$12/mo = Hulu without ad breaks

[Kaido]

Still has ads before & after, but no ad breaks during the show:

http://www.engadget.com/2015/09/02/hulu-no-ads-12/

I find it annoying that they want you to pay more ($4 extra) and STILL have ads before you watch, but at least it fixes the annoying ones during the show. The difficulty is that they have a lot of good content:

Seinfeld
Grey's Anatomy
Once Upon A Time
Marvel's Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.
Grimm
etc.

I hope Netflix & Amazon don't follow suit. I'm pretty sure they won't because they want to keep their services controlled. That, and I don't really want to pay for another service. I pay for Netflix & Spotify, both of which I love, and I buy movies on Amazon & VUDU (plus Amazon has Instant Video included with Prime), but even with all that, my total monthly media bill is under $30 (it was like $80/mo with the regular cable plan I had before), so that's super nice.

 

[MustISO]

That's nuts, if they're going to charge extra there should be ZERO commercials. Maybe they're planning another tier that is $10 more for no commercials.

 

[IlllI]

maybe if they allowed more than 1 stream per account at the same time with that price increase, but i don't think they do. most people have more than 1 tv, but if person a upstairs wanted to watch something, and person b was already watching something... sorry.

 

[Nebor]

I got the email this morning and immediately switched my plan.

Only a handful of shows will have commercials before and after, due to their streaming licensing agreements.

I like Hulu for watching network TV shows (The Simpsons, Family Guy, Brooklyn Nine-Nine) and Showtime. It's worth $4 a month to get rid of commercials. Though I'd still argue there never should have been commercials to start with.

 

[Kaido]

That's nuts, if they're going to charge extra there should be ZERO commercials. Maybe they're planning another tier that is $10 more for no commercials.

I agree, plus no one else has commercials. But I can also see the value of having ads because then it's like cable TV - you pay a monthly fee AND get advertising revenue, so you get double the money, and people will be willing to put up with it because they have exclusive content. So you either get cable, get Hulu, or pirate. A lot of people don't know how to (or don't want to) pirate, and also don't want to pay for cable, so Hulu will unfortunately be a viable option if you want those shows.

 

[Kaido]

maybe if they allowed more than 1 stream per account at the same time with that price increase, but i don't think they do. most people have more than 1 tv, but if person a upstairs wanted to watch something, and person b was already watching something... sorry.

Yeah that's the other crazy thing:

http://www.hulu.com/help/articles/197541

Our license agreements for our content allow for one stream per account – so you can activate your Hulu subscription on as many devices as you please, but you can only stream to one of them at a time.

I pay $12 a month for Netflix and get 4 streams with no commercials. Hulu wants me to pay $12 a month for one stream with commercials before & after.

Nah.

 

[Kaido]

I got the email this morning and immediately switched my plan.

Only a handful of shows will have commercials before and after, due to their streaming licensing agreements.

I like Hulu for watching network TV shows (The Simpsons, Family Guy, Brooklyn Nine-Nine) and Showtime. It's worth $4 a month to get rid of commercials. Though I'd still argue there never should have been commercials to start with.

If I still had Hulu, I would upgrade too. I've heard they're going to put the commercials on the shows that everyone actually wants to watch, which is how they'll get you. Ah well. I got sick of them not having pilot episodes, only having part of the seasons, and then stuff disappearing. Although I guess that's happening to Netflix as well now:

http://fortune.com/2015/08/31/netflix-epix-disney/

 

[Nebor]

Yeah that's the other crazy thing:

http://www.hulu.com/help/articles/197541



I pay $12 a month for Netflix and get 4 streams with no commercials. Hulu wants me to pay $12 a month for one stream with commercials before & after.

Nah.

AFAIK Hulu does not enforce the 1 stream per account rule.

 

[Kaido]

And then you've got Amazon jumping into the game by offering offline downloads to mobile devices:

http://www.forbes.com/sites/abigail...lix-doesnt-offline-video-streaming-on-mobile/

VUDU lets me do this already, but Amazon has a pretty good selection too.

 

[Kaido]

AFAIK Hulu does not enforce the 1 stream per account rule.

Oh nice! Any idea how many streams Amazon allows? Tried searching but the answer was not readily apparent.

 

[Nebor]

And then you've got Amazon jumping into the game by offering offline downloads to mobile devices:

http://www.forbes.com/sites/abigail...lix-doesnt-offline-video-streaming-on-mobile/

VUDU lets me do this already, but Amazon has a pretty good selection too.

Please explain your Vudu comment. Vudu doesn't offer a subscription model. And Amazon has always let you download things that you purchased, just not things that were Amazon Prime "free."

 

[SithSolo1]

I'd rather put the $4 toward a showtime addon, I alt-tab during ads anyway.

 

[Nebor]

I'd rather put the $4 toward a showtime addon, I alt-tab during ads anyway.

Get both? The cost is so low it's virtually free compared to cable.
Hulu Plus with no commercials + Showtime: $20.50\mo
Amazon Prime: $7\mo (but I'd have it even without the streaming)
Netflix with Ultra HD: $12\mo
HBO NOW: $15\mo

So that's $55 a month. I'd like a streaming service that gives me AMC & FX, but hopefully Apple's new service will do just that for around $20 a month.