 day trial on any device in Canada?
> Or just certain "pre-authorized" devices like the Denon?
>
> What seems odd to me is if you can get the 30 day trial from anywhere
> then how is Rhapsody not in violation of their agreement with the RIAA
> to not allow streaming outside of the US?
> I suppose they may have a special agreement to allow this, dunno. But
> interesting..........

The free trial we offer is only available to US users.

[toby10]

The free trial we offer is only available to US users.

Thanks Andy. Is this an SD hardware/server limitation imposed by Rhapsody? Or a Rhapsody limitation in general?
I'm still suspecting that the Denon music server is US based and that is how the OP's Denon AVR is getting around the ISP border restriction.

Denon does use the vTuner service as I suspected.