Hulu Plus App Updated to Support Chromecast Streaming

Google’s Chromecast wireless streaming dongles will now support content from the US movie and TV streaming service Hulu Plus.

Addition of support for Chromecast brings shows like “Modern Family,” “New Girl” and “Parks and Recreation,” to the big-screen via your smartphone or tablet.  As with other Chromcast apps, to view the content on a TV, you simply hit the ‘Cast’ button which is now present in the app.

The Hulu Plus Chromecast functionality includes a custom remote control that has all the usual playback controls (for playing, pausing, etc.), along with a 10 second rewind options as well as the option to enable captions or jump straight to your favorite moment in a TV show. Neat.


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Hulu Won’t Be Sold, Its Current Owners Will Just Throw Cash At It Instead

By all accounts, Hulu is a pretty decent service. It sucks that you have to watch ads even with a Hulu Plus subscription, but it’s oftentimes the only place to watch the latest TV shows whenever you want. It’s the kind of service that companies would want to own, but its current owners aren’t letting go just yet.

Disney, 21st Century Fox and NBCUniversal announced today that they are taking Hulu off the market. The three had been previously searching for a buyer to take the service off of their hands, but they ultimately decided it was in their best interest to retain ownership. As part of this decision, the three owners have also agreed to pump $750 million into Hulu.

“We believe the best path forward for Hulu is a meaningful recapitalization that will further accelerate its growth under the current ownership structure,” said Chase Carey, President and Chief Operating Officer of 21st Century Fox. “We had meaningful conversations with a number of potential partners and buyers, each with impressive plans and offers to match, but with 21st Century Fox and Disney fully aligned in our collective vision and goals for the business, we decided to continue to empower the Hulu team, in this fashion, to continue the incredible momentum they’ve built over the last few years.”

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#Hulu: No Sale

Hulu’s stakeholders have decided not to sell the company after all, ABC Enterprises, NBC Universal, News Corporation, who jointly own the Web video site, said today. The stakeholders will provide a cash infusion of $750 million to drive growth.

A number of credible bids had come in for Hulu, including from major cable companies.

“We believe the best path forward for Hulu is a meaningful recapitalization that will further accelerate its growth under the current ownership structure. We had meaningful conversations with a number of potential partners and buyers, each with impressive plans and offers to match, but with 21st Century Fox and Disney fully aligned in our collective vision and goals for the business, we decided to continue to empower the Hulu team, in this fashion, to continue the incredible momentum they’ve built over the last few years,” Chase Carey, CEO of 21st Century Fox, which part of News Corporation, said in a statement.

The companies’ decision to sell the successful platform, which brought in nearly $700 million in revenue in 2012, had some scratching their heads.

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Hulu Joins YouTube’s 1 Billion Views Club

By Megan O'Neill at SocialTimes:  
A new member has just been inducted into YouTube’s 1 billion views club and the channel may come as somewhat of a surprise to some—it’s Hulu!  That’s right, the 37th channel to cross the 1 billion views mark on YouTube is another video streaming site.

Hulu has been posting videos to the huluDotcom YouTube channel since 2008.  The channel is currently home to 175 videos, including Hulu Superbowl commercials, teasers from original Hulu shows, clips from The Simpsons, Family Guy and more.  The Hulu content on YouTube doesn’t serve as a replacement for the content on Hulu, but rather as enticement for viewers to head over to Hulu to watch more.
The Hulu YouTube channel currently stands at 1,021,566,481 views with 322,981 subscribers.  It clocks in at 37 on the list of YouTube’s most-viewed channels and is closely followed by The Ellen Show’s channel, which is just shy of 1 billion at 988 million views.  Ellen is expected to join the 1 Billion Views club any day now.
To celebrate Hulu’s YouTube success, please enjoy this delightful Family Guy clip, care of the Hulu YouTube channel!

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Apple to make a bid for Hulu?

A couple of days ago we mentioned the UltraViolet cloud service which was basically like iTunes, except for movies and videos. It seemed like a pretty good idea as it would allow users to access their movies in the digital format on a variety of devices, all at one price.
Now it seems that there are rumors of Apple being in talks with Hulu to acquire the company and to provide five years of programming to the US networks and two years of exclusive rights to shows from Disney, News Corp and NBC Universal. Essentially if this deal goes through, it could very well be Apple’s answer to the iCloud for video.