As expected, the so-called YouTube killer known as Hulu debuted today in limited form. Reaction around the Web from those who got to play with it (or just viewed a demo) was encouraging, if not cautious.

Liz Gannes provided one of the best, most thorough preview looks at Hulu for NewTeeVee. She notes that Hulu is as different of a Web video service as can be from YouTube, the market leader. Hulu, known first as “NewSite” when parents NBC Universal and Media Corp. announced their joint venture in March, was initially touted as a YouTube killer.

Gannes notes a number of weaknesses. Hulu just offers Web-based advertising-supported streaming. It also shuns user-generated content — meaning that only its professionally-produced, TV Land content is available — and misses on opportunities for viewers to participate through ratings, reviews, and playlists.

However, Gannes and other say, Hulu has an impressive library of old and new content that’s easy to view using Hulu’s Web interface. Uniformly applauded, but not completely understood, is giving viewers tools to embed clips or full-length episodes and movies wherever they want. Since Hulu only makes available a show’s last five episodes, what happens to the embedded links once the show is no longer on the site?

We asked at the start of the month if Hulu’s impending debut is already too late. Well — drum rolls please — Hulu is set to open its doors, at least in beta form, on Monday. And lining up are even more critics.

Investor’s Business Daily writes that the “picture isn’t pretty” for the launch of NBC Universal’s and News Corp.’s online video joint venture, according to people in the industry.

“Some observers foresee failure,” Brian Deagon writes for IBD. “They say it suffers from not enough content and from having two partners that are rivals with poor track records in partnerships.”

Time to get out the proverbial salt shaker and look upon these poll results with a wary eye.

On the one hand, more than half of U.S. residents sampled want the government to regulate Internet video, according to a just-released poll by 463 Communications, a Washington, D.C., public relations firm that specializes in high tech issues.

463 works with Zogby International on periodic polls asking “quirky” questions about technology and the Internet (463 Blog). Sometimes these surveys yield interesting results, like the regulation of Internet video.

Twenty-nine percent surveyed said Internet video should be regulated just like TV content, and another 24 percent said the U.S. government should push for an online rating system similar to the one used by the movie industry. Not surprisingly, only 33 percent of 18-to-24 year-olds support government-regulated video content, while 72 percent of those over 70 years old do.

“I was really shocked that people look at the Internet the same way they look at TV,” said Tom Galvin, a 463 partner. “People see (online video) as spiraling out of control, and they want the government to do something about it.”

On the other hand, quirky polls leave you shaking your head, wondering about the validity of the overall effort.