Hulu- Thing 19

I discovered Hulu on Facebook. Someone had posted a link to the latest Lady Gaga video and it was on Hulu. I was impressed with the quality. Sometimes on You Tube, the quality is really poor. Sometimes, this has to do with the fact that it was taken from an old VHS tape or something like that- but I've experienced it with some newer video, as well. After watching the Lady Gaga video, I went on to watch all of the other ones on Hulu and remained impressed. I have searched for some old Saturday Night Live sketches on Hulu from time to time and have always found what I am looking for. I hadn't watched whole TV shows on it until this assignment. I chose to watch the last episode of Jamie Oliver's Food Revolution. I had watched the other 5 episodes on ABC's website, and found Hulu to be just as good. I prefer to watch TV and movies on my huge screen TV, but sometimes that is not convenient and I will use the computer. Streaming is a really amazing technology that I think will most certainly affect libraries in the future. I doubt that it has slowed down our circulation of DVDs at this point, but eventually that is the direction we are headed and libraries should go with that tide. It will definitely save shelf space and we won't have to do as many repairs, discards, and new cases. Libraries should move toward offering more streaming... slowly. Many of our customers will have to be trained and so many people don't want to let go of past technologies and formats. I remember in 1999 when I worked at Borders, I had people trying to special order cassette tapes. My thought was "Still?" Even in my first year or so at the Frisco Public Library, I had people ILL audio on cassette. So, yes we should move forward, but be prepared that some customers will still want DVDs- even when they stop making anything new in that format!

An interesting note- when I watched the Food Revolution episode on Hulu, there was a statement at the bottom of the screen that said the episodes are available on Hulu until June 6th, when the streaming rights expired. Streaming rights. Wow. It's a whole new world.