Hulu on the Xbox 360: Will it be Announced at E3?

JudoChinX

June 8, 2010

With E3 approaching, the rumor mill is running faster than ever, and along with it comes the claim that Hulu will be making an appearance on the Xbox 360. What does this mean to the average user, and on a greater scale, what does this mean for Microsoft?

huluSide (12K) This could be an excellent feature for users and would undeniably make the Xbox 360 even more of a value than it already is. Hulu does include advertisements, but I think most people will find that it's a small price to pay to view popular content on demand. Who knows, some may even choose to cancel their cable services entirely. Hulu would get money for advertising, Microsoft would get money for gold subscriptions and likely a cut for advertising as well, and the users would get great content. Everyone wins.

The one issue I can see with this would be the inevitable competition between Hulu and the Xbox Live Video Marketplace. There is bound to be some overlap between each library of videos, and when given the choice, what do you think the average consumer is going to choose: free content with some commercials or overpriced content without commercials? It's generally not a great idea to compete with yourself, but still, this could prove to be good for the consumers. It's probable that videos found on both Hulu and the Xbox Live Video Marketplace will be offered at a discounted cost on the Video Marketplace.

If Hulu does indeed become available on the Xbox 360, who will it be accessible to? History shows, as was the case with Netflix, last.fm, Twitter, and Facebook, that this will be a feature reserved for those with a gold (paid) subscription, and though this is something I would expect to see, I'd still like Microsoft to better consider the benefits of allowing not only Hulu, but these other mentioned services, with silver (free) accounts. This extra fee was a bit more understandable when the competition wasn't offering these same features for free. Now, both the Wii and PS3 offer Netflix, and though it requires an extra disc to use this service, they still don't have to pay an extra premium. They have their subscriptions to Netflix, and they get access to it for no additional fees on these other consoles. The same goes for Facebook and Twitter. Both are available through the PS3 browser for no additional fee. I'm not saying that other features in the gold account aren't worth the price of entry, but there are some features that need to be moved to the silver accounts.

It's not surprising that Microsoft would be considering a deal with Hulu. Obviously, they've been taking great steps in making this a console that appeals to everyone. They're not only trying to make the Xbox 360 enjoyable for gamers: they're trying to get everyone and anyone who likes entertainment to jump in, and who knows, this might just do the trick. The Xbox 360 is a great and inexpensive set top box that already streams video, music and photos over your network. Then there's Netflix that adds even more options. Hulu will hopefully continue this trend.

In closing, we don't know for certain one way or the other whether or not this feature will make the cut, or even if it's anything more than pure speculation. Our curiosities should be settled soon enough. It's just a week until E3. Do you think this is a change that's going to happen? What do you think would be the next big thing that Microsoft could add to the Xbox 360?