Watch Your Favorite Shows With Hulu

 I have been using Hulu for a couple of weeks now and I must say, I do love it. The TV networks have really come together to create one great solution for internet TV. Hulu has a clean interface and is user friendly. It is not over-done with ads or extra stuff. The animations are smooth, with lots of scrollover popups and transparency, and buttons for all of the few things you can do with a video. Grays and blacks surround the video in a widescreen format, making it easier on your eyes.

It is easy to search for and find a TV show or episode. By clicking “Browse Titles” you can, by default, view all of the TV shows Hulu offers by what’s “Most Popular.” If you prefer you can also view the shows alphabetically or by network/studio or by clicking a “On Air” button you can view what shows Hulu has that are currently being shown on television. You can also search for shows or episodes using the search engine, I found it to be quite effective at recognizing keywords, whether it is the name of a television show, episode, or the name of a cast member.

I am a little concerned about the fact that Hulu does not put shows up quickly enough after they air of a few things. It is still faster to download a torrent right after Heroes airs than to wait for it to drop on Hulu.

In addition, it is an incomplete archive, with new episodes pushing out older ones. This is probably  to continue DVD sales, but if I haven’t bought it, I am not going to. I want to be able to watch all shows from all seasons, not from the second episode of the latest season of Heroes, but I digress.  

It is not far to compare Hulu to Joost mostly because Hulu has not been around as long, and is still in private beta, but I really think Hulu, or Hulu “like” websites are the future. I think we are getting close to the day when all video, TV shows, and maybe even movies are available free and legal over the Internet and Hulu is a great start.