Hulu Plus: Thank God for Trial Periods

Hulu has been a great way to catch up on our favorite shows for a while now, but one thing has always been missing from this service: [non-PC] device access.

This feature has been in such high-demand, that others have been trying to implement ways to attain this, all-the-while, Hulu has been quick to disable it. Everyone knew that Hulu had to have this up their sleeve, and sure enough it was delivered as the subscription-based Hulu Plus.

I started watching a TV series on Netflix and when I reached the end of the available Instant Streaming seasons, I decide to give Hulu Plus a chance.


I started by downloading the player for Playstation 3. I was eager to see what kind of content was now available on my TV. What, if anything, would keep hooked. Maybe even allow me to ditch the cable.

Within minutes, however, my dreams were being crushed. Navigating content is very limited, and while the subscriptions feature is great, it, and your queue, are buried within menus.

I was also disheartened to find out that a lot of the content available to computer users are not available on Plus devices. I found examples of many shows whereas I could only watch them on the web from a computer--not exactly what you want to see when you are plunking down $8 per month for the privilege of device use.

I also found that both apps are quite buggy, the Playstation 3, especially. Often the case, my viewing session would pause, as if to be rebuffering, and would back up 2-3 seconds once the buffer seemed to be caught up. This isn't a bad thing, except it would play and freeze at the same spot. This occur very frequently and would essentially loop for minutes on end--assuming it ever did make it through. I liken it to have a scratched CD. The player would seek backwards, but when it hit the spot again, it would just skip all over again. A 21-minute episode took closer to 45 to actually watch.

The iPad's app was better, and actually, I completed watching my series through it. There were several crashes, but Hulu was able to pick right up where I left off last after relaunching.

Let's go ahead and summarize this then, shall we? Separating app issues that I experienced during my trial, I was very disappointed in Hulu Plus. The fact that Hulu Plus subscribers are not entitled to all content available to Web users is inexcusable. Yes, some shows permit access to full season
Hulu has been a great way to catch up on our favorite shows for a while now, but one thing has always been missing from this service: [non-PC] device access
This feature has been in such high-demand, that others have been trying to implement ways to attain this, all-the-while, Hulu has been quick to disable it. Everyone knew that Hulu had to have this up their sleeve, and sure enough it was delivered as the subscription-based Hulu Plus.

I started watching a TV series on Netflix and when I reached the end of the available Instant Streaming seasons, I decide to give Hulu Plus a chance.

I started by downloading the player for Playstation 3. I was eager to see what kind of content was now available on my TV. What, if anything, would keep hooked. Maybe even allow me to ditch the cable.

Within minutes, however, my dreams were being crushed. Navigating content is very limited, and while the subscriptions feature is great, it, and your queue, are buried within menus.

I was also disheartened to find out that a lot of the content available to computer users are not available on Plus devices. I found examples of many shows whereas I could only watch them on the web from a computer--not exactly what you want to see when you are plunking down $8 per month for the privilege of device use.

I also found that both apps are quite buggy, the Playstation 3, especially. Often the case, my viewing session would pause, as if to be rebuffering, and would back up 2-3 seconds once the buffer seemed to be caught up. This isn't a bad thing, except it would play and freeze at the same spot. This occur very frequently and would essentially loop for minutes on end--assuming it ever did make it through. I liken it to have a scratched CD. The player would seek backwards, but when it hit the spot again, it would just skip all over again. A 21-minute episode took closer to 45 to actually watch.

The iPad's app was better, and actually, I completed watching my series through it. There were several crashes, but Hulu was able to pick right up where I left off last after relaunching.

Let's go ahead and summarize this then, shall we? Separating app issues that I experienced during my trial, I was very disappointed in Hulu Plus. The fact that Hulu Plus subscribers are not entitled to all content available to Web users is inexcusable. Yes, some shows permit access to full seasons or the whole series, but it's very limited. Keep in mind that the subscription cost is $8/month and that premium feels much higher. On top of that, a Hulu Plus subscriber still must contend with commercials, something that Netflix doesn't do.

So for $8 you get a restricted library, commercials and buggy apps. If you're choosing between Netflix and Hulu, there's virtually no competition. If you're looking to use both services, I'd hold off--or catch up on your shows during the trial period.