The latest Dell phone leaks point to a version of Hulu running on their upcoming Android devices. The question is whether it will be Flash-based or HTML5?
Engadget today posted images of an upcoming Dell Android phone called the Thunder. Along with other high end features, it advertises the ability to play Hulu, possibly in Flash or a standalone app. That is something that mobile device users have been after for awhile.
As far as I’ve seen, Flash 10.1 for mobile devices isn’t able to run Hulu, which begs to question whether or not the Hulu on this phone is Flash-based or not.
It probably makes more sense that this device is advertising a non-Flash version of Hulu which has been rumored to be a subscription service.
Apple (AAPL) has famously avoided Adobe (ADBE) Flash on its iProducts and there have been no shortage of rumors that Hulu is developing a non-Flash version of the site to work on iPhones and iPads.
If Hulu.com works on iPhone, will it work on Android? It would stand to reason that other HTML5-compliant Webkit browsers, like the one Android phones use, would also be able to play this new iPhone version of Hulu.
The advertisement says that it is for a “Hulu app” so perhaps Hulu is building a special Android Linux application, similar to what Hulu offers Macs and PCs . Those applications are built in Adobe’s Flash as well, but Adobe has been courting the Android platform since applications built in Flash will no longer be accepted on the iPhone platform.