Freecasts

Hulu Review Part 2

Posted on December 27th, 2007 by Sporn.
Categories: Uncategorized.

While I do love Hulu, I am not so stupid as to say it has no problems whatsoever. Here are my top 5 problems/suggestions with/for Hulu.
1. U.S. only- While this doesn’t affect me greatly, it is a big deal to other people. Frankly, I think that international support will happen soon, but there are a few things left to be done. This issue will probably be solved soon because of the huge demand for it to be resolved. The users want international support because they want to watch outside of the US, and I would think that the producers would want it because more people= more eyeballs to view the ads= more money for the producers (but probably not for the writers).
2. No iPhone version- This one is a bit more self serving. I would love to view Hulu videos on my iPhone, and since QuickTime has streaming functionality, it seems only natural.
3. Only a few episodes of some shows are up. When I went to the Family Guy section, I only saw that part of Season 1 and part of Season 7 were up. Once again it is only a matter of time before all the episodes are up.
4. Personally, I would like it if they put uncensored shows up. I would love it if there was a button that let you select which version you wanted to view: the censored or uncensored.
5. Open Hulu up to more people! As much as I love being the member of an exclusive club, if more people were able to access Hulu, many of the misconceptions would be eliminated.

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Hulu- Television How it is Supposed to be

Posted on December 18th, 2007 by Sporn.
Categories: Raves, Reviews, Web.

If you haven’t heard of the video website Hulu, you must be living under a rock. For the past few months, it has been the site of controversy, hate, and mild like. For those who are living under rocks, let me sum it up for you. Hulu is a joint venture between NBC Universal (NBC, USA, Sci-Fi, etc) and Newscorp (Fox, FX, Fox Sports, and iHOR (International House of Republicans)). Both of them were tired of having their shows put up on YouTube, and felt that Apple was ripping them off, so they decided to make their own site. When I first heard about this site, I assumed the usual: No downloading, heavy DRM, no Mac/Linux, and only clips. Yet I signed up anyway because, lets face it, I am a sucker for a new web service (I am the guy who signed up for the Slingbox for Mac private beta even though I do not own nor have I ever owned, a Slingbox.) A few days ago I got the email that I had been accepted, and I delved into the website with the lowest of expectations. And those expectations were blown away.
I thought the website would be terribly ugly, full of ads, and html from the 1990s, but the website is clean, and a little bit ajaxy. It is only spoiled by a few ads here and there. My next reservation would be platform restrictions. I have 9 computers, none of them windows, so that would pose a problem. You can imagine the look on my face when I clicked on a link, and it just worked! How novel! I searched and a lot of my favorite TV shows were there. So far so good, then it came time to watch an episode.
I had many preconceptions about the viewing experience including, but not limited to: the ads, the quality, and the loading time. I found the ads, while somewhat annoying were fine. And the best part about them is that you can see exactly where the ad is in the general time line of the show. There are 2 ads per 30 minute show, not including preroll ads. Each ad is 60 seconds long and is ignorable. The quality isn’t bad either, while it isn’t HD (yet),it is far better than anything that I have seen on youtube. And yes, the loading time is nice and fast.
Now it is time to tackle the naysayers. And while I have negated almost all of their complaints, I left out one. The issue about downloading. This is a non-issue for me. Whenever I bought a TV show on iTunes, I would watch it once or twice, then I would never watch it again. I would start to notice how much space it was it was taking up on my iPhone/iPod/MacBook/PowerBook’s HD. I wanted to delete it, but then I would feel bad that I wasted money, and besides what if I wanted to watch it again? Now I can rest safely knowing that the content is on Hulu’s servers.
I was never a TV fan. When I was a baby, I would rather read than watch TV. Even now, I don’t have a TV let alone cable. And because of all the mentioned reasons, Hulu is perfect for me.

1 comment.

Laughing at Apple

Posted on December 17th, 2007 by Tom.
Categories: Uncategorized.

I’m standing in my local Apple store and right behind me is one of those sweet new 4 core Mac Pros and it is crashed. I’ve never seen a mac crash the way this one has. The screen went all crazy around the title bar and the rest of the screen seems fine. In fact, it’s right in the middle of minimizing a window, so it actually looks kinda cool. Anyway, I’m going to go try to revive it because I’d rather be using that computer with it’s 30″ cinema display than this 17″ MacBook Pro, not that the MBP is a bad computer, but the Mac Pro is just so much better.

-Tommy Dude

0 comments.

Official Heist 2

Posted on December 14th, 2007 by applgeek.
Categories: Uncategorized.

THe Official Heist #2 has started! It is a continuation from heist 1.5, and actually has a solution

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Macheist 2 has started!

Posted on December 5th, 2007 by Sporn.
Categories: Uncategorized.

After many months of waiting, it has (re)started!

read more | digg story

0 comments.

Linux Mods 2: XGL On A Dell

Posted on December 1st, 2007 by Sporn.
Categories: Uncategorized.

Click to Play

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Is it Leopard? No it is Ubuntu!

Posted on November 17th, 2007 by Sporn.
Categories: Uncategorized, linux.

Click to Play

0 comments.

New Mac vs. PC Ads!

Posted on November 14th, 2007 by applgeek.
Categories: Uncategorized.

Apparently, Mac and PC ads Are Back! I just saw one on CBS, which has an announcer as well as PC in a Boxing Robe. PC says that Mac sales are rising and he won’t go down without a fight. The commercial nds With an iMac and the new Leopard background. Hopefully this will be on iTunes tomorrow.

1 comment.

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