Hulu's corporate masters have reared their dragon heads from time to time in the past, like when it nuked Boxee and PS3 access, so you couldn't watch Hulu on your actual TV, and made it even harder to watch Hulu outside of the US.

Now, Hulu's blocking startup video discovery sites like Rippol, Yidio and Clicker from embedding its videos. Likely, again, because Hulu's content providers aren't too happy about somebody throwing all of that content into a single place that's not Hulu, even though theoretically, embedding is harmless—the video goods aren't being stolen, and Hulu still makes money off of the ads in the stream. I mean, we're talking about embedding here. This is about control.

And, given that Rupert Murdoch is publicly entertaining the idea of de-listing all of News Corp.'s content from Google (with Microsoft offering its own cash incentive to do so), a Hulu you have to pay for, or at least, is even more tightly controlled is more feasible than we'd like to think. (Hulu is a joint venture between Murdoch's News Corp. (which owns Fox), NBC Universal, and Disney (which owns ABC).

Ads, those I can deal with. Alec Baldwin's genius isn't free. Arbitrary restrictions that make it harder to watch what I want to—that, not so much. I'd rather watch nothing at all. I'm pretty lazy, after all. I can't even muster the energy to figure out when a TV show actually airs. (When does 30 Rock or Dexter run? I don't know.)

The way Hulu's going, it looks like I'm going to have a lot more time to play Modern Warfare 2. You know, TV dudes, the biggest entertainment event in history. The kind of thing that's pulling people away from their TVs, ripping their eyeballs away from the ads you sell to survive.

The sooner we quit Hulu, the less painful it'll be in the long run. [GigaOm]

The New York Observer reports that the company formed by publishing's Superfriends—perhaps Legion of Doom is more appropriate—will format and publish rags that "work across multiple digital platforms, whether the iPhone, the BlackBerry or countless other digital devices," though they're not developing their own reader hardware.

Which is where it gets a little sticky, says one of the Observer's sources: "The really, really hard part is that you've got so many different kinds of devices running on different operating systems. And how do you handle that? The consortium provides one point of contact for the consumer. When you come to the main store, you can get the content any way you want."

In one sense, the venture will be very much like Hulu—a separate company from the publishers, run by Time's John Squires, who's been behind the whole initiative, as All Things D originally reported. It's like Hulu for another reason, in that it's more like a disjointed confederation whose motto is hanging together or hanging separately since every publisher clearly rolling their own, separate gambit as well: We've got the tabletized version of Wired (Conde); Heart was planning its very own ereader at one point; and Time too.

It feels like the early, disjointed days of digital music, at best. There's a good chance stuff you buy now (well, soon) isn't going to work forever. Time's thing. Maybe Apple's thing. Some kind of Adobe formatted thing. Amazon and Barnes & Noble's thing. One of them will stick and we'll have our digital magazines preserving an old print format in a digital way—hey, the publishing industry might even save itself—but I'm just going to cower in a corner with free stuff in my web browser until this all gets sorted out. [Observer]

Apple Stomps Over Nokia to Become Most Profitable Phone-Maker in US

Despite being in the game for just over two years, gaining only a 2.5% national marketshare and selling only one main model at a time, Apple is now the most profitable maker of phones in the US market, taking the lead spot from Nokia. Apple's operating profit was half a billion dollars more than Nokia's this summer, mostly due to a high profit margin on smartphones—Nokia barely competes in the States in the smartphone category. Nokia doesn't seem inclined to initiate the kind of aggressive push into the US (they're mostly focused on their native Europe) that would be required to compete, so it looks like Apple will continue to sleep on giant beds of cash. It ends up in Remainders because this kind of thing is really only pressing news to Apple shareholders and the kind of weirdos that watch CNBC. [Electronista]

Windows Mobile 7 Is on Track for an Early 2010 Release to OEMs

ZDNet Taiwan reports that Microsoft is on track for an imminent release of Windows Mobile 7, the long-awaited overhaul of the soul-killing WinMo OS. It should be released to OEMs in the first quarter of 2010, which is in line for a spring 2010 general release. Hopefully it won't feel outdated so far in the future. This story landed in Remainders because, well, it's a rumor stating a project is on track for a release a long time in the future. Not the most exciting news ever. [ZDNet via WMPowerUser via Engadget]

Bing Videos Aggregates Hulu, YouTube, ABC and More

This is actually really cool: Bing has begun aggregating videos into its search results, pulling video from sites like Hulu, YouTube and ABC (as well as Microsoft's own MSN Video) into one clean homepage. It allows for easy searching and organization, plus a standard UI (which includes dimming and sharing features). The rollout started today and will continue to expand over the next few days, and can be accessed here. [Bing]

Non-Apple Companies to Support Mini DisplayPort Soon

I hate Mini DisplayPort. I hate proprietary jacks, I hate having to buy a $20 adapter, and I hate capitalization in the middle of words. But I have a MacBook Pro (more mid-word capitalization!) and I have to deal with it, so I guess I'm glad that VESA, the Video Electronics Standards Association, has agreed to adopt mDP as a legitimate branch of DisplayPort. That, coupled with Apple's recent decision to grant no-fee licenses so companies can develop products for it, means Mini DisplayPort could start being more than an annoying Apple idea. Expect accessories using the new standard to start popping up fairly soon. [Ars Technica]

Apparently, Myka goes beyond Hulu and Boxee allowing you to run other full PC applications like XBMC and "browse to any web site and play video content directly onto your TV." Thre is no mention of BitTorrent with this version, but given the fact it runs on Ubuntu Linux, it seems plausible. The base model ION is available now for $379 (Wireless-N and Blu-ray add ons bring it to $644) which only goes further in proving my point about these quasi-PC streaming set-top-boxes. Why would you spend $400 or more on what is essentially a Linux HTPC branded like a set-top-box, when you can buy full-fledged HTPCs for far less money?

Want Boxee and Hulu to play in high-def on your TV? Meet Myka ION

LINCOLN, Mass., Nov. 5, 2009 — Myka, makers of the magic box that downloads and streams high-definition videos onto your TV, is introducing the Myka ION — the first Web-to-TV product that can easily run Boxee, Hulu and other leading Internet video services.

Myka ION is powered by the Intel Atom Processor 330 and NVIDIA ION Graphics Processor, giving Myka ION fast media-player performance at a low cost.

Myka ION lets you browse to any Web site and play video content directly onto your TV — bypassing your PC entirely. No messing with conversion software, no tinkering with anything. Plug it in and it starts working right away.

"Technology has finally caught up with what consumers want out of Internet video services," said Myka President Dan Lovy. "They want to be freed from their computers and watch the growing variety of Web video content on their large-screen, high-definition living room TVs. And they want to do it without a lot of hassle and without video quality suffering.

"We've heard them loud and clear and we're proud to present the Myka ION, the first product to take advantage of the latest processor technology and finally give Web video consumers what they want."

The Intel and NVIDIA processors do all the heavy lifting, such as video encoding/decoding during playback, resulting in seamless, high-quality content beamed directly to your TV. The Myka ION is actually a mini-PC in itself.

With the Myka ION, you don't need to do any work to figure out how to get a downloaded video to actually play on your TV. With a wide range of file formats supported, you don't need to think about it at all. Just plug it in and enjoy.

[Myka]

Before we get into the HD-XR, there's the other new model to introduce. The low-end Roku SD is pretty much a stripped-down version of the current Roku HD model, appropriately enough. It has Wi-Fi b/g and Ethernet, but only offers composite output—no HDMI, component, S-video or optical audio out, all of which the Roku HD has. The SD offers just standard-def streaming to go along with its standard-def output, and retails for $80 (the HD, in comparison, sells for $100). Both the SD and HD-XR are crammed into the same small, fanless case as the HD, so they're all the same size.

The HD-XR is Roku's new high-end model, selling for $130: In addition to everything the Roku HD has, the HD-XR is packing 802.11n Wi-Fi and, intriguingly, a USB port. But therein lies the problem with the HD-XR, and the reason we're bringing you a hands-on and not a review today: The USB port doesn't do anything. Yet.

Roku tells me that they've got some substantial additions coming to their service via automatic firmware upgrade in "the coming weeks." First is the Roku Channel Store, which "will offer a number of new content channels for the Roku player, many of which are free." This comes in addition to the currently offered Netflix (duh), Amazon and MLB. What could the new channels be? We'd say Hulu is a fair bet, given past rumors. Other dedicated streaming sites like ABC or MSNBC wouldn't be out of the question either, and since everybody's doing it, I wouldn't be surprised if Facebook and Twitter come to invade your tidy little Roku box.

Second is that currently-useless USB port—it may not do anything yet, but I assume it'll allow video playback from UMS devices like hard drives and flash drives when it's enabled through firmware. A helpful tip, Roku: Extensive codec support is mandatory, not optional, in a device that has as few features as this one. It only does a couple things, so it had better do them damn well. DivX, MKV, and H.264 would be a start.

So how does the HD-XR perform? Just about as well as I could hope. It's a bit slow to start streaming a video (two minutes at most, but that's a long time to stare at a progress bar on your TV), but once it started it never stutters, and video quality is nearly as good as when streaming on a computer. I do wish you could browse through Netflix's catalog, rather than only being able to stream what's in your Instant Watch queue, but it's super simple and works well. The remote is small but feels solid, and has few enough buttons that pretty much anyone can figure it out. Setup is easy and the antenna picks up my Wi-Fi signal just as well as my laptop. Overall I was really pleased with it, and so were my non-tech-savvy roommates—no mean feat, since they're not usually into all the nerd stuff that I deal with every day.

So what's new right now? Um, well, 802.11n. That's it. It's pretty disappointing to see new hardware released without the accompanying software that takes it to the next generation, especially given Netflix's invasion onto Blu-ray players (only $100!), HTPCs, PS3s and god knows what else. I'm not so sure the HD-XR is worth $130, given the growing ubiquity of Netflix streaming, so Roku had better bring it with this firmware upgrade—the days of a one trick pony in the living room are nearly up. [Roku]

What kind of features would you need to see from Hulu before you can consider it a full cable replacement? Not one with caveats like Sean found, but one that does everything you want. No compromises as far as you're concerned. We don't know the cost yet, but let's assume Netflix-style pricing in the ballpark of $10-20 a month.

For me, I would need content available as soon as it airs (no delay), HD, a much wider selection of content, and set-top-box playback capability. At least.

If they meet those requirements, I might be willing to part with a few bucks a month and ditch my cable company entirely. What about you?

Hulu, the joint venture between News Corp.'s Fox, GE's NBC Universal and Disney's ABC, doesn't plan on charging people to watch the stuff it's currently airing on the site–a mix of first-run shows from broadcast TV, a limited number of cable TV shows and a smattering of movies. But Hulu is trying to figure out how to create some kind of premium offering where you'll pay for stuff that isn't on the site right now.

This jibes with Carey's adjacent reassurance that "not all content on Hulu would be behind a pay wall," which hints at the addition of some kind of subscription or pay-per-view system, that could conceivably leave current offerings untouched. This is a plausible possibility, but far from sure: Kafka's sources says Hulu doesn't actually have a plan yet, so anything is possible.

Plan or no plan, telling everyone what they aren't going to do would do Hulu good—vague threats of fees for "broadcast content" are just terrifying everyone. [AllThingsD]

Here's the money quote from NewsCorpian Chase Carey, so there's no confusion:

It's time to start getting paid for broadcast content online. I think a free model is a very difficult way to capture the value of our content. I think what we need to do is deliver that content to consumers in a way where they will appreciate the value. Hulu concurs with that, it needs to evolve to have a meaningful subscription model as part of its business

An optimist might interpret this as a move toward tiered access, or even the decidedly good addition of paid premium content, like HBO and Showtime. But read carefully:

It's time to start getting paid for broadcast content online

It doesn't get any less premium than broadcast content, which is exactly what Carey says we'll soon be paying for—sometime in 2010, he supposes. (Though to be fair, there's a scrap of reassurance later in the same article: "not all content on Hulu would be behind a pay wall." Cool?) This is extra-extra-foreboding next to last week's statements about a paid Hulu from Time Warner CEO Jeff Bewkes, highlighted by TVBizwire: "That's not an if," he said "that's a when." It was fun while it lasted, I guess.

On a totally unrelated note, here are some neat articles, for pleasure reading!

Update: Reader Frank pinged Hulu about the issue, and got this not-quite-specific-enough-to-contradict-Carey's-statements response:

Don't worry, Hulu's mission has always been to help people find and enjoy the world's premium, professionally produced content. We continue to believe that the ad-supported, free service is the one that resonates most with the largest group of users and any possible new business models would serve to complement our
existing offering.

Thanks,

Betina Chan-Martin
Hulu

It's a purposely vague reassurance, but a definitive, public "we're not going to charge you for what is currently free" statement would be awfully easy to make, and would quell the concerns of people like Frank. Hint: They haven't made it. [Broadcasting Cable via TVBizwire]

Here's how it'd work: There'd be a new company running a digital store for all of the publishers where people could buy and manage their magazine subscriptions that would be delivered on "any" device. Supposedly, Time Inc's gotten Conde Nast (publisher of Wired, Vanity Fair, etc.) and Hearst (Popular Mechanics, Esquire, etc.) ramped up about the idea as well, which would launch in 2010.

Great, except that it's not going to work. As Peter Kafka points out, they have to convince people to sign up for another service—not an easy feat if they're already tangled up with a Kindle or Apple. Especially if this new service will be just magazines, and not include newspapers. And there's no way Amazon or Apple will let the publishers tie a separate service into their devices, pissing in their pool. The whole point of the Kindle is that Amazon controls the delivery method, and that's likely how Apple's tablet will work—downloading magazines and newspapers and textbooks through iTunes, just like iPhone apps or iTunes music.

Which basically leaves the the publishers with a handful of generic readers they could get their goods on, meaning they're screwed. At this point it looks like all roads to ereaders people will actually buy to pass through Amazon or soon, Apple. Sorry magazine dudes: Give in, give up or get out. [All Things D]

[Image via Digital Home Thoughts]

Yes, read that screenshot from my queue above and weep. In a month, there will be no more 30 Rock episodes (no more Heroes either), and the only Office eps will be early ones. Why the upheaval? You already guessed our most likely guess: Hulu.

As soon as the new seasons kick in, Hulu will be the place NBC will want people to go to catch up—remember, it's ad supported so traffic matters. And what better way to drive people there than to make the best content exclusive? It's just a case of the Sheinhardt Wig Company looking out for the Sheinhardt Wig Company.

Another network, CBS, appears to be yanking some CSI content even sooner, but NCIS looks stable. (I could do this all day, so give me a hand: Go ahead and check your own queues for verification, and report the status of your favorite Netflix VOD series down in comments.)

Sucks for you, Netflix, and for those of us who somehow had the impression that any content on Netflix VOD would be there forever. Now, Hulu, about those VOD widgets for TVs, Blu-ray players and game consoles...

We've seen comparisons like this before and as we move into terabytes of digital storage they're less and less useful (and interesting). But the move to the cloud is pretty intriguing: Facebook photos, Hulu videos, YouTube, all that stuff is pretty much unlimited and will continue to grow. And as a Netflix devotee, I'm glad to see a chart of exactly how thoroughly it's kicking Blockbuster's ass. [Mozy]

PlayOn's been around on the Xbox and PS3 since last year, as well as on all kinds of DLNA-compliant TVs—it's essentially a super-compatible web interface for video services that don't work on certain platforms—and we knew it was headed Wii-ward from the start. This is a step, and a sign that the service will actually materialize sometime soon, but it probably won't include a specific, formal release date. [PlayOn]

-PlayOn support for Nintendo's Wii in Beta.
-This is the first time PlayOn is able to control the user interface (and we spent significant time designing it)
-It is available for a free 14-day full-featured trial at www.playon.tv; after that it is a one-time $39.99 fee to purchase a license
-It is the same software that supports the PS3 and XBOX360, so if you already have a license or active trial, it will work on your Wii as well
-PlayOn uses the "Internet Channel" on the Wii
-How it works: You can find the PlayOn Media Server(s) by opening the "Internet Channel" web browser on the Wii, pressing the "WWW" button, and entering the web address playon.tv — We recommend you add this page to your Wii Browser "Favorites" to make it easy to return to. To upgrade your Nintendo Wii with the "Internet Channel" web browser, visit http://www.nintendo.com/consumer/systems/wii/en_na/channelsInternet.jsp#downloadOpera
-We are very proud to offer Wii support as it has been one of the most requested features from our users and shows our commitment to expanding consumer access to PlayOn
-PlayOn offers the broadest selection of premium content available from Internet – to – TV providers (Hulu, Netflix, CBS, ESPN, CNN, Amazon VOD, You Tube) and our selection of niche content is growing daily via our open plugin architecture:

o Academic Earth
o Adultswim
o Cartoon Network
o Channel9
o Crackle
o Food Network
o GameTrailers.com
o HGTV
o Local Files
o NBA
o NFL
o Southpark Studios
o Spike TV
o Podcasts (OPML Player) — with dozens of available feeds!
o International channels: Danish DR and Spanish TVE
- PlayOn works on a broad range of devices, including the Playstation3, XBOX360, Nintendo Wii, Digeo's Moxi HD DVR, Verismo's VuNow Device and many DLNA-compliant devices
- You can see video demos of playon for the PS3 and XBOX360 at http://www.themediamall.com/playon/lp200907 (sorry - the Wii one isn't ready yet since we are still in Beta and hope to get feedback on the UI before it is set in stone!)

The semi-apology came in the form of an email, in which a Hulu rep told users that the move was a compromise:

Everything we do is with an eye toward achieving our long-term goal of maximizing the content you can access as conveniently as possible in a way that 'works' for the content owner. In the short-term that may require us to make some tough decisions...

Hulu won't go so far as to directly blame specific companies, but it sounds like one—or a few—of their many partners signaled that PS3 streaming was a threat to their relationship, somehow. But yeah, how?

Distribution availability across platforms — theaters vs. TV vs. recorded media like DVDs vs. online streaming vs. mobile phones — was always implicitly or explicitly controlled in that world... the windowing strategy is still dominant in the business. Billions of dollars flow in across these different windows, and entire companies are organized around them.

This is actually pretty clear cut. Content providers are uncomfortable with the concept of video streaming on the PS3, because the console is typically connected to a television. This content delivery gray area is enough to somehow screw with, or simply muddy, their licensing arrangements or somesuch, so they're exercising caution.

As frustrating as that is, it's also a bit reassuring; far from a sign of a concert rollback of digital streaming rights, this is just a minor hiccup during a long, still-advancing transition. As Señor Hulu said, upstarts like Hulu need to be sensitive to media companies' old-fashioned sensibilities in order to change them. Full letter is reprinted below. —Thanks, Kip!

Thanks for writing. In order to answer your question, some context might be
helpful.

For decades, the TV/movie industry has built its business model on a windowing
strategy. Content rights are granted for limited time periods across specific
distribution channels. For example, a movie starts in theaters, then moves to
pay-per-view and DVD, then to pay-cable channels, later to broadcast, and so on
down the line. Similarly, TV shows are available on TV first, then in repeats,
then to DVD and possibly syndication, etc.

Distribution availability across platforms — theaters vs. TV vs. recorded media
like DVDs vs. online streaming vs. mobile phones — was always implicitly or
explicitly controlled in that world. But a few factors have made the barriers
between those platforms more permeable: the rise of the web, increased broadband
availability, the ease of digitizing video, and the increase in the computing
power of devices like gaming consoles, set-top boxes, and mobile phones.

However, in the near-term, the windowing strategy is still dominant in the
business. Billions of dollars flow in across these different windows, and entire
companies are organized around them. Nothing productive comes from flouting that
reality (except to law firms who work on the occasional lawsuit).

We do, however, expect these windows to converge over time. There's no
way around
that, and we're working hard with all of our partners to guide and
participate in
this important transition in the business. Everything we do is with an
eye toward
achieving our long-term goal of maximizing the content you can access as
conveniently as possible in a way that "works" for the content owner. In the
short-term that may require us to make some tough decisions, but we only do so
when we believe it improves our long-term prospects to build a more enduring,
legal solution to that same problem.

We hear your frustration, and solving it remains our full-time job.

Lifehacker's Adam Pash didn't have much luck getting the Windows-only program to work, but if you can, it looks to be pretty great. Sure, they want you to pay for the pro version to rip HD video, but you're setting yourself up for anger if you do that, as the chances are good that Hulu will try to block this thing in the not-too-distant future. So just get the free version and enjoy it while it lasts. [Hulu Video Downloader via Lifehacker]

Neither Sony nor Hulu has come forth with an explanation, though the timing is linked to the PS3's latest firmware 2.8 update and it's hard to see the statement "the video is not available on your platform" as anything less than pointed.

But back when the PS3 did have Hulu, how well did it actually work? The few times I tested it out, the slightest misstep led to memory error messages and I'd need to restart. Is Sony improving the Hulu experience? Is Hulu blocking someone like they did Boxee. Or is Microsoft making deals to score Hulu exclusively on the 360?

Time will tell! [CrunchGear and Engadget via Kotaku]

Television broadcast ads during The Simpsons cost $20-$40 per thousand viewers. On the web, the rate jumps to $60.

Shows like The Simpsons and CSI are now commanding higher ad rates on Hulu and TV.com than on television. It's a byproduct viewers being twice as likely to recall web ads than TV ads, according to Neilsen. (Which I would argue is a byproduct of Hulu showing us far fewer ads.)

But before we all declare TV dead, remember that Hulu has only 37 seconds of ads per "30-minute" show while a Fox broadcast includes a whopping 9 minutes of sales pitches. So there's still technically more money in TV, which will change as soon as Hulu begins cramming 9 minutes of ads into each program.

Lots more on the story here: [Bloomberg via PCWorld]

At the event, Boxee announced that they'll finally be moving out of alpha to beta starting this September. And they've got big changes in store: For one, Windows support.

Boxee'll have some stiff competition on Windows; anybody who's used Windows Media Center knows that it's one of the best pieces of software Microsoft's ever made. But Boxee's support for streaming video, along with new social networking sites, MLB.tv, and embracing of apps (over 120 in total) makes it the media nerd's 10-foot software. Unfortunately, Hulu is still off limits, as they refuse to allow Boxee to access it.

There may be even more good stuff in the future: Boxee CEO Avner Ronen hinted that if there's enough interest, they might create an iPhone app based on Boxee. We'll keep our fingers crossed for that one. [TechCrunch]

As CDO, Miller is in charge of figuring out how News Corp properties like Fox leverage their offline content to make money, online. His words:

I don't see why over time that shouldn't happen. I don't think it's on the agenda for Monday [but] it seems to me that over time that could be a logical thing.

"That," of course, being a monetary intrusion on one of the best services on the internet. He makes sure to qualify all his statements with a blanket "in my opinion" clause, but his hedging shouldn't be comforting: this is a guy who attends Hulu board meetings, and sets digital policy for one of the three biggest owners of the video venture. His opinion matters.

As frightening as his statements sound, the pay system Miller envisages is a subscription model, and his words don't necessarily imply that non-subscribers will lose any of their current access to content. After all, News Corp owns a large movie studio, so perhaps this theoretical "pay wall" would sit outside of regular TV programming, between users and films, or maybe premium cable shows. That'd be fair, but somehow, I don't get the feeling that's what Murdoch and Co. have in mind. [Daily Finance via Gawker]