Hulu has been released into the wild this week, and the buzz is certainly making its rounds. I have been using Hulu as part of my almost-daily activity since October, and must say that they have certainly improved by leaps and bounds over the past few weeks before launch. So what is Hulu?

Hulu is a website that you can visit to see tv shows, movies, and clips from a vast array of content from NBC, Universal, and other major content creators. Hulu is ad supported and this can either be a small fifteen second clip a couple times during the presentation, or a half dozen. It would appear that advertising is either less than expected or more than is tolerable, with no happy middle ground. The advertisements are repetitive yet not completely unreasonable.

Quality is quite acceptable for the speed and ease of  download. Everything is supported through the site, much like you’d find on YouTube. Some of the content is available in 480p which looks great on a 15.4″ widescreen laptop.

Speed is dependent on their load. More often than not the content picks right up and load flawlessly. Occasionally, when they have a heavy load, the content is very choppy and seems to buffer every few seconds. This makes for a terrible viewing experience, though the problem isn’t as common as to deter use altogether.

Shows are uploaded to Hulu fairly quickly. Sometimes you can find the latest tonight show a few hours after it airs, and though I haven’t seen them go up simultaneously, I have heard reports of it doing so.  It would be safe to say that if your favorite show comes out on Monday, checking Hulu for it on Tuesday would be a safe bet.

In summery, I enjoy the Hulu experience. The site offers great content with reasonable support. The service is improving and the pool of content Hulu offers is certainly growing with its popularity.

~Matt~