Drop a note in the discussions some time. I'd love to hear about what you're doing and even help migrate when the time is right for you.
1,199 karma · joined December 26, 2008
Founder of Zencoder (YC W'10) https://zencoder.com
Creator of Video.js http://videojs.com
http://heff.com
https://github.com/heff
[ my public key: https://keybase.io/heff; my proof: https://keybase.io/heff/sigs/4Uio99eiVJcctZUWcgwngNR2TRkhYssoKZepHlsi4ko ]
In the core JS of Video.js v10 we're building without the assumption of there even being a browser involved so we can point to future JS-based platforms like React Native.
In the new version the core player itself is built as many composable components rather than one monolithic player, so we're going to invite more people to contribute their "plugins" to the core repo as more of those composable components. Versioning plugins and keeping them up to date has always been a challenge, so we're thinking this will help keep the whole ecosystem working well together.
WebRTC being a more open model for real-time streaming, but nowhere near as easy or scalable HTTP-based streaming today.
However we can all also start getting excited about MoQ [1][2].
[1] https://moq.dev/
Generally, the video tag is great and has come a very long way from when Video.js was first created. If the way you think about video is basically an image with a play button, then the video tag works well. If at some point you need Video.js, it'll become obvious pretty quick. Notable differences include:
* Consistent, stylable controls across browsers (browsers each change their native controls over time)
* Advanced features like analytics, ABR, ads, DRM, 360 video (not all of those are in the new version yet)
* Configurable features (with browsers UIs you mostly get what you get)
* A common API to many streaming formats (mp4/mp3, HLS, DASH) and services (Youtube, Vimeo, Wistia)
Of course many of those things are doable with the video tag itself, because (aside from the iframe players) video.js uses the video tag under the hood. But to add those features you're going to end up building something like video.js.
What are you supporting today that requires Wowza or Red5? The short answer is Video.js is only the front-end so it won't help the server side of live streaming much. I'm of course happy to recommend services that make that part easier though.
HLS also has newer features that address the growing manifest issues you were seeing. [2]
All that said, I think a lot of people would feel more comfortable if the industry's adaptive streaming standard wasn't completely controlled by Apple.
There are no immediate plans to deprecate React Player and I think it holds a special place in the ecosystem, but there will be overlap with video.js v10 and if there's specific features you care about or feel are missing, or if you think we're doing a bad job, please voice it here.
It was a similar story with Vidstack and Plyr, with Mux first sponsoring the projects. That's how I met Rahim and Sam, and how we got talking about a shared vision for the future of players.
We're putting out Video.js v10 beta in March, rebuilt from the ground up and merged with Media Chrome. We're being really intentional to build an idiomatic React version in addition to WCs, not just wrapped web components, but I'm interested to see if the web component version is actually the more popular flavor.
Check out the Omakase player: https://player.byomakase.org/
> a section on their site explaining how they are able to undercut everyone in the business and still keep going
This is great feedback that I'm putting on our todo list. We should absolutely have this.
We'll never put pricing out there that we can't handle with our economics, or at least have a clear path to supporting. All of our volume pricing is available publicly, so you should never be bait-and-switched if you're understanding concepts like credits. This is in contrast to some of our competitors that regularly surprise users with new pricing when they hit scale. I hate that so much.
Under the hood we use just-in-time encoding and other advanced optimizations that do give us an edge. Not to mention economies of scale. Writeup to come.
But a challenge comes in customer perception. Some of our customers understand encoding and it's cost, plus the benefits it brings like adaptive streaming and handling user-generated uploads. Many devs are new to video and expect it to cost the same as uploading an MP4 to S3. Some point to our competitors with no encoding costs, and some even point to Youtube as a reason why it should be cheaper. In the past Mux has been labeled as "the expensive option" because we charged for encoding, so we've been working on new pricing shape (some launched already, some to come) that allows you to come in at levels using less encoding that we can support economically, then elect higher levels of encoding costs/values when you understand if they're worth it to you.
We also think video should be more places than it is today, but video is inherently expensive in comparison to many other costs related to building an app, so we see it as our job to keep pushing costs down and shaping pricing so video is accessible to more use cases.
The situation is a little complex with "hot keys" for controlling the video in general (after clicking on the video), accessibility controls for each component, and then general accessibility expectations for the whole page. For example, should we capture the up and down arrows to always control volume when the player is in focus, or should we not do that because people expect that for scrolling the page.
All that said, we definitely have some iteration ahead of us on this front so thanks again for the input.