• by P.J. Bednarski  @pjbtweet, August 8, 2016

Hulu premium content will now be available -- for free -- via Yahoo View, a new “community TV watching experience” as Yahoo is framing it, that is available starting today. Meanwhile, Variety reports, Hulu will fold its stand-alone free version, offering the Yahoo View alternative in its place.

Yahoo is also using Yahoo View to enable viewers to browse through photos and GIFs from its Tumblr service. One wrinkle will visually block content that could reveal spoilers. The new service also has a picture-in-picture feature that allows users to browse other content as they are watching the program they selected. View.yahoo.com is available now, and smartphone apps will come later. 

The arrangement comes shortly after Yahoo announced its acquisition by Verizon, a deal that should close by the end of the year. In addition, Time Warner just acquired a 10% stake in Hulu, which is otherwise owned in equal shares by the parent corporations that own ABC, Fox and NBC. Shows from those networks will be available eight days after their on-air date on Yahoo View. That’s the same arrangement viewers of the free Hulu service get now. Pay viewers can see network episodes the day after.

In addition, Yahoo View will feature day-after clips, and full seasons of anime and Korean drama, and it would seem that Yahoo View has become a way for the Yahoo brand to add more content in one place, possibly appealing to cord-cutters. One thing it will not have, apparently, are full seasons of Yahoo’s original series, a Yahoo spokeswoman confirms.