Hulu For Sale: Is There Good News For Users?

itwbennett writes "The LA Times reports that Hulu, which is jointly owned by Comcast, News Corp., Disney, and Providence Equity, has retained investment banks Guggenheim Partners and Morgan Stanley to help them find a buyer. Yahoo is said to have expressed an interest, but not made a firm offer. But what might this sale mean for users? GigaOm says we can expect to see more ads. But there are also 'indications that free Hulu users will have to be a cable subscriber in order to watch shows the day after they air,' says blogger Peter Smith."

Comments

Re:Licensing Fees

[KingSkippus]

True. And what frustrates me most is that content owners and distributors sit around scratching their heads wondering why people download infringing content so often. Um... Could it be because they have systematically shut off every reasonable legal way of obtaining it?

Well, it was nice while it lasted.

I'll pay to get rid of ads.

[odin84gk]

I HATE ads. HATE.

I am willing to pay more for ad-free TV. Hulu seemed like the perfect platform, but they wouldn't shut up and take my money. Cable companies offer DVR's for an extra $5 to $10 a month, which seems equivalent to paying for TV without ads.Why can't Hulu do the same? I never did Hulu+ because it still contained ads.

Businesses are so focused on selling ads that they forget about just using paid subscriptions. Sure, ads provide income above and beyond the subscription, but if you are trying to grow, you need to offer something better than what everyone else does.

Life is too short to spend it watching ads. That is why I love watching old shows using Netflix.

Re:Licensing Fees

[Andy Dodd]

Another sign that the people running it are out of touch with reality: The 8-day policy on many shows.

Now I can fully understand why one would want to hold off on putting a show online - the content providers would prefer if people watch the (apparently more lucrative) TV commercials over cable or broadcast TV. They want to give people a chance to get one of the "late airings" of the show.

So 5 days or 6 days would make great sense - Miss a show, either catch it later in the week, or catch it on Hulu just before the next episode airs.

But 8 days is dumb - With the prevalence of series with long-running storylines (IMO one of the positive effects of DVRs and online streaming - miss an episode and you're not lost for the entire season any more.), this means that if someone misses a show, they will wind up permanently on a "don't watch it on TV" schedule unless the show skips a week. If you miss one, and it becomes available on Hulu AFTER the subsequent episode airs on TV - why are you going to watch the next episode on TV when you haven't seen the preceding one?