Could Hulu be in the iPad's future?


The two hottest Flash applications on the Web are YouTube videos and the Hulu video service. The iPhone's YouTube player covers the bases for YouTube, and we can probably assume HTML5 support on YouTube for iPhone Safari isn't far down the road.

So generally when people complain of Flash support, they're likely less concerned with slick graphics and advertising, and probably more concerned about watching Hulu. TechCrunch reported Wednesday on an effort underway to bring Hulu to the iPad, and perhaps the iPhone OS in general. Citing an industry insider, this is an unsubstantiated rumor but the possibility is too big to ignore. Hulu could be a killer app for Apple's mobile devices, particularly for those looking to untether themselves from cable or dish services.

To run video on the iPad, the video would need be either H.264 or MPEG-4 standards, and Hulu is already running h.264. With that, it's certainly doable at least without a massive effort to transcode Hulu's library of video. There's just needs to be a new method of displaying that video. Perhaps Hulu could take this opportunity to get a jump on the all but certain inevitability of HTML5 video, or, more likely, make an app to run as a front end similar to the YouTube app.

TechCrunch notes of one other big issue. The site is advertiser supported, and the ads are run within Flash. YouTube's is in the same boat as its app and HTML5 player is sans ads. So, Hulu would either need to let the ads slide for now as YouTube does, or come up with a new delivery solution.

Hulu Could Still Launch On The iPad