The beta version of Hulu, a new online video venture between NBC and News Corp., launches this week. Challenging YouTube, the service allows users to embed and share existing video, but won’t support user-generated content. Instead, Hulu will focus on distributing ad-supported versions of movies and 90 NBC and Fox TV shows through deals with AOL, Comcast, MSN, MySpace, and Yahoo.
The project has attracted the wrong sort of attention since long before it went beta, according to NewTeeVee.com, which cites big media ties and the decision not to allow downloading as weaknesses. However, it does allow users to select clips of videos to share, and claims to offer more ‘premium,’ professionally-made video than any other site. (More Hulu stories.)