Two major events in the realm of online viewing: the first is today’s online premiere of Crawford, a locally produced documentary about the tiny Texas town that GWB chose to adopt as his “home” (Bush was born in Connecticut, and spent his formative years in Houston and Midland). The film was acquired by Austin-based B-Side Entertainment, and was released simultaneously on Hulu, iTunes and Amazon. I personally hate the Hulu player (it’s way too intrusive and distracting–but hey, it’s free), but Amazon’s unbox service is much less annoying, and hopefully B-Side will soon offer a paid download. B-Side’s service is great, and they offer mobile and DVD definition versions at (in my opinion) appropriate price points.

The other big news (yes, I’m two weeks behind on this one) is the online release of Michael Moore’s 2004 election doc Slacker Uprising. Moore is, unarguably, a popular filmmaker, and for him to buy back the North American rights for the flick from Harvey Weinstein just so he can give it away online is a pretty big deal. Read Luke Quinton’s fantastic piece on Slacker Uprising here.