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Subscription-Based 'Hulu Plus' Is Now Official

Posted by kdawson on from the whenever-wherever dept.

itwbennett writes "After months of rumors, Hulu officially announced its $9.99/month Hulu Plus service. Invites will soon start rolling out in weekly batches. So what will you get for that $9.99? 'Full access to a bunch of current shows (Hulu lists 40 but adds 'and more' to that list) as well as complete series collections of some older titles such as The X-Files, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, and the wonderful and mostly-ignored Eli Stone,' writes blogger Peter Smith. 'HD content sources will be streamed at 720P but Hulu mentions that the service is ad-supported.'"

19 of 434 comments (clear)

  1. HD Sources by therealobsideus · · Score: 5, Insightful

    So not only will I be paying $9.99 but I'll also be watching ads? Hmm... no.

    1. Re:HD Sources by Psyborgue · · Score: 4, Informative

      Netflix already does that. HD too, even on pc.

  2. Wait... by TheGreatHegemon · · Score: 4, Insightful

    So you pay 9.99, and then still have ads on top of it? Absurd.

    1. Re:Wait... by AnonymousClown · · Score: 5, Insightful

      So you pay 9.99, and then still have ads on top of it? Absurd.

      Worked for cable.

      --
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      July 4, 1776 - September 11, 2001

    2. Re:Wait... by kithrup · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Unskippable ads. Unlike with cable (with a DVR), where you can fast forward or skip through them, if you've recorded it.

    3. Re:Wait... by ThisIsForReal · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Antennas are great. You should try one sometime.

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      -THE END-
    4. Re:Wait... by egburr · · Score: 4, Informative

      Cable originally started with "no ads" as the big selling point. After only a few years, the "no ads" was only on the "premium channels" for which you paid even more, while regular cable got more and more ads as the number of different channels kept increasing.

      At least Hulu is just starting off admitting they need the ads along with the subscription fee. This is probably to cover costs of getting permission to provide the shows and also is probably just enough to cover network bandwidth of the high-volume movie watchers.

      --

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    5. Re:Wait... by Mr.+Freeman · · Score: 4, Insightful

      I disagree. If you read the comments on the trackers then you can pretty much avoid poor quality rips. To bittorrent something I have to spend about an hour to get it including finding a torrent and then the time to download it. With hulu I just go to hulu.com, type in "family guy", and click play. I have to watch about 2-5 minutes of ads, which is far less than downloading the torrent.

      That said, if it's a movie then it's not worth it to go to hulu. The commercials ruin the mood and flow of the movie, whereas TV shows are actually designed with commercials in mind. If it's something that I want to watch more than once then I will torrent it because I'll have to watch the ads on hulu multiple times.

      It's not a "bittorrent is always better" or a "hulu is always better".

      --
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    6. Re:Wait... by hedwards · · Score: 4, Insightful

      But it's more expensive than Netflix with advertising and a smaller catalog. Which is the problem. They're not competing with cable, they're competing with Netflix, and if this is the best they can do they aren't going to win.

      $120 a year for the privilege of watching ads during the viewing is insulting. Perhaps if they made it pay as you watch up to $10 a month it would feel so bad, but a flat $10 a month is just way too much for what they're offering. Personally I won't be paying, I don't mind watching a few commercials, but expecting me to pay for that kind of limited selection and watch ads is just a tad bit insulting.

    7. Re:Wait... by Hatta · · Score: 4, Interesting

      You can fast forward or skip through ads on Hulu if you've recorded the show with RTMPDump.

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    8. Re:Wait... by Lumpy · · Score: 4, Informative

      Yuck. I just have uTorrent grab them automatically from my RSS feed with filters for the show I want. Took me 20 minutes to set up. I spend 6.2 seconds a week maintaining it, all my TV shows just magically appear.

      --
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  3. Nice for Netflix by swarm · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Sounds like Hulu is doing good advertising for NetFlix to me.

  4. Ad-supported? by eihab · · Score: 4, Insightful

    You mean to tell me you have to wait for an invitation to a paid for product that's ad-supported? What are they thinking?

    Their collection of shows do not seem that impressive either. Where's Weeds/Big Love/True Blood, or whatever people are watching nowadays?

    I have a hard time believing that this is going to go anywhere. My $10 a month stays with Netflix, color me unimpressed.

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  5. Anything! by Yvan256 · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Charge for it, put ads in it, charge a low price and put ads in it, but for crying out loud make Hulu available in Canada.

  6. netflix? by farble1670 · · Score: 5, Insightful

    netflix is $8.99, is ad-free, has more content, has many client platforms (PC, mobile, wii, playstation, roku, etc), and includes DVD rentals by mail.

    what are they thinking?

  7. So lets see here by Darkness404 · · Score: 4, Insightful

    So lets see I still get A) Ads B) Stupid blocking so I can't watch it on different devices and C) I'd have to wait for an invite?

    Count me out.

    To all "media" executives take a few things in note, I can go to the pirate bay and get shows ad free that I can watch everywhere without stupid little geographic or device limitations. Oh and its free.

    Look, we have no problems buying your crap, but when its easier to pirate it and you get a better product? Why not download it?

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    Taxation is legalized theft, no more, no less.
  8. Speaking of "Entitlement Complex" by Beelzebud · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Hulu isn't entitled to my money!

    If you think it's great, then by all means pay for it, but don't act surprised when not everyone thinks exactly like you do..

  9. Stutter? by lymond01 · · Score: 4, Interesting

    So when I blow hulu up to a 55" LCD with a DVI cable and gaming computer, it stutters like claymation. Doesn't buffer, etc, it's just not a smooth playback whatever the resolution. YouTube has no such problems even when watching 720p video.

    Will that $9.99 give me decent performance?

  10. Re:Goodbye Hulu by znerk · · Score: 4, Informative

    Because they're charging for stuff that used to be free. That's why.

    This does not replace regular Hulu. Go read up on this before you fly off the handle.

    Au contrair, the stuff they're now charging for access to started quietly slipping off of the site months ago... Whereas you used to be able to watch entire seasons of programming on Hulu, now only the most recent several episodes are available. Any "flying off the handle" is justified; my own Hulu viewing has been severely curtailed by this development.

    It may not be replacing "regular" Hulu, but that's only because "regular" Hulu has been getting stripped down for the past several months... apparently in preparation for this step.

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