I know this is behind the game, and that the bleeding edge of blog reviews has moved well beyond online streaming service Hulu (even though it's not yet out to the public). But I received my beta invite last week and have had all this time to play around with it.

My initial thoughts: none.

No, not one initial thought. Hulu doesn't work in the UK. They don't tell you: "Hey, if you live in the UK, you will be able to access and begin your Hulu experience, but when you choose a show to stream, you'll be disappointed. Have a nice day." You have to jump through all the Beta hoops to get there first.

Now, I know I should have known better, being a generally web-savvy chap. But after a few pre-reviews of the Hulu service, I decided not to read any more blogs about it until after I'd tried it out myself. I knew not to expect too much, after reading the last review over at Between the Lines , but I wanted my own experience.

Since then, I've found dozens of blogs about how bad it is that Hulu doesn't work in Europe . Aside from whingeing about the lack of support, I can't really think of anything more to write about Hulu (apart from its ridiculous, trying-too-hard-for-the-Web-2.0-market name).

But, doesn't this kind of go against point of the web? The idea that we can make connections, share content, stream and connect?

The principle of the internet is broken by this experiment, and I don't think a platform intended to be a YouTube killer should ever have been trialled in a geographically-limited network. Sure, I understand private Betas, but why limit this to the States? I don't think News Corp really gets the Web 2.0 thing. In fact, I wonder if they really get the internet?

It reminds me of LaunchCast (now Yahoo Music). When I first launched the player, all the content was free, and there was absolutely loads of it. I was thrilled! Over months, however, content became harder to find due to advertisement interruptions and restrictions on skipping tracks. Suddenly, Launch re-directed to Yahoo, and I could no longer skip any content without upgrading to a premium service which hadn't existed before. Then, when I moved to Britain, all the content was unavailable apart from a limited selection which I can only presume was intended for a British audience. (Don't think my mates here would have agreed in a focus group!)

I haven't used a yahoo service since. No, seriously, I haven't used Yahoo. As soon as Konfabulator was purchased by Yahoo, I uninstalled it. I was all set to set up a Flickr account, when I found out it was Yahoo. (I might go back on that one, once I get a decent digital camera.)

This wasn't really a boycott so much as a pre-emptive decision. I know that as soon as Yahoo gets a hold of a service, its user-friendliness will dissolve into advertisements and 'premium services' (a contradiction in terms!) This is what Hulu reminds me of. An attempt at grabbing a market instead of a well-thought-out startup trying to sell a genuinely good service and make a profit on its quality.

What is Web 2.0? Hulu doesn't know, and it makes me think that News Corp hasn't really got its head round it at all. I shudder to think what's going to happen with LinkedIn.

-Zach (http://www.zachbeauvais.com) 

Craig McCaw, current Chairman of Clearwire (NSDQ: CLWR) and founder of McCaw Cellular Communications, which later became AT&T (NYSE: T) Wireless, and John Stanton, who founded Voicestream and Western Wireless, joined Steve Largent on the stage to talk about the start of the wireless industry. Stanton, who is an investor today through his own firm, will become a board member of Clearwire if and when the merger closes between Clearwire and Sprint (NYSE: S) WiMax division. The conversation started off looking at the past and where the industry was almost 30 years ago, but quickly moved on to discuss 3G and 4G. The boldest statements came in the end when Largent asked the pair what the industry would look like in five years. Both stressed innovation, but the largest applause was saved for Stanton, who warned that the U.S. carriers are quickly becoming a commodity, and that they need to make more investments in content and platforms to maintain growth.

-- What was it like in the early 80s?: Stanton: "One of the exciting new things was that we weren't coming up with new offerings, we were coming up with a new industry. AT&T didn't understand that all of our Seattle customers could also use it in Portland. That was the beginning of roaming, it was purely accidental. One of my favorite stories involves one of [Largent's] former teammates. We sold phones through independent stores. One sold a phone to Jacob Green, was a huge player for the Seahawks for $4,000. They didn't explain that you didn't get service for that, and his first bill was for several hundred dollars. He thought he got service for life...The business was so thoroughly fragmented. In Seattle, we had six partners, and as a consequence, M&A was expected from the beginning."

McCaw: "The operators faced a three to five year process. The process is much better today… the free market approach was we are going to throw it out there and have the entrepreneurs figure it out. Guys like John and the guys in the industry. All of us had to sort out this mess."

Lots more after the jump…

-- How do you get customers to pay $3,000 for a phone in the car when you can't sell a data plan for $20 today?: McCaw: "This isn't an AK-47 [holding up a classic large brick phone], it was the original phone. You couldn't hold it for more than 15 minutes. It had 30 minutes of talk time, but you couldn't hold it up for that long. Things started slowly. The car phone was even worse because you had to take the car apart, and keep his car for a whole day. So, as we look at this from the data perspective, people don't realize two things that are relevant: When products aren't right, people won't buy it… people won't come until there is something moderately rational. As you begin, you don't expect it to be viable, and the one thing I'd say about data, it hasn't been right for the customer or the operator.

-- What's the view of wireless broadband here compared to the rest of the world?: Stanton: "The U.S. has had good and bad policies [when it comes to spectrum]. But the goodness has been the notion of innovation. Average users on a per month basis, 96 minutes of use in Germany. The standards and pricing that they've regulated has limited the industry even though it accelerated it at first. What McCaw has been able to do is exceptional and compete against the guys who were on the last panel. They have the ability to create a very interesting network. That innovation is driving volumes here, compared to Europe. A better regulatory process is better at letting entrepreneurs do their own things.

McCaw: I wouldn't say that our country is great because there's all these laws of unintended consequences. Europe is an SMS market, and in Europe with extraordinary roaming rates, they are punitive. We conquered that problem in the U.S. how many years ago? 18? Europe operates on punitive pricing, which drove them to short-messaging. For us in the U.S., it's a much more natural progression. If the cellphone is such a part of your life, the next step is to put the Internet now in such a way that it's like being at your desk. Our team includes Sprint, Google, cable guys and John, to come together and say there's something much better here, let's not be held back from the past.

-- On evolution to faster networks: McCaw: Clearwire had more customers faster than McCaw Cellular, and we don't think it's fast by today's standards. The idea with what we've assembled with Sprint, it's unbelievable and will change the paradigm of cost. It's slow or it costs a bundle of money. Punishing the customer is not the answer. When you hit that sweet spot, it will explode.

-- WiMax vs. LTE: McCaw: "They are the same, but different. The argument in our favor—they are so close it doesn't matter—is if you are downloading a movie, why is half your spectrum sitting there not doing anything. That's the beauty....That's the great opportunity, but technologically they are like brother and sister."

-- In five years, where will the industry be?: McCaw: "The thing we see is that the industry is commoditizing when you look at one cent a minute. Is it even worth keeping track of? The lesson with the iPhone is innovation. People say handsets are a commodity business, well, I wish I was in that business, and received the same margins that Steve Jobs does...The lesson is that if you innovate it means something."

Stanton: "From my point of view, there's two things that the major carriers have and need to be cognizant of. You talk about big numbers, like 75 million customers, but the biggest U.S. operator has 2 percent of worldwide subscribers. Scale is going to be ceded to foreign companies. This is still a U.S. centric organization [CTIA], and innovation has been ripe here in some respects, but we still also have to go to GSM [World Congress]. The U.S. has to get out of its old ways. I'm surprised that none of the major U.S. carriers have made significant investments. In the conversation about open networks this morning, that defaults back to the fact that we are only access providers. When you become an access company, you cede yourself to growing at the rate of the economy. The U.S. is still flirting with double-digits, whereas Europe and Asia are growing at the rate of the economy. I'd argue that NTT DoCoMo (NYSE: DCM) created a platform that was better than any of the traditional networks today, by owning content, why is it that none of the carriers have sown their own content? They ceded that to Google (NSDQ: GOOG). We are running the risk of heading toward a U.S. commodity business, instead of a global content business that therefore earns disproportional profits."

Join us for EconMusic Sep. 23 in London featuring a Mobile Music panel with Nokia Music’s Tom Erskine, Sony BMG’s Ian Henderson, Vodafone UK’s Tom McLennan and O2’s Julian Zmood discussing the exciting future of this sector. Register at http://contentnext.com/econmusic.

An Open Social Web

Plaxo's Pulse platform, mistakenly thought of by some as just another social network, is actually an attempt at an open version of the social web where sites inter-operate with each other. Currently Pulse supports integration with flickr, YouTube, digg, LiveJournal, Windows Live, del.icio.us, yelp, MySpace, webshots, last.fm, Pownce, xanga, tumblr, jaiku, twitter, smugmug, Yahoo 360, Picasa, and Amazon.

A great example of the type of interaction Pulse aims to achieve on their platform is the new two-way synchronization feature between Pulse and Twitter. A little over a week ago, Pulse quietly launched a "status" feature. Then a few days ago, they announced that this feature could now be used to synchronize with Twitter, two-way. If you set up your Pulse status to sync to Twitter, when you update your status in Pulse, it instantly updates in Twitter. You can also update in Twitter, and this will be synced back to Pulse. And if you have the Twitter Facebook app installed, it will update there, too.

Dynamic Public Profiles

With the launch of Google's Social Graph API, Pulse is now giving users the ability to create a unified public profile enriched by some or all of the aggregated content streams from the social web.  Pulse uses the API to gather together your various URLs on the web to create a public identity that you can control. With this, you can manage your own data and content and determine how you want to present it to the world.

This is a new sort of public profile page. Instead of a being a static page, like the one you would have on MySpace, the page is constantly being updated by your stream of content that you create all over the web.

The public profiles are a completely opt-in feature. You decide for yourself what content and information is included. The resulting pages are tagged with microformats, so your profile page is readable by Google and other web sites.

Over the next few weeks, Plaxo promises to introduce even more in this area, as this is just the first release.

To get started setting up your Public Profile, Plaxo members can go to Pulse, then click on "My Profile" at the top. On the left-hand side, click on the "Public Profile" link to begin.

Here’s the latest bunch of Star Wars drives from Mimobots. They are extremely cool - as always. The 1GB version goes for $40. Check them out.

C-3PO Flash Drive Takes Its Bow at Comic-Con [blog.wired.com]

Conjure your inner-Trump in Palm Beach and marvel at posh estates and lavish get-togethers–it doesn’t cost a cent to look. Then return to reality and seek refuge in the laid-back wiles of West Palm.

Editor’s favorite watering hole: In the historic neighborhood of El Cid, Hotel Biba’s bar is the Friday night hot spot where the beautiful people go to sip a few cocktails by the pool (regular folks are welcome too).

Activity we love, even if it’s touristy: Spend part of your day along the Intracoastal Waterway in a Palm Beach Water Taxi. Cruise past Palm Beach mansions, Singer Island, and the Munyon Islands.

Chill-out spot: The Norton Museum of Art is the largest and most prestigious museum in Florida. Ogle collections of European, Asian, and American art, highlighting artists such as Picasso, Pollock, Hopper, van Dyck, and Ruscha.

Get out of Dodge: Just 55 miles off the Florida coast, Grand Bahama Island is a relaxing day cruise away.

Last Minute West Palm Beach Deals

Worldwide Infrastructure Security Report
Arbor Networks, Inc., in cooperation with the Internet network security operations community, has completed the second edition of an ongoing series of annual operational security surveys. The survey is designed to provide data useful to network operators so that they can make informed decisions about their use of network security technology to protect their mission-critical infrastructure. Registration is required to receive the 2006 report. Please complete the form below.

Ashton Kutcher can now add to his resume, which previously consisted of MILF Marrier and Prankster. He is now a High School coach. Apparently he showed up to help some youngsters out. I like Ashton, but he sure dosesn’t strike me as the coaching type. I wonder if day one had them all learn how to put pepper in jock straps?

Page Six says, “The team was totally surprised when they showed up for practice and Ashton was there,” said our source. “His best friend is the head coach and asked for his help.”