• by Wayne Friedman , June 29, 2010

Pressed to start making real money, Hulu -- the big premium TV program Web site -- is finally launching its subscription fee service, called Hulu Plus. But advertising still remains a key piece of its financial puzzle. 

Hulu senior executives maintain that the service, which will be offered at $9.95 a month, is not a replacement for the free, advertising-supported Hulu service.

In fact, Hulu Plus will also include advertising. Jason Kilar, chief executive officer of Hulu, said in his blog that the move will "allow us to keep our Hulu Plus price low." He added: "We offer one of the world's most effective advertising platforms, with the ability to speak effectively to users across a variety of devices, anywhere they happen to be."

The difference with Hulu Plus is that for a fee, users can pull up a deeper array of episodes from TV shows on or off the air and several years in the past. As a Hulu Plus subscriber, for example, a user can get all nine seasons of "The X-Files," or all three seasons of "Arrested Development," or all seven seasons of "Buffy the Vampire Slayer."

The free part of Hulu will continue to provide TV shows -- but only the most recent episodes.

Executives of Hulu's three partners -- Walt Disney Co., NBC Universal and News Corp. -- have been hinting that Hulu would adopt some sort of subscription business over the past year. Hulu has been pulling in some $100 million in advertising revenue a year, according to executives, but has yet to be profitable.

Hulu Plus subscribers who own a Samsung Internet-connected TV set or Blu-ray players can download a Hulu Plus application from the Samsung app store and start streaming Hulu Plus directly. Owners of iPads and iPhones will be able to do the same thing.

Hulu's Jason Kilar says Hulu Plus will allow users to move more freely from device to device, room to room.

"You can start watching a show on your HDTV one night, pick up where you left off on your laptop at lunch, watch another chunk on the bus ride home on your iPhone, and finish watching in bed on your iPad."