Comment by pyrmont | Hacker News Reader

Comment by pyrmont | Hacker News Reader

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tldr: The simple answer to John's questions is that sometimes, when you act in the real world, in order to achieve things you have to make compromises and cannot be ideologically pure.

In more detail:

1. Because, like it or not, Flash is an established part of the web at present and it would be unacceptably frustrating for users if numerous websites stopped working. This would be the result because these sites often do not have a fallback option for users who are not using Flash. On the other hand, sites which only serve h.264 content with no fallback option are rare (non-existent?).

2. I, too, am interested in the answer to this question but not because I'm trying to prove that Google isn't ideologically pure.

3. I don't see how it wouldn't be better for open innovation if YouTube served video in an open format. Perhaps what John is really getting at is what does YouTube intend to do for platforms that will not support Flash or WebM?

4. Why isn't it valid to have Flash as a fallback option? This is only invalid if you work from the assumption that Flash is unacceptable (either because of performance or for ideological reasons). Utilising a ubiquitous closed technology while you help establish a new open technology is not an ideologically pure strategy but it may be one that will work.

5. People who are concerned about video codecs being controlled by for-profit corporations are happy about this but I don't think that's most people. I also don't think those same most people care.

I think John's frustration is really with Google wanting to make decisions on the basis of ideology (open is good/don't be evil) only when it is in Google's financial interest to do so (John has given examples in the past that open doesn't seem so good when it comes to Google's proprietary search algorithm). I think this is a fair frustration to have but it doesn't mean that everything that Google does is irrevocably tainted and can never be good. Establishing an open standard for video on the web is a good thing long-term. The way they are going about it isn't as pure as one might hope but sometimes this is how things work in the real world (see Obama and tax cuts/repeal of Don't Ask, Don't Tell).

Establishing an open standard for video on the web is a good thing long-term.

Why is that a good thing? It's not a bad thing, but is it worth a lot of churn? Virtually none of the media formats in wide use today are open, yet it hasn't really been a problem, from Flash to MP3 to MPEG-2 to even WMA/WMV. The ability for users to transcode is virtually limitless. I don't have a single media file that I can't get to any other format.

I don't think this is about the long-term good of the web. I think it's about the long-term good for Google.

It's long-term good in the sense that it means your freedom to produce video that other people can play back is no longer at the convenience of others.

At present, you can do most of the things you do because the people that control the intellectual property rights are allowing you to do that at a minimal or no cost. As the GIF example demonstrates, it's not always wise to rely the charity of for-profit companies when it comes to this type of thing.

What are the chances of this being a problem in the future? I don't know. I believe it's good long-term in the same way that I believe insurance is good long-term. Taking out insurance doesn't always pay off -- in fact most of the time you'd hope it doesn't -- but that doesn't mean it's not a good thing to do.

This is to Google's benefit and, as I said in my original comment, I believe this is at the heart of John's problem with Google. Google positions its actions within a moral framework that never mentions that the actions which it takes are of financial benefit to Google. I don't disagree that Google is doing that and that it's frustrating -- only that basically every company does it.

Take for example, Apple. Apple only lets users download apps through the App Store. This is good for users because it means that users can trust the software and developers can easily charge for software and make a living from it. But Apple also does it because it's good for Apple. They make money this way on software that's sold and they can also limit apps which would otherwise compete with their own software.

Does the fact they have an ulterior motives mean that it's not good for users? I'd say no. John says no, too. Well at least he does when it's Apple. When it's Google, he seems upset by the dishonesty. I don't mind if John wants to be upset with dishonesty but I think you should make it clear why you're not upset at Apple's similar dishonesty (the reason might be because Apple doesn't frame what they do in such moral terms as Google).

You do realize you're basically arguing FUD.

Let me throw some FUD your way... equally likely (or unlikely). WebM does violate a patent in the MPEG-LA pool. At that point Google needs to rev every instance of WebM, from browser to every video encoded with WebM. MPEG-LA could go after anyone who encoded a video with WebM. And given MPEG-LA's patent pool size (which includes H264, VC-1, MPEG-2, etc...).

In contrast for H264 to violate it patent it would have to violate something not in the patent pool, and something not held by a licensor, e.g., WMV or Quicktime (as these would in good faith be in the patent pool). That list is LOT smaller. Most people think that they likely own al

And note, Google does NOT offer indemnification. If they did, and they should, that would change the equation on this FUD a fair bit.

Who offers indemnification against unexpected patent threats in their codec licenses? Expecting Google to indemnify WebM users or MPEG-LA to indemnify H264 users are equally ridiculous. It's uncountable downside with very little upside.

Re #3: Performance is reason enough. The fact that a dual-core MacBook Pro can't even play back a 360p Flash video without dropping frames is completely unacceptable.

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