Ubuntu manages the Ubuntu packages etc., not VideoLAN. New versions of programs aren't accepted in the stable version's repositories until they have gone through a vigorous testing process etc. PierraDeKat posted (AFAIK) an unofficial PPA (Personal Package Archive) repository containing 0.9.4, which could stop being maintained etc. hence placing on the VideoLAN website might not be a long-lasting solution. The current VLC version in the official repositories of you distribution is normally the recommended version.
The current official hardy package is 0.8.6e:
http://packages.ubuntu.com/hardy/vlc
And the official intrepid (latest unstable version) package is 0.9.4:
http://packages.ubuntu.com/intrepid/vlc
You can add the intrepid repository to your sources.list, however unless you want a bleeding-edge version of Ubuntu not recommended (unless you do some apt pinning or something similar
).
Arite.