The Kindle Fire is shipping next week, and Amazon wants to ship it with as many mainstream apps as possible. There will be thousands of apps which will work on the customized Android tablet, including Facebook, Pandora, Netflix, Angry Birds, and Zynga games. You can now add Hulu Plus and ESPN ScoreCenter to that group.
Fire owners will be able to watch thousands of TV shows on Hulu Plus for $7.99 a month. Or, they can watch shows from Amazon’s own Instant Video streaming video service, which is built right into the tablet. After all, the Kindle Fire was designed as a media tablet. Everyone who buys one will get a one-month free trial of Instant Video, which is bundled with Amazon Prime (the $79/year all-you-can-ship service from the e-tailer).
So you can pay $79 a year and get all of Amazon’s Instant videos along with free shipping, or $96 a year for Hulu Plus for just the videos. Hulu Plus has a better selection of TV shows, and many people are already members. But for people considering paying for a video subscription on the Fire, Amazon’s bundled offering is going to be hard to beat, assuming Amazon can license a competitive library of TV shows and movies over time.