You might not think it, but traveling can be extremely boring! A day of in the life of a traveler isn't at all like the movies. The movies show you all the good stuff - museums, parties, quirky taxi drivers, interesting conversations on the train, and fast forward back to the hotel. What they fail to include is all the boring stuff in between - missed busses, 10 hour train rides, delayed flights, waiting in line, buying tickets, and pure exhaustion. Don't get me wrong, traveling is my all time favorite hobby, but there is a lot of down time to fill, and you can't always read a book when you're waiting in a smoke filled, humid Chinese train station with crying kids sitting next to you. This is why I cherish my mobile entertainment, and always make sure I get a US IP address on my phone and laptop when I travel.

iOS devices (iPad/iTouch/iPhone), Android devices (Smart Phone/Tablet), Macs, and PCs are now all able to access US entertainment sites like Hulu, Netflix, and Pandora. The only condition is that you have a US IP address to access these sites. This is not a restriction on your device, its a restriction put in place by these websites. It probably has to do something with advertising and distribution rights, but the details aren't important. What is important is that you won't be able to access these sites with anything other than an American IP.

While there are a number of ways to change your IP address, not all will open up American sites. For example, "changing" your IP can be interpreted a couple of ways, and some users are able to change their IP by altering the proxy settings on their browser, or manually changing the IP of their phone or laptop. The issue with these methods is that they don't hide your real IP. Many open proxies for example, while they unblock sites you've been banned from, will still expose the fact that their proxy, and Netflix/Hulu block proxies. Manually changing your IP can also unblock sites, but again, the non-US IP won't allow you to stream video from these sites.

Virtual private networks solve these issues. VPNs combine basically two types of technology to hide your real IP, and replace it with an IP from The USA. When you sign into a VPN server in The USA, your data is encrypted using SSL encryption - the same kind of security shopping and membership sites use to keep you membership information secret. This means that there's no risk of your real IP being exposed, because only you and the VPN server have the key to access this information. The other thing a VPN does is "tunnel" your information to and from the VPN server. This is more related to security that hiding your IP, but still, it's important to give your data a safe path as it travels halfway around the world.

Once connected to a VPN server, you're then assigned an IP address from that location. If the VPN server is in The UK, you get a British IP address. IF the sever is in japan, you get a Japanese IP. The same works for The US - if you sign into a VPN server in The USA, you get a US IP address. This kind of IP will get you past any firewalls, and allow you to access an already existing membership account, or set up a new one, depending on what site you want to gain access to.

And just like that, you have automatic filler entertainment when you have to wait three hours for a late bus, or have half a day layover at the airport. If you're going to be traveling for a while, you can even use this to keep up on your favorite TV shows, or watch some documentaries or travel videos about the places you're going. The possibilities are endless, and they're right there in your pocket.