Slashdot Mirror
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.
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.
Now I am not condoning (or condemning, for that matter) Hulu, but I thought the point of Hulu+ was that you got access to extra shows, a larger backcatalog, and the ability to watch on devices. That is worth nothing to you? There are other (legal) ways to watch TV shows without commercials, some of which — like iTunes — will cost you much more.
So I can see a place in the market for what Hulu+ is offering
What do you know I wrote a novel
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.