That whole "evil plot to destroy the world" thing? Hulu's working on it, sort of.
A new hire at the streaming video website, Johannes Larcher, will try to negotiate international rights with its stable of more than 130 content providers, the Wall Street Journal reports. The providers account for Hulu's 1,100 movies and television shows, and that library is of course growing.
The Journal notes that Hulu, which is jointly owned by NBC Universal and News Corp., has some stiff competition overseas from Joost, an independent online video service. While Joost also has to deal with licensing issues outside the U.S., it has a localized website for U.K. viewers and recently announced plans for a German localized site to launch later this year.
Alec Baldwin's quips aside, Hulu really does want to take over the world, so to speak. "In no uncertain terms, the Hulu team is committed to making great programming available across the globe," CEO Jason Kilar said in a 2007 blog post. For now, though, globally available content is limited to a small selection of snippets. Barack Obama's news conference from last night is an example.
I'm in the US, happily lapping up my free streaming content, but there have been some complaints around here about the second-class treatment other countries are getting. Lets hope for our readers around the globe that Larcher's work yields a breakthrough.
