The Wii Homebrew Channel has become an invaluable resource for many Wii owners. While some undoubtedly love the fact that it can run pirated software, many also use it as a means to fill certain gaps in their library. Specifically, old NES/SNES/Genesis games that were never released for the Virtual Console for whatever reason.
Many assumed that it would never be up and running of Nintendo's new system. But lo and behold, and less than a month into business, the Wii Homebrew Channel is now available for the Wii U.
But the thing is, it was designed for the original Wii and that's still the case here, i.e. within the confines of the Wii mode. Which the Wii U utilizes for the sake of backwards compatibility. This is similar to how flash cards will allow the 3DS to run DS or DSi software, even though the 3DS has yet to be cracked itself.
According to Eurogamer, members of the hacker community all claim that the Homebrew Channel may one day work within the Wii U itself, sans the Wii mode shell, but that's still a bit of a ways off. In the meanwhile, those who are interested in running the HBC should note that doing so will void the Wii U's warranty, since it's unauthorized software.