What is Hulu?

Category: Television

"I checked out Hulu and was impressed by the amount of popular TV shows available for free there. Almost seems too good to be true, so… is it?"



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Hulu - TV Shows and Movies Online

Hulu Online TV With the rising demand for TV and movie content available online, many Internet companies have been working hard to give consumers what they want. With P2P services like Bittorrent and LimeWire, it's easy to download movies and TV shows, but doing so can get you in legal trouble. (See Sued For Downloading.) However, Hulu offers a solution to legal issues and copyright problems associated with downloading and watching TV shows and movies online.

Hulu enables you to watch popular TV shows and movies online. No downloads required. No cost. We're not talking small and unheard of shows and Youtube-quality home movies, either. Hulu is home to popular network TV shows and films you would find on TV. Hulu has thousands of videos and movies from Fox, E! Entertainment, MGM, Sony, NBC and many, many more. Popular shows like The Simpsons, The Office, House, Firefly and others are archived and made available for audiences. They are all archived and you can view the content by genre, or alphabetical order, or by doing a search.

The content is viewed online. No need to download the movie or even some sort of application to view. If you have Flash 9 or better, you should be able to view the programs you want. You can view the programs in your screen, in a pop up window, or view the show in a full screen setting. The content is pretty fast loading as well.

Hulu Subscriptions And How It Works

You don't need to subscribe to Hulu to try it out. A number of TV shows and movies can be viewed without signing up. Signing up for Hulu is completely free though, and worthwhile. Signing up for the site makes it possible for users to save their favorites and subscribe to shows.

There is a queue, which acts sort of like your own personal DVR. You can add your selections to a list to be played. You can also sign up and subscribe to your favorite shows. When another new episode is added, you are notified so you can watch it.

For now, only people in the United States are permitted to view the content of Hulu. There are plans to make it available worldwide when possible. It comes down to intellectual property rights and those contacts that Hulu must agree to. They hope to make Hulu available in more areas in the very near future, as the work out contracts with the entertainment companies.

Joost Versus Hulu

Joost is similar to Hulu. It offers a way to view programs for free when you like. You can sign up and view different movies and TV shows. Joost offers a different variety of content, so you're not just signing up for two different sites that have the same content. (See also What is Joost? for more info.)

A big difference between the two is that Joost requires you to download a specific player in order to view the content. Joost starts out as a 10 MB download and expands to about 50 MB, but then you have to download the films and store them in a cache, which can be as much as 1 Gig of space after just 10 hours of watching. Hulu requires no downloading. It only requires Flash 9 or better and a fast Internet connection.

While both sites allow you to share films with friends via sending them email or inviting them to sign up, Hulu also allows you to embed films into your website. You can embed the whole film, or just show your favorite clips. Joost offers a feature of watching at the same time as your friends, and chatting with them in the window while you are watching.

Hulu appears that it will give Joost a good amount of competition, especially when it comes down to ease of use. It probably comes down to your preferences of shows and which one happens to have that particular film or show at that time. One bonus for Joost is that some of the content is available at different geographical locations outside of the United States. The website will let you know which programs you are able to view.

In all, Hulu offers a nice alternative to having to watch your favorite TV shows when it is shown on actual television. It is nice to be able to view the shows when you want. If you missed an episode, you can go back and review it before catching up on next week's on TV. Hulu's version of video on demand is bound to become a very popular way of viewing films online.

Got comments or questions about Hulu? Post your thoughts below...


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Posted by Bob Rankin on April 28, 2008 08:33 PM


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Related Keywords: Television   Hulu   Joost   online TV   download   bittorrent   limewire   p2p  

Most recent comments on "What is Hulu?"

Posted by:

MmeMoxie
04 Jun 2008

Bob - Hulu is fantastic!!! While there aren't that many shows yet, I think it can only grow and grow. The quality of videos is excellent, in my book, just like watching on a good TV.

I also downloaded Joost and watch it for a bit, but it's interface to way to 'busy' for my taste. Plus, some of the main programs I am truly interested in, aren't available in the USA. Bummer.

However, I did take the opportunity to sign-up for both, but plan on using Hulu a lot. Thanks for sharing this with us.


Posted by:

Richard Weaver
13 Oct 2008

I am a current subscriber to Hulu and I love it! Several shows that I did not know were currently showing on TV are available on Hulu for me to enjoy at MY leasure! Also there are some movies and TV serise I have not seen in years and that I get to enoy once again. I recomend this site to anyone!!


Posted by:

Marcus
14 Oct 2008

Very good review! The only problem I've got with Hulu is that the Flash player they have does not cache the video at all, as Youtube does. This makes the playing of the tv all stuttery (since I dont have the best connection). Doesnt even help to let it stand for a few minutes to start download the content ahead since it doesn't cache it. Joost is much better with caching.


Posted by:

Bon
08 Apr 2009

Bob, I love Hulu and watch it sometimes more than TV. When hurricanes Gustav and Ike came through Louisiana my satellite went down. They couldn't fix it for a long time so I grew very fond of Hulu. I actually canceled my Dish network there because I was moving out of state in a couple months and didn't want to bother. Thanks for all your helpful information.


Posted by:

AWK
08 Apr 2009

Bob - We've enjoyed the TOURBUS for several years now; especially your reviews. We've watched both HULU and JOOST since their inception. We particularly liked the high-quality picture and sound with JOOST's original downloadable player, but they discontinued that service in the Fall of 2008. Their current in-site player is comparable to HULU's, so now we'd rate them as pretty much equal to one another. Since they both have small caches, each suffers from some glitches in pix & audio when there's network congestion. Also, TV.com isn't bad as a third choice. All have a wide variety of RECORDED content. For LIVE content, we especially like TVuNetworks.com We prefer their downloadable player, but their in-site player isn't bad either. Their quality is definitely not consistent, as the content comes from worldwide sources that vary greatly - but we like the variety of choices. P.S. We often forward the TOURBUS on to friends who don't know about it. Great job! ~ AWK


Posted by:

Kendra
08 Apr 2009

Does Hulu support closed-captioning? Many TV shows are captioned on the air (they're required to be) so I was wondering if the same programs would also be captioned on Hulu. It wouldn't do much good to be able to watch a program if we wouldn't be able to understand it - a beef I have with most internet videos. Please let us know. Thanks!

EDITOR'S NOTE: There are a few dozen shows on Hulu that have captioning. I expect the number will continue to rise. While searching at Hulu, look for (cc) which indicates captioning for that show.


Posted by:

Zeke Krahlin
19 Aug 2009

I just discovered Hulu last week, and am going nuts over all the great shows. I've never had cable or satellite, just the airwaves...so I finally get to see a lot of the fun and informative shows that I've been missing out on for years. Plus, my social security income means I can't even afford my own high speed access...but thanks to public wifi, I can march on down to my local coffeehouse and hunker down to watching some cool shows over a steaming cup of java and a chunk of cinammon coffee crumbcake.

I don't subscribe to Joost, because I use Linux only.


Posted by:

Steven Nowak
05 Sep 2009

Like all .tv wannabe solutions on the Internet including Hulu, Ustream, You-Tube, Google, MSN, CNN, CBSSports.com, etc. They forgot one major clue!

Video live streaming on the Internet is not based on the normal transmission of bits and bytes that they normally could control and sync. to their networks. This requires professionals that know what large files and quality to stream live video is all about. These boys should have asked the IP security professionals that have been doing this for over 2 decades.

You-Tube created a sensation on a few boys that allowed edited videos to draw attention that people love to see video. After Google bought them for 1.75 billion in 2007, Google is no better off today in 2009 than they were when they had the cash to splurge. Why? Because they can get away with stupid.

Forget what you know, understand what you don't! That is the difference of all Internet .tv channels on the Internet today in September 4, 2009. Flash, and all media players and active x controllers will never sync quality .tv clones. Why?

Because all of their so called expertise depends on the users computer and broadband connection. When they figure that out, like I have, then they can graduate to not a wanna be .tv clone, but master what all tv/radio/print cannot do!

EDITOR'S NOTE: I have no idea what you're trying to say. You figured out some secret to... what? Mastering all forms of media? Are there tinfoil hats involved?


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