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Last spring, spanish subtitles for Lost were consistently up 24 hours after an episode would air in the US. And better translated than the official dubbing that came up 4 month later. Do not underestimate the power of sheer passion, my friend.

I agree, but we were comparing two "legal ways" : Buy the U.S. DVDs or waiting the "local" DVDs ; not other :pirate: solutions.

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I have no idea whether or not Swedish television will pick up the series, but regardless, I will download episodes from the internet. First of all because it's the fastest way, I can watch it right after it has been broadcasted in 'merica. Second of all, I don't actually own a television set. Will buy it on bluray/DVD as soon as it is released on such, though.

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Some corporative high-salary HBO mastermind should just figure out a way to let people watch things online after paying a fee. I mean, Anazon is selling books, iTunes is selling music, why can´t HBO sell their shows? It ca´t be that difficult, and it sure as hell would be profitable. I am seriously considering cancelling my cable suscription seeing as I only seem to be watching things on Internet now. There are things I can´t wait 1 week for, let alone a year. Who in his right mind would wait a year to watch GOT? Is it my fault I happen to be spanish?

I completely agree. I hail from the bullskin too and seeing things legally in Spain is a real pain. You have to wait for a channel to decide to air it first. Some things which are having a very big success they have done very quickly (House) while others they've sure taken their time with (Sopranos). It's anybody's guess when or who will decide to air AGOT and whether it will be aired by a public or cable channel (and what company cable, at that...), but chances are it will be 6 months to a year after the series has finished abroad.

Dubbing in Spanish is also like rolling a dice, some of it is pretty good, but some of it is awful. I'd rather see the series in its original language.

It's pretty silly, because I'd be perfectly happy to buy something and must resort to other means simply because the seller won't sell because of where I happen to live. If he did, he'd get my business and my money, since he doesn't I'll have to download. I'll buy the DVD when it comes out, of course. Probably the UK version rather than the Spanish one, though.

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I'm so frikkin glad that the Dutch do not dub anything (well some kids programs they dub). Subtitles all the way!

If HBO makes sure I can resort to legal ways of seeing the show at the same time the US can I will do that. If not, as said above, piracy it's gonna be.

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I completely agree. I hail from the bullskin too and seeing things legally in Spain is a real pain. You have to wait for a channel to decide to air it first. Some things which are having a very big success they have done very quickly (House) while others they've sure taken their time with (Sopranos). It's anybody's guess when or who will decide to air AGOT and whether it will be aired by a public or cable channel (and what company cable, at that...), but chances are it will be 6 months to a year after the series has finished abroad.

Dubbing in Spanish is also like rolling a dice, some of it is pretty good, but some of it is awful. I'd rather see the series in its original language.

It's pretty silly, because I'd be perfectly happy to buy something and must resort to other means simply because the seller won't sell because of where I happen to live. If he did, he'd get my business and my money, since he doesn't I'll have to download. I'll buy the DVD when it comes out, of course. Probably the UK version rather than the Spanish one, though.

The question is, we don't have the possibility to get it legally. Which is absurd, and leads to the logical conclusion that a lot of people will get it anyway, and for free. Stupid.

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Back in the days of high-powered transmitters, most of the Republic could pick up the TV signals passively from transmitters in Northern Ireland and Wales without a problem, so I think they did a deal with the BBC so they could retransmit the service across the whole country. The number of Irish EastEnders fans I encountered when I lived in the far west of Ireland was quite surprising :)

Same is true of the Netherlands, Belgium and France, large chunks of which along the coast picked up the TV overspill from Britain, and again as they got used to having those TV services the national governments made deals with the BBC to continue showing the channels even as the transmitters got toned down and after they're all switched off across the next couple of years (actually, maybe not in France, I'm not sure).

Aha! So the Irish are a nation of theives! :P

It's actually possible to get Radio Scotland MW in Germany.

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It is important to remember that the BBC are cofunding Game of Thrones, which automatically gives them transmission rights in the UK. The question mark is how quickly they will show the series. Recently the BBC were going the right way by showing Heroes within one week of US broadcast, but they've just announced that they might wait until January to show Season 4, five months after it debuts in the USA, which is a retrograde step. They've also only just started showing The Tudors when S3 was completed months ago in the USA and they've actually started filming S4 (I believe).

So it's up in the air. The BBC may show it straight away or they may wait months, as they did with Rome despite the fact they were also cofunding it.

I would think (read: hope) that by the time Thrones is screened, the Powers That Be will have realised just how easily things get leaked onto the internet, and that trying to stop a huge fanbase of fantasy geeks from downloading it illegally if you make them wait a year before you screen it yourself is probably impossible. And therefore the BBC will end up showing it really soon after it's shown in HBO, if not pretty much simultaneously. I know I'm always far too law-abiding for my own good and will end up waiting, if they don't :(

Maybe it'll depend on how successful they think it'll be? And how much buzz we can drum up?

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I would think the Powers That Be will have realised just how easily things get leaked onto the internet, and that trying to stop a huge fanbase of fantasy geeks from downloading it illegally if you make them wait a year before you screen it yourself is probably impossible.

Problem is, they should have realised that like a year ago (see the previous post about shows being up and subbed 24 hours after US release). Also, see the example of Fullmetal Brotherhood - a cult anime series that airs on Sundays in Japan and has this pioneer deal going on: they show it subbed, free and legal on YouTube for the whole Europe on the following Wednesdays. People still mostly watch it fansubbed on Mondays. So it´s not even a money problem, it´s the fact that even a 3 day wait is just too much for a real geek.

The really sad thing is, I WANT TO PAY FOR THE SHOW. Really. ASAP. I want to give HBO a bit of my money so that they won´t think of cancelling it. And I can´t pay. What kind of a crazy world is this?

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Aha! So the Irish are a nation of theives! :P

How is making a deal to redistribute something stealing it?

Anyway, I hope HBO create some way for international fans to download on a per-episode basis. There are a lot of people out there who would pay to get it immediately if they could, but won't restrict themselves from getting the content in some other way if they're not allowed to pay for it (but will buy the DVDs when they come out).

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Aha! So the Irish are a nation of theives! :P

It's actually possible to get Radio Scotland MW in Germany.

A few months ago I would have said you can have McGeady, the stupid dope. But now he has actually improved and I will grudgingly put up with him.

We're not thieves in that sense of the word. We just know how to acquire things.... :lol:

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I see Swedish TV has just signed a deal with HBO to air HBO series episodes for 14 days after the episode airs in the U.S. So, hey, to our Swedish friends--you guys can watch each episode of GoT for TWO WEEKS IN A ROW if you want! Skoal!

SVT lines up HBO online in Sweden

Swedish Television to draw 'Blood' on the Web

By GUNNAR REHLIN

STOCKHOLM -- Pubcaster Swedish Television will show HBO series on-demand online at SVT Play for 14 days after an episode has aired on SVT channels.

The service starts this week with "Little Britain USA" and the first season of "True Blood." In November, "John Adams²" will be given the same treatment.

"Our goal is to offer the audience our total output at SVT Play. This deal with HBO is a very important step on the way there," said SVT program manager Lena Glaser.

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the problem I have with internet vs TV is the quality.... but whatever means possible....

Back when I lived in Mexico they would show Monday Night Football games on the cinema, it was quite cool! you would be able to buy bear and watch football on huge screens and all.... I was thinking that if HBO permitted airings for their shows on cinemas in Europe they would get some nice money out of it and keep the people happy.... just an idea....

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Ok so basically, I don't want to wait till someone decided to pick up the series and air it in Greece, which can by anything from 6 months to a few years after it aired in the US. I don't want to wait till the DVDs come out either. By that time, I will have suffered some sort of disease as a result of the horrid anticipation. If it was possible, I would stand by the editor while he/she is cutting the show together. Even better, I'd even want to be there at the filming, to catch a glimpse of it while its being filmed.

Thankfully, there is a nice community of people around somewhere on the Internetz that subtitles shows and movies, mostly about 24 hours after the original screening (LOST took less than that last season, was about half a day later), and mostly with much better quality of translation. I'll give you an example of what I mean. The official translation of the LOTRO movies sucked, mainly because the translator was unfamiliar with the fantasy terminology. Gandalf's "staff" was translated into Greek by a word meaning "things", since the translator thought it was "stuff", and the "scouters" that went ahead of the Roan people to check out for bad guys where translated into the word meaning "boy scout" in Greek, because the translator obviously didn't know that there is a whole other meaning of scout than kiddies in shorts. The unofficial translation, however, not only avoided these sorts of mistakes, but also was exact and precise.

So I will watch it however fastest I can. When the DVDs come out, I will buy them, to encourage HBO to make me some more. I promise. I also promise I will rewatch it when it officially airs in Greece, to encourage our local providers to buy the shows on time and air them fast.

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Gandalf's "staff" was translated into Greek by a word meaning "things", since the translator thought it was "stuff".

You (or rather the translator) just made me spill my coffee. This one I will share with my Gandalf fanboy friends for sure.

I am fully with you on the translation issue. European channels should just let some fans do the job for them (because in Spain, it´d be totally impossible to air a subbed show- we are just that lazy with lenguages). The worst problem is that people who have to watch the dubbed version get a very different (much worse) image of the show. And the better the original script, the more abysmal the quality difference. Witty, instant win one-liners and deep, meaningful one-liners get the worst part. Even when the script lines = book lines, for some reason they just translate it all over and never bother to check how the book version went.

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I am fully with you on the translation issue. European channels should just let some fans do the job for them (because in Spain, it´d be totally impossible to air a subbed show- we are just that lazy with lenguages).

Sadly true. This happens even with books, if you are not lucky and the version in your hands wasn't translated by a skillful geek; sometimes you read something that obviously has not sense, and you get the joke just after reading the original english version. Spanish is a great language for some purposes (like insult and colourful blasphemy), but for short, witty lines the translation is often very difficult.

In fact, I read ASOIAF in english because the spanish translation sucks.

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In fact, I read ASOIAF in english because the spanish translation sucks.

I don't think the Spanish translation is that bad. I really like Invernalia for Winterfell (I named my WoW main Invernalia :P).

I read the two first books in Spanish before getting Storm in English, and I really enjoyed them (and bad Spanish translations usually stick out a lot for me).

As a thread-jacking bad translation anecdote I'll share a jewel from Timothy Zahn's Star Wars trilogy.

In the trilogy Han and Luke refered to Storm Troopers as Troopers and Speeder Bikes as Bikes. The Spanish translator, (who had the perfect movie references available to him), translated trooper for an extremely outdated word for soldier (the trooper in Iron Maiden's The Trooper), and bike for the kind of bike with wheels and pedals. The result was hilarious ("los milicianos avanzaron por el bosque montados sobre sus bicicletas" for the Spanish inclined).

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because in Spain, it´d be totally impossible to air a subbed show- we are just that lazy with lenguages

Yeah, why do you do that? I find subbed shows in any language horrible...I remeber being in Spain and opening the TV in the hotel to see Obi Wan Kenobi in Episode I speaking Spanish. The horror!!

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Yeah, why do you do that? I find subbed shows in any language horrible...I remeber being in Spain and opening the TV in the hotel to see Obi Wan Kenobi in Episode I speaking Spanish. The horror!!

Really don't know why... I think it's an inheritance from the franquism; 35 years ago there was simply NO WAY to see anything in other languages, everything (which was not much) was doubled, and there is a doubling business associated to the show business. Or perhaps we are just lazy :dunno:

Now it is possible to see much (some) TV in original languages, but if you want to see a movie just a few theatres (in big cities) allow you to hear the original version.

And I'm sorry, but I still think that the spanish translation of ASOIAF sucks :whip: :D I will never get used to Matarreyes (not personal insult intended!! :P ), Altojardín, Invernalia, Desembarco del Rey... :o It was SO unnecessary to translate the names! What if Luke Skywalker were Luke Caminante del Cielo?? :ack:

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And I'm sorry, but I still think that the spanish translation of ASOIAF sucks :whip: :D I will never get used to Matarreyes (not personal insult intended!! :P ), Altojardín, Invernalia, Desembarco del Rey... :o It was SO unnecessary to translate the names! What if Luke Skywalker were Luke Caminante del Cielo?? :ack:

I disagree. When names have a meaning or connotation, if you decide not to translate it is lost on all the readers who can't speak the source language. Matarreyes is a perfect example. Kingslayer might sound cool to some (though maybe not to others), but if you don't speak English it's not a constant reminder of the fact that Jaime murdered the king he was supposed to protect. Winterfell might sound better to you than Invernalia (though I prefer the later), but to a Spanish reader who doesn't speak English it's Invernalia that keeps the winter connotations which Winterfell won't have.

Caminante del Cielo is far too long (3 words for one), but the bastard surnames in ASOIAF, for instance, are perfectly suited for translation, and keep the idea that bastards are given common words for surnames.

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