I find it dubious to suggest the following: we should use it, just because most other people use it. Google dropping this codec actually helps prevent h.264's monopoly.
A baseless assertion. It’s far more likely that most sites will continue using H.264, wrapping it in Flash for desktop users, and then sending it naked to mobile devices including iOS and most other video-capable phones. Economically, what is the incentive to do otherwise, as a publisher? How in the world do you figure otherwise?
And can you please fucking stop pretending your own definition of “open” is the same as everyone else’s? Open ≠ free. Sometimes people use it that way. But there IS open source software (GPL’d, even) that is NOT free of cost (like many Wordpress themes & plugins), and there IS open source software that has been tripped up by PATENT TROLLS, and when we are talking about open SPECIFICATIONS the word “open” should be demonstrating that more than one party controls it — which IS the case with H.264 but NOT the case with VP8. So if you want to argue about openness, DEFINE your terms and ACCEPT others will not agree, but we CAN and SHOULD be dealing in terms of facts regarding who controls the spec and who can use it for free, not to mention what’s best for users (something Chrome is otherwise fantastically and fanatically obsessed with).
The shouldn't, thats not what it means. An open specification means that anyone can contribute to the authoring of the specification it has no bearing on licensing terms. Which is the OP's point "open" means a lot of different things.
So why can't we just envision ourselves embracing H.264 and picture what it'll be like in 10 years? Which camp will be trying to push it out the door because of licensing issues? There will be licensing and royalty issues. MPEG LA is a business at heart. Google is as well, certainly. But WebM could be ours instead of theirs, no?
I think what people miss about WebM is that it isn't perfect - and no one is saying it is. It's not fully developed, but shouldn't we participate in fully developing WebM under an open source/royalty-free vision?
Can't we all just get along?
When a big company in Redmond says stuff like this, its called FUD. This is FUD, plain and simple.
What technologies have patents, fees and/or licensing around them?
H264, MP3, Flash, USB, Java, HDMI, CDMA, GSM, LTE, WiMax, Firewire, CD, DVD, BluRay, MP3, AMOLED, and many more.
To argue that computing is going to collapse with the existence of all these is pure FUD. Its FUD when MS does it. It's FUD when Google or the Google camp does it.
UPDATE: And I forgot a biggie, MPEG-2.
Google probably will benefit financially from this change and the rhetoric from Google's camp probably is FUD. No different than what Apple is doing with it's proprietary App Store process or it's closed source OS or how Apple's camp (again, I'm apart of this camp) manages to stick-shift through an uncomfortable conversation about open source beyond WebKit.
The difference is that WebM might also help open source as well. Just because it benefits a corporation doesn't necessarily mean it's the devil.
...which is puts them on equal footing with H.264 and WebM. The HTML5 video standard specification does not specify a codec, so no codec can be said to be "embedded within web browser standards" either.
Neither are video codecs.
At best WebM splits <video> into a state where its really not much more useful than it is today. Or H264 just kills it anyways, and Chrome dies.
In no case does WebM become the defacto standard.
And, BTW, Android phones just passed their iOS competitors, so, it doesn't matter how popular they will be, Android devices will be more popular. If Google decides they won't support h.264, it will be a serious hit.
On marketshare, while Android just passed up iPhone, something happened this past Tuesday which will probably tighten up the race a fair bit more. On top of that, the report counted iPhone subscriptions. Not iPad or iPod Touch devices. I've heard estimates that iPod Touch + iPad sales == iPhone sales.
And iPad2 is likely hitting the market in a few months.
In anycase the road we're going down is a fragmented one. Maybe people will get it right for HTML6. But I think most of the vendors at this point take the view that they'd rather have a fragmented web, rather than one dictated by their competitor.
Both WebM and h.264 are imperfect solutions for the same problem. WebM has a image quality issue h.264 has not, but this can be corrected, as WebM can be improved over time. The problem h.264 has - being encumbered by patents you can borrow for free only for a limited time - will not be corrected. If we decide to store all our video in h.264 we risk being unable to play it a couple years from now without paying the MPEG-LA for its licenses.
> iPod Touch + iPad sales == iPhone sales.
All it shows is that it may take more time for Android-based devices to surpass iOS's individual market share. Still, the world is not going to be an iOS monoculture. While we can't say Blu Ray is a huge success, the lack of Blu Ray drives on Apple computers cannot be credited. We consistently over-estimate Apple's influence.
> In anycase the road we're going down is a fragmented one.
I am happy for that. Diversity and competition are the twin tools of evolution. I like fast evolution.
> Maybe people will get it right for HTML6
I don't think the lack of a specification for video codec is such a bad thing for HTML5. Like I said before, the worst that can happen is HTTP header-based media retrieval of multiple encoded files. Where I work, we routinely batch-encode our video content for just about anything between classic iPods and 1080i h.264 (yes) video. Encoding for WebM will not be a heavy burden. If a pocket device asks for a URL, it gets the pocket version. If, a couple years from now, a huge 4K 3D TV asks for the same URL, it will get 4K-sized video. I think I won't have to change a single line of code...
WebM has a image quality issue h.264 has not, but this can be corrected, as WebM can be improved over time.
Certainly it can be improved over time, but the degree of improvement will be limited to features not covered by the hundreds of video-centric patents that comprise H.264 (assuming WebM isn't already violating any of those patents). Additionally, H.264 encoding technology can be improved over time. You'd be hard pressed to make any technical analysis that demonstrates WebM could ever improve enough to exceed H.264 and it's encoding improvements. The probable reality is that H.264 will always have a not insignificant quality lead over WebM.
The problem h.264 has - being encumbered by patents you can borrow for free only for a limited time - will not be corrected. If we decide to store all our video in h.264 we risk being unable to play it a couple years from now without paying the MPEG-LA for its licenses.
That's not an accurate summation of the H.264 license. H.264 delivered for free on the web will always remain free. H.264 delivered at cost to the viewer is currently free. For more details on the cost H.264 licensing, refer to this: http://www.zdnet.com/blog/bott/by-dropping-h264-is-google-av...
So perhaps neither WebM nor H.264 are perfect ... but using the two points made to highlight the imperfections of each shows that perhaps H.264 isn't as imperfect as some would make it seem.
The case where WebM dies is that everyone continues to encode with H264 (which is what they're doing now). If you're IE or an iOS device you get raw H264. If you're Chrome or Firefox you get H264 in Flash.
You just encode H264 and that's it. Now dual encoding, and you work everywhere.
Whereas with WebM there is NO delivery mechanism to iOS devices (iOS won't play WebM and won't play Flash). You have to dual encode to get those devices. Just seems like a less likely scenario.
Compared to the effort it takes to produce the content, encoding is negligible. We have a complete studio and a dedicated team producing a couple hours of original material every week. Originals are kept as uncompressed as possible storage-wise and are captured at the highest quality the equipment allows. Encoding happens in a server that's nowhere near capacity.
I proposed a presentation on it at the last FISL but it didn't make the cut (for which I am glad - two others did and it was quite enough work preparing them).
And in Chrome, flash is part of the internal workings. You can't update (or remove) the flash player inside.
Google bundles flash for one reason only: to make sure that users aren't given the chance to shoot themselves in the foot by not upgrading. Everyone downloads the flash plugin because sites require it. It has 98% penetration (perhaps less now with more people using iDevices, but still very high). But people never update the plugin, which is a major security issue. Google has solved that problem in chrome.
And you are mistaken that flash is part of the internal workings of chrome. You can disable it: see about:plugins. And there is no need to update it since chrome takes care of that for you.
I dont need to pay anyone in order to write text on the web, I dont need to pay anyone in order to share images that I have created, I dont understand why people think its ok that we should have to pay to share the videos we create
I know mpeg-la arent actually charging end users (yet), but that doesnt matter, someone has to pay
Even if they say the sky is blue?
I don't even know why you're dragging MS into this. They've already stated that IE9 will pick up WebM codecs if they're installed on the machine and will use it play HTML5 video.
They just don't want to ship it with the OS and step onto patent landmines which could cost them billions in lawyer and licensing costs. Google does not provide patent indemnity with WebM.
And I don't know how you even create FUD about something like this, where the uncertainty is based on traps that are known to exist, which most users are currently standing on but simply haven't been triggered yet. Is it a controversial claim that H.264 requires a patent license? Is it a controversial claim that MPEG-LA has only offered a limited-time indemnity, and that only for a subset of uses? This is all verifiable and documented.
I love this line, "where the uncertainty is based on traps that are known to exist"
Have you never bought a DVD player in fear of MPEG-LA might do? Do you own no computers with no licensed technology? I shiver in my boots every morning for fear over this.
Gimme a break. I love how the Google/Mozilla tribe have become the world's best FUD slingers. Everything now is about this horrible tragedy that can happen at any moment.
If that's your choice fine. Stick with Chrome and stay away from H264 streams. Like I said to RBanffy, a fragmented web won't keep me up at night either.
Again: We have no guarantees from the MPEG-LA that they won't turn around tomorrow and demand outrageous royalties from anyone using H.264 videos. We also know that they are able to do so. The only reason it isn't so today is by their good grace. That is real uncertainty, and it seems like a valid cause for worry (Google would have been better off if they'd treated Java so cautiously). Am I mistaken somewhere, and this situation is actually not plausible? I'm not personally involved with either camp — they just seem to have the facts on their side, while all any pro-H.264 folk ever respond with is ad hominem and dismissals.
Yes, we do know that, for the same reason that they don't start charging end users of DVD players. They have legally binding agreement.
For free video, H264 is permanantly free. They can not turn around and change this.
For non-free video, they have established pricing that is locked-in until 2016. And then you're saying, but then they'll screw me, right? Wrong, MPEG-LA states in their contract: "For the protection of licensees, royalty rates applicable to specific license grants or specific licensed products will not increase by more than ten percent (10%) at each renewal."
So enough with the FUD please. H264, amongst licensed technologies, is probably one of the clearest there is and with the least minefields.
No. WebM could be Google's instead of MPEG-LA's. WebM is a Google project, Google-owned and Google-managed. Much like Android, it is open source so that anyone can see the code and make their own changes, but again, like Android, it is not a community effort. There's a chance that your changes, if useful, will make it back in, but in the end WebM, like Android, is controlled not by the community, but by a corporation.
Essentially the comparison being made is between open source and open standards. The WebM implementation is open-source, but it is not an open standard. There are also open-source implementations of H.264 (e.g. x264), but H.264 is also an ISO/ITU standard which anyone can read and implement. WebM, however, is royalty-free, whereas H.264 is not.
WebM has two of the three (open source, royalty free). H.264 also has two of the three (open source, open standard). If Google submits WebM to a standards body for approval, it will have all three.
Until Google does submit it as a standard, it's still Google's format, not ours, they're just letting us use it for free. Down the road they can always change the format, the container, add new features (like some kind of inline advertisement), and anyone who's invested in implementing this format will have to scramble to add the new functionality or be left behind.
Will they? Who knows, but the price you pay for implementing WebM right now is uncertainty. With H.264, you know exactly where you stand, and the licensing terms are specific, and corporations like that about it.
You mean imagine when we're 2 or 3 years from the last of the H.264 patents expiring? At that time I would expect it to only be ditched for something that offers substantially better quality/bitrate.
How about a Google monopoly? At least h.264 is owned by a number of different companies. Never mind that almost everyone agrees that it is the better codec.
It's amazing to me. In the 90s Microsoft's overt policy was "embrace, extend, extinguish," and it called the GPL a "cancer," the MPAA was launching war against DeCSS, and Amazon.com was flexing its one-click patent against competitors. Open source developers had no powerful allies.
Now you have a powerful company like Google that releases millions of lines of open source, sponsors college students to work on open source, fights for openness standards in wireless spectrum auctions, fights for open standards like HTML5, open sources its entire mobile operating system, and in its latest move, buys a video codec company for $106 million and promptly pledges all of the patents for use by anybody.
And yet some people would prefer the codec whose rights are effectively owned by a known patent troll (MPEG-LA) because "at least [it] is owned by a number of different companies."
It goes to show that you can never please everyone.
I like H264 because VP8 is an inferior technology.
It was also around that time that all the geeks hated Flash. How quickly we forget.
Google open sources things that are not central to it's business, just like every other company out there.
MPEG-LA cannot be a patent troll let alone a known one, because it's a loose organization of companies that agree on a standard to prevent fragmentation of video and let people deal with one entity instead of a thousand. Those individual companies could be trolls.
>fights for open standards like HTML5
Really? Then this move to remove support for H.264 will get Flash even more entrenched because it would be the easiest way for content providers to get WebM video working on IE9 and Safari. Flash has already announced upcoming support for WebM.
MobileMedia is owned by, and shares a CEO with, MPEG-LA (who also licence non MPEG patent pools e.g. Firewire, the name alone is a bit misleading if you ask me).
http://thepriorart.typepad.com/the_prior_art/2010/04/mobilem...
Because the GPL does not require them to do so.
If the GPL required them to do so, nobody would licence their code with it, and only the most batshit-insane people would dare use code licensed under it. Would YOU want to run a Linux server if it obligated you to provide a complete dump of source code to anyone who asked? Seriously people, think before you write.
> MPEG-LA cannot be a patent troll let alone a known one, because it's a loose organization of companies
MPEG-LA manage a suite of patents and can issue press releases, therefore they can be a patent troll.
Also, the licensing terms are fixed at a maximum 10% rise per five-year renewal. Given the lifespan of patents, that's a low ceiling.
This is the first I've heard of this. Since one of the main concerns I've heard is that MPEG-LA could raise fees to unacceptable levels, do you mind providing a source for this? I'm still less comfortable with H264 being the standard rather than WebM, but this makes me less worried. (Anti-FUD?)
If you make changes and are unable to convince Google to incorporate them, the video generated by your software will be incompatible with all the millions of WebM decoders out there.
WebM have a Apache style license, you can grab the source, fork it and develop your codec, and you're not even obligated to open a repository including your changes, they can remain closed.
Google will not stop you from doing so and guarantees that he will not sue you asking for royalties, since a license like the Apache license gives the use of the patent for free.
The case of Android and Chrome is simple, Google employes the majority of developers in both projects, however Google does not employes the majority of Linux kernel developers an as a result much of the Android code isn't in the kernel.org code.
Similarly the directions of Webkit is decided by the two main committers: Google and Apple.
Maybe the H264 spec drones on and on but at least it's a spec. The VP8 "spec" is just a mandate from Google. A shitty one, at that. I'll take the small risk of patent litigation among only the biggest players for an open specification and standard any day. Of course, there's also the fact that H264 is way better than VP8 which it seems like no one cares about.
As many have argued, it's disingenuous to treat Flash and the H.264 as being equal in this argument. One of these would be implemented into the browser rather than a plugin. One of these would incur a royalty cost. One of these has viable alternatives.
Google Chrome Now Comes With Flash Built In
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View Comments Robin Wauters Jun 25, 2010
Last March, Adobe and Google jointly announced that Flash Player would soon come built in to the latter’s Chrome browser, eliminating the need for users to download, install and update it separately.