Hulu is a game changer. Internet TV is the future. They will monetize with real time click to buy ads and TV will never be the same. I'd say give it five years, very few will still be watching broadcast TV.
Every time I hear somebody say "internet video is the future," I look around at how utterly inept our telecommunications infrastructure is and how utterly unwilling they are to reasonably provide the services we ask for. If you want internet video to take off, you need ISPs that will offer 100MB lines without caps (or with very, VERY high caps) at reasonable ($40-75) prices. That has to change first.
Miro offers a mixture of quality that strikes somewhere between BitTorrent and Hulu, depending on what you watch. Between Miro, Torrents, Hulu and Joost, it's impossible not to find something good.
ISP-based IPTV perhaps may not count against caps, but speeds still have to increase to let me watch TV and game at the same time. In the meantime, torrent streaming almost certainly will continue to count against the caps. And won't Hulu? That's not ISP-based yet.
Good read. I would also recommend taking a look at Zinc by ZeeVee. I have been using this on my Win7 PC's. I actually like it better than the Boxee solution I have on my Mac Mini.
I'm seriously looking into this. Comcast is $75 for HD package and DVR. There is no need to pay this since really I all I need is the sports channels, but ESPN360 will be offered by Comcast in the fall so I'll have sports covered.
We have been ever so happy to watch several of our favorite shows over the internet for quite a while now.
It's HD, its free, it's on my time table, and it's a lot less time out of my life with less commercials.
Don't forget Netflix streaming video, which is now available on everything except my old SNES. The selection is so-so, but it's backed up by snail-mail disc delivery for everything else.
One of the last few things making cable TV worth bothering with for me is that we have an HD TiVo that basically turns cable into a really slow delivery network for shows on demand.
But, the cable companies & networks are even screwing with TiVo via random schedule changes and cablecard incompatibilities. I think when they finally make a TiVo unbearable to use, I'll just cancel cable rather than switch to one of their DVRs
We have been ever so happy to watch several of our favorite shows over the internet for quite a while now.
It's HD, its free, it's on my time table, and it's a lot less time out of my life with less commercials.
HTPC's will take over, of this I have no doubt.
Same here..
Wife & I have been watching Hulu, Joost & Fancast> (which wasn't mentioned).
We downgraded our Comcast to the smallest basic package now.
$19.95 plus all the state and federal charges bring it to $23 and change per month.
Soon to be gone when selections grow a little more.
We have been very pleased with finding most of our favorite shows online for sometime now also.
I still prefer to use the web interface for Hulu while on my actual desktop, but on my media PC, Hulu Desktop is absolutely wonderful. Between Hulu and Netflix I haven't needed TPB in months. That says something.
I dropped down to basic limited cable about 2 years ago and haven't looked back. The only time I watch TV is for an occasional dvd, everything else I want to watch is done online. These bandwidth caps that are coming do have me concerned though. Time will tell.
I've got a another one. Boxee.tv is a pretty awesome service. It doesn't host any of it's own content but provides a pretty awesome frontend for just about every other media site. You can even link your Netflix account in with it.
Forgot to mention sharetv.org which adds Full-Episodes from HULU, Joost, and TheWB.com.
I watch it and Fancast the most.
Between those 2 we get almost all of our favorite shows, and a bunch of old shows I like to re watch.
Thrax
🐌Austin, TX Icrontian
Comments
Miro offers a mixture of quality that strikes somewhere between BitTorrent and Hulu, depending on what you watch. Between Miro, Torrents, Hulu and Joost, it's impossible not to find something good.
It's HD, its free, it's on my time table, and it's a lot less time out of my life with less commercials.
HTPC's will take over, of this I have no doubt.
One of the last few things making cable TV worth bothering with for me is that we have an HD TiVo that basically turns cable into a really slow delivery network for shows on demand.
But, the cable companies & networks are even screwing with TiVo via random schedule changes and cablecard incompatibilities. I think when they finally make a TiVo unbearable to use, I'll just cancel cable rather than switch to one of their DVRs
Same here..
Wife & I have been watching Hulu, Joost & Fancast> (which wasn't mentioned).
We downgraded our Comcast to the smallest basic package now.
$19.95 plus all the state and federal charges bring it to $23 and change per month.
Soon to be gone when selections grow a little more.
We have been very pleased with finding most of our favorite shows online for sometime now also.
I watch it and Fancast the most.
Between those 2 we get almost all of our favorite shows, and a bunch of old shows I like to re watch.