Comment by patrickaljord | Hacker News Reader

Comment by patrickaljord | Hacker News Reader

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> being unencumbered by patents was its big advantage over the MPAA-backed formats and they lost that

They didn't lose that. They just signed an agreement with MPEGLA that anyone can use WebM for free. Firefox implemented WebM support. WebP is already being used by Facebook and many others and saves them millions making the open web faster, it'll be in Firefox soon. You also conveniently forgot WebSockets, Web Components, SPDY and WebRTC (they spent millions on iLBC and others that they just gave away for free to everyone including Mozilla, saving everyone years of R&D) and all the amazing work Ian Hickson has done on the _whole_ HTML5 API. Edit: there's also https://code.google.com/p/angleproject/ without which Firefox wouldn't have WebGL on windows. There is more but you get the idea.

Criticizing Chrome 'apps' for having non-standards API is ridiculous because Firefox does the exact same thing: Firefox addons. They have their own proprietary non-standard API: https://addons.mozilla.org/en-us/developers/docs/reference How evil! What people don't seem to understand is that Chrome Apps are just like Firefox Addons, so it's hypocritical to criticize the former and not the latter. And the Chrome UI did revolutionize the field, every browsers copied it and that's a good thing! Just saying that it was a huge contribution (among tons of others from Google, way more than Mozilla).

Google has been sponsoring Firefox for a long time even when they had an insignificant market share at the time. What you don't understand is that what's good for the web is good for Google. That's why they support even insignificant projects that may help the open web in the future (they even sponsor Open Street Map).

I'm not giving Google too much credit, they have literally spent more resources than Mozilla on the open web whether you like it or not. Are you seriously saying that Mozilla has a bigger budget than Google when it comes to the Open Web? If you think about it, Mozilla itself is part of Google's budget for the Open Web. They have also spent more than any other company be it Apple, or Microsoft or any other really. Just educate yourself on the topic.

They lost it. WebM is officially patent-encumbered. So, license or no, it's non-Free. Making it no better than MPEG now that MPEG is basically under the same license. Plus, unlike WebM, MPEG has widespread hardware acceleration on mobile devices, making WebM basically DOA. I was a fan of WebM and thought it could supplant MPEG on mobile. Mozilla did, too, which is why they took the stance of supporting WebM but not MPEG. Google, however, supported MPEG for commercial reasons, so WebM never had a chance.

WebP isn't used by Firefox yet and won't be used by IE or Safari anytime soon, making it useless for most sites. It's handy for some mobile apps. I know Facebook uses it in their mobile apps. But it's pretty useless on the open web due to lack of widespread support.

I will give you SPDY's small latency improvements, of course. As well as WebSockets now that it isn't horrendously broken and insecure anymore. WebRTC is quite cool and will hopefully achieve wider support.

Chrome's apps are definitively not the same as Firefox extensions. Chrome's extensions are the same as Firefox's extensions. Chrome's apps are a proprietary grab at the desktop and keeping people locked into Chrome instead of being able to use open web apps in a browser of their choice. This is by design and not exactly a secret.

Chrome's UI was simply evolutionary, not revolutionary and is the direction things were already headed in. Take a look at Opera 9.5 released the year before Chrome existed. Tabs up top. Forward/back to the left of the URL bar. Chrome evolved having the menu bar hidden by default and simplifying the visual controls a bit. But it didn't completely change what was already occurring in other browsers. Firefox took more note of Chrome than Opera because Chrome started stealing market share.

Mozilla/Netscape has put more man-hours into the open web than Google. Google doesn't 'sponsor' Mozilla. Google pays Mozilla for a service that nets Google far more money than they give Mozilla. It isn't just about money thrown at things, it's about actual hours and results. The majority of Mozilla's man-hours being unpaid doesn't mean they don't count, despite your insistence on only measuring dollars.

And, as for the open web, Mozilla is the only one fighting for it on mobile via Firefox OS, which will use open web apps with additional open source connectors into local functionality (storage, camera, etc). This is an attempt to fight against the closed ecosystem of Apple and the partially closed ecosystem of Android's app store. You'll be able to 'install' web apps from any website without the need of an app store and without needing to side-load onto your phone.

Chrome's apps are a proprietary grab at the desktop and keeping people locked into Chrome instead of being able to use open web apps in a browser of their choice. This is by design and not exactly a secret.

This is overstating the case. A "packaged app" is just a web app stored locally, with some additional APIs available. There's nothing to stop any other browser from treating the app in the obvious way, leveraging the html5-standard "manifest". Indeed this is the same way that Chrome OS and the Firefox OS of which you've spoken highly handle installed apps. If you're concerned about the expanded API, keep in mind that useful APIs are often ported from one browser to another: this is why we have XmlHttpRequest.

But WebRTC makes use of WebM and WebP is really starting to get huge. And then there's all the other techs I already mentioned.

About Chrome Apps, you really don't know what you're talking about as Jess Austin just demonstrated https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6021899

Most Firefox contributors are paid employees thanks to Google's money. It doesn't happen for free. Of course dollars matter. Plus, Chromium is open source too and Chrome gets unpaid contributions too.

> And, as for the open web, Mozilla is the only one fighting for it on mobile via Firefox OS

So is Google. Who was the first huge company to release a 100% web centered OS? Google Chrome OS. They also ported Chrome to Android but right now, the web is just too slow compared to native (and it's going to last http://sealedabstract.com/rants/why-mobile-web-apps-are-slow...) so it doesn't stand a chance. Look at how ridiculously slow FirefoxOS apps are. Google is realistic enough not to do the same mistake but still, they ported Chrome to Android and it supports all the things that FirefoxOS does plus AOSP is open source so it shows that Google actually care about openness even when the web is not a good fit. Oh, and any idea what FirefoxOS uses as a base? Yep, Google's Android.

WebP is huge in apps but not on the open web due to lack of support. It saves Facebook a lot of bandwidth in their native app, though. WebM could have been swapped out for MPEG in WebRTC. It would actually be better due to hardware support.

Chrome apps are still web apps packaged for a single browser in a proprietary app store. It's not the open web.

You do realize there are a ton of Firefox contributors that don't work for Mozilla, right? And, for the third time, Google is paying Mozilla for a service that Google makes a TON of money on. It's not charity as you seem to keep implying. Without Mozilla, Google wouldn't be where it is today. And vice versa. But you seem to only harp on the latter.

You mean the other techs I already acknowledged but you continue to harp on?

On speed, Firefox OS isn't bad for a 1.0 on middling hardware. It'll get faster (remember, Android was a DOG in its initial released on the TMobile G1, which I still have sitting on my desk). And ASM.js will make things interesting, too (and is far more open than Google's native code in the browser attempt). And the article you mentioned is talking about mobile Safari mostly which, don't forget, is completely gimped for packaged web apps on iOS due to Apple's anti-competitive 'you can't use the faster Javascript engine' stance for everything except Safari.

Google Chrome OS is a web-centered OS but it's not an open web OS like Firefox OS is. It supports Chrome apps but it don't think they have any plans to support other ones. It's also funny that you mention Chrome OS and that the web is too slow in the next sentence.

Firefox OS uses the Android internals as a base, which is in turn built on top of Linux. I'm aware of all of that as I've tested it. And I have an Android phone. I think I'm missing your point here as it's unrelated to what we're discussing.

In the end, I have a lot of respect for Google and the contributions they've made. I think they can be a force for good when they want to. And, honestly, I'd love the chance to work at a company like that. But let's keep a balanced eye on their motivations and contributions compared to Mozilla. You make it sound like Google has done everything and Mozilla nothing. I get that you're a Google fan. I am, too. But I'm also a fan of Mozilla and their commitment to openness and a level playing field for everybody.

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