Hulu

I have been telling family and friends about this service for a while now but apparently they are not in the loop. Or maybe it is because I really do have no life. Whatever the case I have been performing an unofficial and financially imposed experiment where I don't watch TV. I know that's been done and probably for the same reason (like most starving college kids we can't pay the bill for another week) but I am going to see if I can survive off of online content only because that bill always gets paid...that and food. I am, for the same reason, doing my online content on the cheap, or in the case of Hulu.com, free! Now this experiment will probably last until I get to the upcoming payday, but I may not go back to watching TV.

Granted this is not for everyone. There is a small but growing catalog of films including documentaries, action flicks, drama, comedies, and more available on Hulu. The TV content on Hulu, if recent, is usually a day or several behind live broadcasts on the actual tube. For me that is no big deal. The only show I try to catch every week is Burn Notice and it comes on Hulu the day after airing so I have no qualms. For me the best part of Hulu is catching up on TV. After getting out of the Navy I realized that there was a pop culture hole in my life the corresponded to the four years I spent sailing the seven seas as I cruised around Hulu discovering all kinds of thing's I've missed like Hero's season two (I am going to go back and buy season one when I get paid!) and Firefly, which I saw the movie but never watched the series and The Dresden Files which I never saw before but loved!

Speaking of Firefly, Hulu made a big splash in the whole digital streaming content marketing sceam scean (say that five times fast) with Joss Whedon who created Firefly, Buffy, and Angel, recently released Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog to the masses via Hulu only. There is a version available to purchase online on iTunes and you can still stream it on Hulu but the show which was originally launched as three acts was broadcast online only. There was no TV or movie or strait to DVD option here. The low budget, under an hour musical romantic comedy has generated some huge buzz and is extremely entertaining...especially if you want to see NPH sing! That's right, Neil Patrick Harris (a.k.a Doogie Howser, M.D., the blog father who is available to watch on Hulu) stars as Dr. Horrible. It's a pretty great gig and Whedon's strategy is great. Random people like me bable on endlessly about how this is the wave of the future.

And I really think this is where we are headed. Verizon is pushing out more and more fiber optic cable to more people and AT&T is doing something similar. These connections will actually increase a connection almost ten fold and still have room for live TV streaming simultaneously. Pretty impressive. So jump on the wave and watch something for free...or at least add based. It's a pretty small price to pay to sit through a couple 30 second adds to watch Pitch Black or Battlestar Galactica for free!

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Brian
http://bmbufalo.blogspot.com