First Look: Hulu Video Service
Is this new video service from NBC/Universal and Fox a preview of how we’ll get our online TV shows and movies in the near future?
Big Hollywood studios take a somewhat scattered approach to distributing their video online, using a combination of their own Web sites, sites they’ve invested in (like Movielink), and popular third-party storefronts like iTunes.
But analysts say studios eventually want to sell video directly to consumers, either from their own sites or in small joint ventures with other studios.
That ’s why the October debut of Hulu, a web video joint venture between NBC/Universal (owned by GTE) and Fox (owned by News Corp.), is a notable date in TV and movies’ transition to the Web. Portals like Hulu may eventually be the places where we go online to buy mainstream TV and movies.
Using Hulu’s “private” beta with permission, I watched a good deal of the free service over the course of a weekend. I found Hulu’s content selection impressive, the video quality at least passable, the site design elegant and simple, and the navigation and community features mainly useful.
Hulu’s only sour note is the rather harsh restrictions that its Old Guard studio owners place on when and where and for how long you can watch the videos
Impressive Content
Contrary to the hype leading up to Hulu’s coming out, the site is not designed to be a “YouTube killer”. Hulu’s main draw is current, prime time TV shows like Heroes, House, Scrubs, and The Simpsons. Hulu also features some old TV series episodes (Kojak, Night Gallery), and a few old movies (The Blues Brothers, The Breakfast Club), plus some clips (like Saturday Night Live bits), movie trailers, and a few viral videos thrown in for good measure.
Video Quality: Not Bad
I watched Hulu on a Gateway home computer connected to the Internet using a 1.5 Mbps AT&T DSL line. The quality of Hulu’s video isn’t perfect, but I found it quite watchable, despite some slight pixilation and a few hiccups in the audio and video.
When I moved the navigation slider to a future point in the program, however, I saw a considerable amount of stopping and starting as the stream buffered. These things are, of course, more noticeable when you switch into full-screen mode, and any such service is only as good as the broadband pipe it comes in on.
Still, Hulu is among the best attempts I’ve seen yet at streaming video at high quality over the public Internet.
Navigation and Community Tools
Hulu’s designers appear to have done their homework, assembling a sort of “greatest hits” of navigation and community tools in the interface. The Embed tool spits out the HTML you’ll need to host Hulu video at your site or blog. The “Details” button gives you information on the show you’re watching, such as its episode number and original air date.
The designers may have borrowed the “Lower Lights” feature from Stage 6, which dims every pixel on your monitor except those within the video window. Hulu does feature one tool I hadn’t seen elsewhere: Within Hulu’s video share tool, you can use a simple slider tool to chop out a clip from a show and enclose it with a note to a friend.
source: Mark Sullivan, PC World
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Kensei has Hiro’s face forced into a haze of opium smoke. White Beard offered Kensei anything he wanted to capture Hiro and lead his army. Kensei will soon rule half of Japan and Yaeko will be his bride. In the Ukraine, Noah snaps photos of Isaac Mendez’s paintings and sends them to Suresh before lighting them all on fire. Suresh hangs up the phone with Bennet as alarms blare. Nathan and Matt arrive with details on their encounter with Matt’s father, which causes the facility to begin evacuation procedures.
Peter and Caitlin wander the streets of New York City, but there isn’t a soul in sight: they’ve all been evacuated by Homeland Security. An armored car speeds toward them and men in hazmat suits grab them, asking if they’re sick or infected. Claire wakes up to find West in her kitchen preparing waffles for breakfast. When Mrs. “Butler” leaves the room, Claire scolds West for stopping in. He shows her a newspaper article about the drunk cheerleader claiming she saw a flying boy, and Claire tells West they have to be more careful. Bob yells at Suresh to bait Maury to them so he can inject the Nightmare Man with the virus. Suresh worries that this might put the entire population at risk. Bob tells Matt he has the same abilities as Maury: anything one’s brain controls, Matt can control as well.
In the hall, Suresh frets to Niki that it’s morally unacceptable to give Maury the virus. Niki says no one will die, that the Company is good - they saved her. When Suresh leaves, she turns around to come face to face with D.L., who tells her she is a killer and by the end of the day, she will kill everyone. When she leaves the hall, Maury Parkman emerges from a door. Nathan asks Bob about “Adam Monroe,” one of the founding Company fathers. Adam convinced them they all belonged together to make the world a better place. Bob says that the “visionary” Adam is the one trying to kill them and he’s using Maury as his “blunt weapon.” Years before, Adam talked about holocausts, plagues, punishing humanity to save the world - Linderman was Adam’s disciple. They locked Adam up and threw away the key, but he escaped two weeks before. Bob tells Nathan that Peter is alive and somehow involved with Adam Monroe.
Peter is reunited with his mother, but he doesn’t recognize her. She tells him of his abilities and that Nathan died in the first outbreak. She also says he can travel in time and change history to prevent all this from happening. Peter starts to flash through his life and he suddenly remembers everything. Peter leaves the facility with his mom as Caitlin is taken away, but without warning, Peter finds himself in another room, completely alone. Claire and West canoodle on the couch, but she can’t stop looking at his tracking marks. They get up to go to the kitchen. When West turns around, he sees Mr. Bennet arrive home. He grabs Claire and flees the house, and she tells him that it was her father who abducted him. Scared and confused, West flies away before Bennet notices him. Suresh catches Niki talking to D.L., who isn’t really there - an unseen Maury is manipulating her mind. Suresh tries to help, but she punches him in the face.
Hiro finds Kensei’s mask in the smoldering ruins from the fire and returns to Yaeko’s side to tell her that White Beard’s army has scattered. She convinces him that he is the real Kensei of history, and her true husband. He cautions that in the final trial of Kensei, he has to cut out his own heart to save her life and all of Japan. Hiro realizes he must return to his own time, and with a final kiss, he is gone. Suresh gives Niki an infusion of his own blood to eradicate the virus in her system. But when it doesn’t work, Suresh realizes that there’s a new strain of the virus immune from his blood’s antibodies.
Peter packs his things to head to Montreal where he believes the clues are leading. Caitlin insists on coming, too. In California, Claire tries out for cheerleading squad, but Debbie rejects her, adding, “You are not extraordinary.” Suresh works with Monica on her muscle-memory ability. Bob interrupts and orders Suresh to give Monica a form of the Shanti virus manipulated to end her ability without harming her. Suresh warns that such tinkering could mutate the virus and make it jump into the general population. When Claire worries about not getting on the cheerleading squad, West advises Claire to bring Debbie down a notch. Meanwhile, near the U.S. border, Sylar questions Maya about her ability and says he also once had power. Alejandro doesn’t trust their mysterious and seductive new traveling companion.
In the Ukraine, Noah and the Haitian arrive at the home of his former mentor Ivan where they tie him up and grill him about the missing Isaac paintings. Ivan, who trained Noah and Claude, denies knowing where they are located. Noah threatens to have the Haitian erase all of his most-treasured memories. After erasing many of Ivan’s memories, Ivan offers a deal: rejoin the Company and he’ll be safe. Suresh is about to give Monica a shot of the manipulated virus when he realizes he can’t do it. He tells Bob he’s leaving and smashes a cabinet filled with the serum. Meanwhile, Maya and her fellow travelers sneak across the border where they are threatened by the “Citizens Border Patrol.” Maya intentionally loses control and kills the patrol members. Alejandro warns Maya against Sylar and tells her the next time her eyes blacken, he’s leaving. Sylar flat-out says he plans on killing them both.
Hiro, Kensei, and Yaeko creep into White Beard’s camp under the cover of darkness. Kensei battles his way through until the three of them find Yaeko’s father chained in a tent. Her father refuses to leave until he destroys the 1000s of illegal guns that White Beard has built based on his own instructions, for White Beard plots on taking over all of Japan. Kensei and his small army attack the camp. When a bullet is fired at Yaeko, Hiro stops time and brings her from the camp, and she realize that he was the one under the cherry blossoms and not Kensei. When she asks if he loves her, he says, “yes.” She leans in to kiss him, and regardless of the temporal fallout, he kisses her back as Kensei watches from the distance. When Noah threatens to erase Ivan’s memories of his dead daughter, Ivan caves and gives up the location of Isaac’s paintings. Noah then ransacks the apartment to make it look like a robbery before killing his former mentor. Kensei confronts Hiro about kissing Yaeko. Hiro says they are in love and that he didn’t mean for it to happen.
Hiro swears he won’t give into his love and that the kiss will be his last. But with Hiro’s back turned, Kensei punches him as henchman bring Yaeko out in chains. Bob escorts Monica home where he gives her a new cell phone, a packet of information, and the news that she’s enrolled in the Burger Bonanza management program. In New York, Suresh meets his new partner… Niki. Across the world, the Haitian and Noah uncover Issac’s paintings, none of which bode well for the future. Peter and Caitlin arrive in Montreal. In some kind of storage facility, Peter finds a note with his name on it: “You were right about the company. The world is in danger. It’s up to us. Adam.” Peter closes his eyes and hugs Caitlin. When he opens them, they are standing in a completely deserted Times Square…one year from now!
A new character was introduced last night. Her name is Elle and she’s played by 
In this weeks episode, Scofield is determined to find a weakness in the guards partols, as time is running out to get Whistler out of Sona. There’s a new inmate (who just happens to have a spot on Heroes as well) who claims to know Whistler via diplomatic circles, which lead Mahone and Scofield to distrust him even further. T-Bag has officially turned Mahone into a Heroin junkie, who is now beginning to fall into debt. Sucre find himself in a small sidejob aside from what a normal gravedigger would do. He’s been asked to smuggle “small packages” into the prison for $5000, and really has no choice. On the outside, Burrows and Sofia are scrambling to find an escape route from the Prison to safety.