title: How do I get netcat to accept connections from outside the LAN?
body: <p>I'm using netcat as a backend to shovel data back and forth for a program I'm making. I tested my program on the local network, and once it worked I thought it would be a matter of simply forwarding a port from my router to have my program work over the internet. Alas! This seems not to be the case.</p>
  
  <p>If I start netcat listening on port 6666 with:</p>
  
  <p><code>nc -vv -l -p 6666</code>,</p>
  
  <p>then go to <code>127.0.0.1:6666</code> in a browser, as expected I see a HTTP GET request come through netcat (and my browser sits waiting in vain). If I go to <code>my.external.ip.address:6666</code>, however, nothing comes through at all and the browser displays 'could not connect to <code>my.external.ip.address:6666</code>'. </p>
  
  <p>I know that the port is correctly forwarded, as www.canyouseeme.org says port 6666 is open (and when netcat is not listening, that its closed). </p>
  
  <p>If I run netcat with <code>-g my.adslmodem's.local.address</code> to set the gateway address, I get the same behavior. Am I using this command line option correctly? Any insight as to what I'm doing wrong?</p>