Hulu Invites no longer needed

Yes, all you folks looking for hulu.com invites can now rejoice. Huu.com is now open to everyone, so go on over there and sign up!

Not only is hulu.com open to everyone, but they have added movies and some HD video also. The HD video is now just movie trailers, but it is a start.

Now that hulu.com is open, what should you watch? I recommend if you are looking for some easy cheesy viewing to check out the 70's hit, Nanny and the Professor.

Joost Show to Watch: Star Trek

Wow, looks like CBS has posted all episodes of the original Star Trek on-line. You can view them on the cbs.com page, but it is not full-screen. If you want the full screen goodness, you have to go to Joost. So, go to Joost and get your Trek on! Here is the link.

http://joost.com/09401ty

Live long and prosper!

NBC gets new player (s)

It looks like NBC has upgraded its 24|7 player and added download capabilities. We decided to catch up on Heroes since the season is now over and I thought I would check out NBC to see how the viewing experience was. My loyal readers will know that usually Heroes is watched via Netflix Watch Instantly, but this time I decided to try the NBC 24|7 site. Well, the NBC site has changed and the streaming video quality is really great! It also seems that it streams better on our slow-ass DSL connection, so that was really nice. However, we did still have problems viewing it, as it would pause and then jump back to the beginning, which was very annoying.

I also checked out the new download service. You can download specific shows to your computer and then play them back on the special NBC player. The shows only play on the NBC player and they obviously have DRM built in. I tried to convert the file into something I could watch on my Sansa, but no luck. Also, I never did see the show I downloaded, as it only sticks around for 48 hours and I was not quick enough and now the show is gone. Now I see why everyone hates DRM.

In conclusion, NBC 24|7 is better, but it still sucks and the download service just pisses me off. Hey, at least it is progress. I am sure they will get it right soon.

Heroes

Ok, I think I need to change this blog’s format. All that linking is a pain in the neck, so instead of not talking about internet TV and just linking to what I watched, I am going to switch it up. I am going to talk more about what I watched and do less linking. Maybe that will make it easier to post.

So, with that said, let’s talk about a show I was finally able to watch.

Heroes!

As I reported a couple of posts ago, I was having trouble watching Heroes on the official NBC site. Basically, I have a slow connection and it seems that the NBC player does not stream enough into its queue to prevent it from pausing. It was very annoying! For every 5 seconds of video, it would pause for 1 second. Totally frustrating and we clicked it off after less than five minutes.

So, what is a Heroes fan to do?

Watch the show on Netflix of course! Yes, Netflix “Watch Instantly” has THIS season of Heroes for your streaming pleasure. This is really great, considering that if you want to watch the DVD of season two, you have to wait for it to come out.

I am now caught up on Heroes. Yep, I watched all three episodes on Netflix this weekend. Boy, that is a good show and it looks like this season will be great. Watching Heroes on Netflix is even better because there are NO commercials. On the official NBC site, Heroes has short commercials, so it is better than the broadcast version. Watching Heroes on Netflix is even better than that, as no commercials are better than the 30 second ones they add to the streaming site.

Joost is now out of beta...

Joost is now out of beta. That means that anyone can go to the site and download this cool program. 15,000 shows on 250 channels. That is a lot of stuff to check out. If you are not sure what to watch, you can always check out the joost guides at the official joost "What's On" page, or you can check out Joost List. Joost has really improved a ton since we first got the beta invite about 7 months ago. This is a really quality way to watch great video content on the internet, so go to Joost and download the player!