Hulu Scores, YouTube Could

I have to admit I don't use YouTube much, if at all. I do watch Hulu, though, and though the reasons might say as more about me than about the future of on-demand video, there is something worth noting.

When NBC and News Corp announced two years ago that they were creating a new online destination to compete with YouTube, the idea was met with at least some derision, especially from the digirati. As is generally the case, proponents of new media and new "everything" tend to disparage the legacy players opportunties to do anything right in the new way.

But Hulu has done a lot of things right. For starters, it comes me access to short snippets of branded content I actually want to watch, and sometimes have missed. In Hulu's case, it is mostly 30 Rock and Saturday Night Live.

The user interface is really clean, of course, and it is easy to navigate. YouTube dominates user-generated videos of course, so if that is what you are looking for, go there.

At some point, full-length episodes of major TV shows also will be made available, and that's the point. Quality content is very hard to create. So most of what appears on YouTube either isn't very good, or simply isn't of interest.

Hulu doesn't compete with YouTube, in my case or probably in just about any other case. Hulu, even with limited content, is more of a "destination" site, where YouTube isn't. YouTube could change that, in at least one important dimension, though. YouTube would seem a much better destination for business-oriented video, such as a keynote at a conference I didn't attend.

If YouTube or any other provider can put together enough of that sort of content, I will use it.