Playing hide and seek with Hulu

I've had a lot of email in response to yesterday's piece on new US web TV service Hulu.com and a phone call from a guy in the US who told me which software to download to be able to access Hulu from here in New Zealand.
It didn't work for me, but it is working for others who have contacted me and it shows just how tenuous are attempts to limit online TV services by region.
The BBC just plugged a hole in its iPlayer service that allowed people to download and share videos that were meant to only be available to users of iPods and iPhones.
"The BBC admitted that it was most likely facing a cat and mouse game with hackers intent on circumventing copy protection," reported the BBC. That's an understatement if ever there was one. But there are plenty of overlooked sources of good web TV content out there on the internet that are free and legal to watch for anyone.
This timely Digg post links to most of the good sources, the best of which is US public broadcaster, PBS.
There are dozens of PBS documentaries available for streaming on its websites, including this interesting one about the US about the NSA's eavesdropping on AT&T data traffic. It brought back memories of reading Nicky Hager's excellent book Secret Powers about the ECHELON electronic surveillance network.
Free Documentaries is another good one. Documentary videos open up in a browser window, the Google viewer, and the streaming quality is reasonably good. All up, there's a stack of great content on the web for free.
The quality is variable but for watching it on your computer screen it's fine. It's all free after all. I hope Sony Updates its PS3 browser soon so it offers more support for web-based video streaming so I can watch all of this stuff directly on my TV screen.
While hackers play a game of cat and mouse with content providers to spread their content around the web, there's a more sinister game underway in China for those trying to circumvent the Government's ban on YouTube and other web-based media services.
China has in the past imprisoned bloggers and geeks for helping disseminate web-based info that didn't agree with the Government sensors.
Imagine the headache then facing the people behind Tudou.com, the YouTube of China. Keeping that service in line with Chinese Government guidelines must be a constant struggle.