Weekly Rewind
Profiles for Hulu: Just a few years behind Netflix, Hulu now allows multiple user profiles per subscription. That means everyone can have their own watchlists, recommendations, and viewing history. Although personalization isn’t a big part of Hulu now, TechCrunch reports that users should start seeing more recommendations in the future, and they’ll probably play a role in the live TV bundle that Hulu plans to launch next year. To that end, Hulu recently acquired assets from the Video Genome Project, whose technology can classify videos into narrow sub-genres and understand how two videos might be related.
One more though: Hulu still allows just one stream at a time, so perhaps the new profiles are a step toward multi-stream family plans.
Sling TV’s antenna hookup resurfaces: Since April, we’ve seen a few rumors about a $150 device called AirTV, which would bring free over-the-air channels into the Sling TV app on phones, tablets, computers, and streaming boxes. Now, the box has gained FCC approval, which means a launch could be imminent.
Networked over-the-air tuners aren’t new–SiliconDust’s HDHomeRun is another example–but AirTV would let Sling subscribers get all their live TV channels through a single app without having to pay extra for the major broadcast networks. Compared to PlayStation Vue and DirecTV Now, which bake the cost of those channels into their base packages, this would help Sling keep its entry costs down. My guess is that we’ll hear more about this solution at the CES trade show next month.
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