Hulu Charging for Content

There's been a lot of message traffic recently about Hulu charging for its content as early as 2010. Here's what I think: whoop-de-doo.

I use Hulu ALL the time. It's my personal DVR. I watch Hell's Kitchen, FlashForward, Cougar Town, The Office, 24, and soon LOST all on Hulu. I may have regular TV on my TV but I never look at it, I just watch everything via Hulu. So if Hulu threw up a required cost of programming, say $5-10/month, I'd happily pay it, assuming two things:

1) NO advertising. One of the worst things of Hulu is watching a 20 second clip with a 30 second advertisement. If I'm paying for content, I don't want ANY ads.

2) Let me cache videos before watching them! Streaming can be dangerous as it requires quality bandwidth on-demand. Why not leverage my bandwidth when I'm sleeping and download the videos I want to watch during the off hours? This would be a killer feature and something that is technically feasible, it just needs someone to pioneer it.

What they should do is split up Hulu's viewer base into two camps: those who will pay for premium content and those who won't. Those who refuse to pay should still get to see basic content, but be forced to watch advertisements every 10 minutes or whatever. Those who pay for content should get NO advertisements, get access to premium content like HBO, and also be guaranteed the highest quality viewing experience. This might mean downloadable (vice streaming) content, and perhaps even portable viewing options (e.g. iPhone Hulu). HBO does have some great shows so I'd love to get those as well.

Welcome to the future, ladies and gentlemen. Gone are the days of ancient cable programming: welcome to the world of on-demand, downloadable high-quality programming.