Hulu Plus, Take Two: How's $4.95 a Month?

October 21, 2010 at 1:47 pm PT

Hulu is considering cutting the price of Hulu Plus, the subscription service it began testing in June, sources tell me. I’m told the video site is talking about slashing its $9.95 per-month fee in half, to $4.95.

Hulu Plus was supposed to be the video site’s strategy to generate a second revenue stream to complement the free, ad-supported site that launched in 2008.

The idea is that paying subscribers get access to a deeper catalog of TV shows and movies than what the free service offers, as well as the ability to watch Hulu on devices like Apple’s iPhone and iPad, Microsoft’s Xbox 360 game machine and Internet-connected TVs from Samsung and Sony.

But a price cut would indicate that consumers haven’t bought in to the pitch. That shouldn’t be a shock, considering the other video options that consumers have, and the limits that Hulu’s content providers have placed on the service.

At $8.99 a month, for instance, Netflix subscribers get access to a very deep catalog of movies and TV shows delivered on DVD, and a growing number of titles delivered to their PCs, phones or iPads.

But Hulu Plus is limited primarily to current broadcast shows from its three owners–Disney’s ABC, GE’s NBC and News Corp.’s Fox–as well as other shows that have stopped running on TV. (News Corp. also owns Dow Jones, which owns this site.)

And tensions between programmers and cable providers mean that Hulu won’t give subscribers access to current cable shows from those same partners–even though some of them are (barely) available on conventional Hulu. “It’s a broadcast-focused service,” in the words of CEO Jason Kilar.

Hulu declined to comment about the service, which is still officially in beta mode.

Tagged with: ABC, advertising, Apple, blogs, broadcast, cable, catalog, content provider, digital, Disney, DVD, entertainment, Fox, GE, Google, Hulu, Hulu Plus, Internet, iPad, iPhone, Jason Kilar, MediaMemo, movies, NBC, Netflix, News Corp., PC, Peter Kafka, revenue stream, Samsung, software, Sony, subscription, television, TV shows, video, Xbox 360

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http://twitter.com/zweigand zwei

I recently signed up for Hulu+ to use with my iPad and Roku (coming soon) I subsequently killed the subscription before the first month was up. Why? Not because they still show ads (annoying but somewhat understandable), but because you aren’t guaranteed the ability to stream to anything but your computer! Fringe? Not available to stream to my other devices. Caprica? Not available to stream to my other devices… Why the heck would I want to pay $10 a month if I still have to watch a lot of the content on my Mac?
Anonymous

The problem is that they are cutting all the most appealing content from the service, Hulu Plus has a huge catalog of content, but it’s 95% leftovers from the 80′s, give us current content when and how I want it (quickly and on the devices we want) and people will pay for it, even more than $10/mo, but if they give us 20 y/o content that we might not even have liked the first time, they shouldn’t expect our money.

It’s funny when they get worked up about piracy too, it’s just another market force, people only go to it when they don’t have other valid options, just like they’re doing here.
http://www.facebook.com/acetracer Andy Mesa

How about you keep it at $10 and remove the commercials and let me view EVERYTHING on ANY device?
Anonymous

This is a branding problem. Hulu is billed as the place to go to catch up on TV, at least that’s how consumers see it. Netflix is perceived as a destination for content. By implicitly promising fresh content, Hulu suffers when it’s archival, while Netflix is already perceived as at best a place to watch newly released DVDs, already second or third run entertainment. Hulu needs to either a) enforce participation Apple style, or b) change the value branding.
http://www.twitter.com/davidafenton DavidAFenton

They need movies. Lots of movies… and stop giving the brand a black eye by blocking content based on behind the scenes politics. This was a death blow for me. Hopefully I’m the only one.
http://www.facebook.com/bobsentell Bob Sentell

I can see most of the older content on Netflix. As for the newer episodes, I only have two or three shows I actually watch. It is cheaper for me to buy a season pass on iTunes and download them onto my computer than to pay for Hulu.
http://twitter.com/prosperhappily Robert S

Cutting the price to $4.95 is a start. That’s an impulse buy IMO. I’m gonna think about $9.95 a bit more.

I can also justify watching commercials, in my own mind, on a $4.95 service. That just not gonna fly on a $9.95 service.

As for content, they’re just gonna have to do better. It’s just too hit or miss right now.
http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=696332424 Vladimir Vlach

Suckers! I’d like to watch it from overseas – they need to start thinking global and offer pricing to users regardless their location.
Arnav

Perhaps they should consider moving to an annual subscription – I regularly balk at a series of small, monthly payments, preferring getting the pain over with in a single go. This allows Hulu+ to be an impulse purchase, and also allows an economising consumer to use disposable cash for the purchase (which is mentally accounted for as a one-off) instead of having to budget for it.
http://twitter.com/oghowie Howard Chang

Wow. I did not even know this. Not even worth trying if this is the case.
IceBeam

Now all they need to do is remove the Google block, and country blocks and stream to the world.
Of course them being old, incompetent farts they won’t and so they will lose their business.
http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=1191714530 Christopher D Ennis

You might try TVersity. I am streaming Hulu to my XBox 360 with no problem.
suicideluvkitty

i looked at hulu to see if it had any of the shows i watch. (venture bros, rachel maddow) and all it had was clips. so i’m pretty sure those aren’t in the extended catalog.

it sucks that my options are pay out the ass for cable/satilite to get the shows i want, or pirate them.

i will find an alternative to having to pay for 150 channels so i can watch 4 of them.
Anonymous

I’m curious to why the PS3 isn’t mentioned in the article as a device – but the XBOX 360 is?
http://mediamemo.allthingsd.com/ PKafka

Simple – wasn’t a comprehensive list, but wanted to show range of devices (that’s why I linked to Hulu’s “devices” page – and referred to Sony’s TVs.
Anonymous

Fair enough – Not flaming you or anything.

Just seemed like an odd omission considering there’s no date for the Xbox to get it, and the PS3 is already working.

Thanks for the info, though. I’m excited for a price cut.
http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=1298301293 Adam Walker

The service should be free due to ALL content (yes even movies) having commercials!
http://www.facebook.com/Amia1975 Ami Lynne Welch

Only thing Hulu has going is the deaf community really likes what it has that netflix don’t have. Caption/Subtitles. If Netflix had that then it would be a great deal. But in my case by far I rather stick with Hulu simply for the caption/subtitles.
http://pulse.yahoo.com/_NECCLJFHQQVQVU5FMZ7P3J7O6Y Brian

I would pay a small subscription fee (5-9) bucks/mo to watch the normal Hulu content without commercials. Other than that, not interested. If Hulu keeps barfing out increased commercials, I will go back to buying my fave shows on DVD. Used to love it. Now it’s pressing it’s luck.
http://phyrra.net/ Phyrra

I signed up for Hulu + and used it with my new tv. In short, it sucked. I emailed their customer service twice and never received a response to my complaints. This led me to cancelling my service.
Problems I experienced were:
Shows randomly stopping and reseting to the beginning of the program.
The same commercials over and over again.
Jagged cuts that would stop in the middle of a sentence for a show, instead of where the natural commercial insert would go.
No way to let them know you’ve seen that same commercial 6 times in a row and would like a new one.
No way to fast forward through a commercial you’ve seen several times.
Additionally, I couldn’t use the service to see the same shows I could on Hulu, so if I missed something on tv, I couldn’t ‘catch up’ on Hulu plus.
http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=1762245023 Mea Tuu

I’m sorry… it really sucks to have cable tv… as opposed to 2 or 3 local broadcast over the air network affiliates.

Rather… it really sucks to have the content makers dictating how we are to use new technology… computer, eh…ok, iPad…no, mobile…no, …oh, you want current episodes?…uh, no… or maybe we’ll let you see the last one, after we show the next one, to keep you forever out of sync unless you -pay- to rent/buy the episode you’re missing, which you could have DVR’d anyway.
Losers… they’ll never be an entertainment utility (read, guaranteed monthly revenue stream) until they give us the multiplicity of FAIR use, and currency with the broadcast schedule.
I’m not going to pay even $5/mo for -limited- convenience. Missed an episode? I want to jump on my cheap-subscription any-device and catch up before the next episode… or else find it on the ‘net.

Hulu Plus, Take Two: How's $4.95 a Month?

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