I got my Hulu Plus invite last week, and have been trying it out over the weekend. It seems like there’s a lot of kinks. I know the site is in beta, though I don’t see it labeled as such, but it seems like they could have done a better job with what they had. The charge is $9.99 plus tax, and for that, you get access to more content, and on more devices. That’s pretty much it.
You still have ads, and lots of them. I figured you would at least get less ads, but that’s totally not the case. And you still have to deal with Hulu’s crappy ad engine. I have pressed the “not relevant” button on several ads, but the same ones keep appearing over and over. I’m sure the University of Phoenix is a great school, but I’m well past the point of needing a safety school.
Perhaps the coolest part is the access from iPad and iPhone, which might come in handy on my trip to Texas this weekend. But here’s the part I don’t understand: you don’t get access to regular Hulu content. You only get the “Plus” content through the mobile apps. Huh?
The HD videos are nice, but so far I’ve only been able to experience them on my 13-inch MacBook Pro screen, through some of the worlds crappiest speakers. My PS3 is still in a storage pod in Colorado, but that could be the real advantage to the service. I’ve been contemplating getting rid of cable, which is 4-times as expensive, and lousy with ads.
There’s also, apparently, a rule about only using the service on one machine at a time. So, despite what your mom always told you, no sharing. I figured this out when the service wouldn’t allow me to watch a video because I was apparently using the service on another device, which was a lie. For $9.99/month, I expect that the service will at least allow me to actually view the content, and not lock me out.
Hulu Plus isn’t quite ready for prime time, which I guess is why you still have to wait for a request. Netflix is still the superior service, despite the lack immediate content. (Also, I wish Netflix had an option for just the Instant content.)
