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Hulu Not For Sale, Time Warner May Join
HighOrbit writes "Engadget reports that the consortium behind Hulu have issued a press release and have taken Hulu off the market. The current owners will maintain their joint ownership of the video streaming service. Hulu is currently a joint project of Fox, Disney (ABC), and Comcast (NBC-Universal). Instead of selling off Hulu, the consortium will inject $750 Million to grow the streaming service. Slashdot previously reported possible buyers rumored to be Yahoo, DirecTV, Time Warner Cable, and Chernin Group/AT&T. Additionally Bloomberg reports that Time Warner Cable is still interested and seeks to join the current consortium by acquiring a 25% stake."
Only cable companies would think that they can serve ads on a premium pay-for video streaming service.
At this point there's no...point in saying Yahoo is interested in buying $RANDOM_WEB_RELATED_BUSINESS, it's common knowledge.
It is regular TV -- 3-4 commercials in multiple breaks. I can...and do, get that already on my normal TV and would rather fast forward thru them.
Selling means its dying because of this and they wanna get money out of it from some sucker.
(-1: Post disagrees with my already-settled worldview) is not a valid mod option.
it's got commercials. Not interested.
I'd LIKE to pay for some service that let me watch the few tv shows i want without commercials.
But so far that hasn't been an option since the 80's when cable rolled out in the beginning. Didn't last long either.
I'll stick to piracy thanks. nobody gets paid. and i get my commercial free shows.
[I get ad breaks] already on my normal TV and would rather fast forward thru them.
How much does it cost you per month to be able to fast forward through TV? TiVo still owns DVR patents, and TiVo devices still require a service with a recurring fee.
I'd LIKE to pay for some service that let me watch the few tv shows i want without commercials.
Try Netflix. It's $16/mo, and whatever they don't have streaming, you can rent on discs.
Hulu+, the premium subscription that still makes you watch ads. Incredible. Why???
Paying for Hulu+ is like paying to smell someone's farts.
Time Warner, Time Warner Cable, Warner Music Group, and AOL are separate companies, despite formerly being part of one company. Time Warner owns the Turner channels (TNT, TBS, Cartoon Network, etc.), half of The CW, and the channel that's the subject of Obligatory Oatmeal. There's a difference between TW joining and TWC joining: one is more likely to bring series made for Turner channels.
The cable companies are beginning to realize their model of providing a mix of premium and basic channels via their proprietary pipe is at risk from internet based providers and are setting themselves up for getting into the game. They have strong relationships with content providers they can leverage to bring what they now offer as cable as an ISP. Apple, and to a lesser extent, Google are who they fear. Apple because they have demonstrated they can deliver content independent of them and Google because they seem to be serious about becoming an ISP. While Google may be behind Apple's position technologically they certainly have the money and ability to create a similar infrastructure on a high speed backbone; or even partner with Apple. The cable companies cannot allow Apple or Google or both to make significant inroads into the premium channel delivery business since that would seriously cut into their revenue.
So cable companies are taking a two step approach:
1. Partner with web based content delivery companies such as Hulu and offer premium channels via the web for current subscribers through offerings such as HBOgo.
2. Institute bandwidth caps to limit the access, or raise the cost of, to web based services.
I'm a consultant - I convert gibberish into cash-flow.
the ability to watch on devices
And this is one thing that the "nobody needs a PC anymore" tablet fanboys replying to the "death of the PC" story of the week seem to forget: a lot of video providers routinely block users of mobile operating systems from their service. I've seen it on other services as well: YouTube blocks a lot of videos that include music, Vimeo blocks videos whose uploader doesn't pay the recurring fee for Vimeo Plus, and Amazon blocks phones not made by Apple and tablets not made by Apple or Amazon.
Under the law, anything produced within the past 95 years is "new stuff". Besides, OTA TV can't be "gotten for free" unless you take time off work and/or change your sleep schedule to watch when a show is being broadcast or buy an old VHS deck and a DTV tuner to record the video. I don't see how a DVR counts as "gotten for free" when a TiVo DVR requires a service for which TiVo charges a recurring fee.
In short, Hulu doesn't have any complete shows. Every time I got to Hulu, I wonder what idiot came up with the idea of having an incomplete set of episodes for television programs. I will never start watching a series on season 4 episode 9. I want to start on episode 1 season 1. Then, I want to continue through to the current episode. These idiots put commercials into the programs so presumably, having people watch the programs makes them money. So, why not put all of the episodes and make even more money. Instead, they drive away people who refuse to start watching a program in the middle.
Pure stupidity!!!
No, but with a HDhomerun and some PVR software such as MythTV, it's only a minimal fee.
You'd first have to build a PC for your living room, and if comments like these are to be believed, not a lot of people are willing to do so.
Or a one-time investment for a Channel Master DVR.
Thank you for the recommendation. I wonder how they designed around TiVo's patents though.
I hope the company and service fucking go away, so we can start focusing on real content delivery solutions, instead of this trivial bullshit. Why the fuck would you pay $8/mo for a service that presents just as many (and sometimes more) commercials than you would have on the free live television version of the programming? Why would you pay money for a service that makes you watch commercials, at all? Why would you pay for the service, when it forces commercials on you when you could avoid them by skipping ahead with a DVR in other avenues? Why would you pay for the service, when you could get the content from torrents? Why would you pay for the service, when most of the programming is inane bullshit that even a toddler is too intelligent for? Why would you pay for the service, when what (shitty) programming there actually is, is almost never there in full? Why would you pay for a service that only gives you the latest episodes on some shows, but not the older ones or only the older ones but not the newer ones or only a random assortment of some in the middle or only the last two episodes of it and only a couple weeks after they air?
It is such a mish-mash random smattering of incoherent and poorly organized shit. I was trying Hulu recently and they had seasons 1, 4 and 5 of a show I wanted to watch.. I had to go to fucking Netflix to see seasons 2 and 3 (and Netflix charges the same amount. . . and I didn't have to watch a single commercial).
If you want people to stop "stealing" your shit -- or for people to start *watching* your shit at all (much less even pay for it), then you need to give them access to everything. Every episode from first to last and as soon as it has aired on television. That's it. That's the only solution. No amount of boardroom deals, backroom negotiations, or transfer of ownership is going to fix that fundamental problem.
Why would you pay for the service, when it forces commercials on you when you could avoid them by skipping ahead with a DVR in other avenues?
Because it's cheaper than the recurring fee that some DVR models require.