To be honest if its not available on hulu its easier to find it illegally than to hassle with the muddled hassle of CBS or ABC websites (which often want you to download a special proprietary player or have unusual commercial playing–I dont want to have to get up off the sofa to click “continue Grays Anatomy” every 5 minutes.

Personally I strongly dislike clips on TV websites because it makes it momentarily harder to find the actual content I’m there for (full episodes). Some shows dont even offer the shows on their websites (Like big bang theory, despite the fact that the title of the page is big bang theory: watch full episodes and video and join the ultimate fan community, if you click the “video” tab, you’ll see they only offer clips)

Or it could mean that they just weren’t selling that many before. As Tom said, putting samples out in front of the viewing public was the right idea for this specific material.

I watch a lot of my TV shows on Hulu. Although I can’t say that I’m interested in buying the DVD’s for most of them, I have definitely discovered one or two shows that I wouldn’t have watched otherwise that I now watch regularly and repeatedly(namely It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia). The convenience is a major factor for me, and the way I see it, I’m part of an audience that these shows have gained by making them freely available online. The short commercials are not bothersome for me.

I agree that sketch comedy is highly appropriate for this business model. It makes perfect sense that Monty Python is enjoying better sales.

I think this worked well for Monty Python because the show is old enough to have fallen out of mind for a generation of potential viewers. The movies get a fair amount of play time on TV, but the show does not (at least in the states). Also, being a sketch comedy show, it works very well in the free-sample format, where as I can’t imagine the same thing working for any show with a storyline that requires regular viewing like Heros (unless you’re cruel and you let people watch the first few episodes then give them a “buy the rest of the season” link). I think The State and Kids in the Hall would probably have good success with this setup too.

By the way, I believe Comedy Central has South Park online, though I don’t know how up to date they keep it. I know you can watch The Daily Show and Colbert pretty much the next day. I’ve seen Family Guy while cruising the shows in Boxee but I don’t recall what network and if they are full episodes or just clips.