Two issues. It looks like WebM is non free, and if you just decrease the compression, you may not be able to serve to some audiences at all who don't have enough bandwidth, meaning you loose customers by moving to WebM.
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Jobs Responds to Google's WebM Video Standard Announcement as Patent Questions Begin to Surface
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Two issues. It looks like WebM is non free, and if you just decrease the compression, you may not be able to serve to some audiences at all who don't have enough bandwidth, meaning you loose customers by moving to WebM.
Thats 2 days since they've released it.
But anyways, there is no lawsuit because they are already building a patent pool around it.
Honestly dude, you really think these people are "terrorists"? Then not only are you way too willing to completely dismiss any contrary opinions, you have much bigger problems than that. I don't see a vast number of dead bodies on the news because MP3 crushed Ogg in the audio format war...
They don't own some of the patents and provide no indemnification.
It's like they'll drive you to the ice cream store, but they're not going to buy you the ice cream.
If they were going to provide indemnification, and they gave it away free, then it would be totally free.
I deliberately didn't include litigation risks because they are so hard to quantify. The loss of audience is another factor that could be included but which would have introduced a non-cancellable dependency on n.
My opinion (and I'd never dream of arguing it as anything more than that) is that L should actually be quite small (because the probability of charging is likely less than 0.5 and the licence fee per video which they may charge isn't going to be as high as that which they charge for, say, DVDs).
Well, I'm not just talking about litigation risks.... I'm saying that if the MPEGLA does have a patent pool on WebM, they will charge licensing fees, possibly higher than H.264.
Regardless, the licensing fee for H.264 streaming is currently $0.
It is still a risk (by which I mean it is the expected cost/benefit of an uncertain event), and since we do not know even vaguely what any of the possible outcomes would be (in terms of money per video) I decided to elide it. I do believe it is an important factor however, and I believe it is one that all parties are trying to estimate. The variation in their estimates may account for the differences in their actions and opinions even if they're all acting perfectly rationally.
As long as the license fee remains zero, then VP8 loses in this model (assuming VP8 continues to have a worse compression rate than h.264). However, you shouldn't plan just for the present but also for the future since it takes time to enact plans. This means trying to work out estimates like these.
I agree, and maybe VP8 will make that happen. In the meantime, increased browser-level support for H.264 gets us 90% of the way there. It's free to anyone who isn't selling videos directly to customers and, even then, the licensing fees are quite reasonable.
Actually, Google strongly supports H.264. Check out YouTube and the Chrome browser for examples.
I agree about a need for patent reform, but H.264 is hardly an example of patent abuse. It's sort of the opposite, actually. It's an example of how legitimate patent holders can work together to make a critical technology available at a very low price and in such a way that individual, non-profit users don't have to pay a dime.
Are basic factual statements (e.g. VP8 is not technically superior to H.264 and will likely be the target of patent infringement lawsuits) now considered "arrogance"? Besides, Steve Jobs didn't say anything -- he sent a link to an article by a video codec expert. So I guess it's Jason Garrett-Glaser's arrogance that you don't like.I'm not liking Mr. Jobs' arrogance
Your 35% number is way off. Firefox and Opera account for about 26% of browser usage currently and Firefox is in decline. If people find that they can't play videos with Firefox, they'll switch to another browser.
Your GIF/PNG analogy is irrelevant. PNG is superior to GIF in every way, while VP8 appears to be inferior to H.264 in every way except one (free of patent issues) and even that is highly debatable.
It's sad that someone would spend their free time fantasizing about what Steve Jobs does in his office. It might be a good idea to get away from the computer now and then...
Apple owns only one out of many patents in the pool. Stop spreading FUD.
Are the licensing issues in this case just a "card" or are they real and legitimate issues that must be addressed? Lawyers and video encoding experts seem to think the issues are real. If you know more than they do, please enlighten us.
So, for some unspecified reason, Apple would prefer to pay other companies to use their codecs rather than pay nothing. Yeah, that makes sense.
Hah! It's only a problem if you hate Apple with a religious fervor and for some bizarre reason perceive Apple as the primary backer of H.264. Otherwise, it seems like a pretty good idea.
Jobs didn't call VP8 a "mess". He pointed to a technical expert who thinks it's a mess, but that person is not Steve Jobs nor associated with Apple in any way. But, hey, don't let the facts get in the way of your agenda.
It's reasonable to assume that when people say "HTML5", they mean JavaScript as well. And having coded lots and lots of ActionScript, I can state with the utmost confidence that JavaScript is Turing-complete (ActionScript and JavaScript are nearly identical languages, actually).
Again with the "Steve is forcing HTML5" line? Give it up already. What about Google, Microsoft, Mozilla and the W3C?
Wow, talk about FUD. You're quite good at spreading it yourself. Apple is not "heavily invested" in H.264. As has been pointed out repeatedly, Apple is one of the least significant members of MPEG-LA in terms of the number of patents they contribute. Remember that Apple's (and tons of other companies) support for H.264 arose in response to the very real threat of codecs wholly owned by Microsoft becoming the standard. While the situation with H.264 doesn't please everyone, it's undoubtedly better than if the de facto standard codecs were owned by a single company.
As far as VP8 is concerned, if it's technically superior and/or free of patent issues and gains widespread support, Apple will support it as well. Of course, the religious idiots who worship Google and never question their motives will turn anything Apple does into something ominous, regardless of the facts.
It's the de facto standard video codec. There's plenty of "money in it". One of the advantages of MPEG-LA's licensing is that they protect their licensees from any future patent lawsuits.
Good thing Apple threw their weight around to get rid of that DRM.
Yeah, the rendering engine is just a minor part of a browser. The tough part is managing bookmarks.
H.264 has "scant" native support? Correct me if I'm mistaken, but nearly all video playback hardware made today supports H.264 decoding. It's sort of the opposite of "scant". I believe the correct word would be "ubiquitous".
And like I said, they've been building a patent pool for Theora for the last 10 years. A lot of people with money use it everyday, including very profitable game companies like Ubisoft and Atari. Xiph et al are still waiting on that lawsuit.
I'll believe it when a lawsuit is filed, gone through discovery and a decision has been rendered by a judge/jury. Until then, it's all FUD.
FUD spreading organisations are terrorists. Terrorist spread Fear. You don't need to blow stuff up to be a terrorist, quite the contrary.
You obviously have a problem if you ignore the very broad definition of terrorism to define it as a very narrow subject of bombings.
Yeah, the rendering engine is just a minor part of a browser. The tough part is managing bookmarks.
Or the Javascript engine. Chrome doesn't use Webkit's
My problem with this is that you seem to be arguing that it is wrong to plan for all eventualities you can account for. To me, this seems like simple prudence. Likewise, it may be prudent for them to not sue Theora because the potential payoff is too low for the expected costs. That doesn't mean it is imprudent, or even wrong, to threaten to sue if you feel that the warning could accomplish something by itself. Courts are really there as a last resort in my opinion, not to be used unless necessary.
Ok, let us try another example (just so I can see where the boundaries lie in your head); would it be 'FUD' for me to threaten to report someone to the police for (in my opinion) stalking me even though I hope that it wouldn't be necessary to go that far and that they'd go away? What I'm interested in is whether you consider the *threat* or the *medium* of the threat the more significant part of it being 'FUD'.
FYI - HTML5 isn't an agreed and implemented standard yet. Yet you believe the video format will be unspecified. I believe differently.
You clearly don't have very much knowledge about the IT world.
Linux may be insignificant on the desktop, but it has a big market share as server OS.
Other very successful "free" and "open" technologies:
Firefox, Apache, Webkit, the Internet (HTML, HTTP, Email, TCP/IP etc), PHP, MySQL, Java (yes, it's GPL'ed now), and so on...
And given its wide support among software and (probably) hardware vendors, WebM might be another success story. Apple has no choice but to support it.
Ain't that the truth.
We phased out all of our Sun/Solaris systems in favor of cheaper Linux solutions years ago.
Google cares very much about Chrome, they are pushing out releases much, much faster than anyone else.
Yes, I laughed about Chrome (the browser) too. Now I have to acknowledge that it's gaining traction. Slowly but steadily. Check out the long term trend:
http://marketshare.hitslink.com/browser-market-share.aspx?qprid=1&qptimeframe=M&qpsp=112&qpnp=25
While Firefox has reached a plateau, Chrome has been growing quite a bit recently after a very slow start. It's not unlikely that it could become the most used browser in about 5 years.
Safari on the other hand is not really taking off, even though it has been around longer and Apple is just as well-known as Google.
The people who hold the patents will not sell them.
This is the whole issue. Any kind of current video codec is going to be subject to a host of patent and licensing issues. There are all too similar to avoid it.
That is why you essentially have this standoff. You can be assured the other parties involved are not just going to let google do an end run on this and this will be challenged and will likely end up requiring licensing fees as well. In fact it will probably end up with worse terms than H.264 because of the people involved.
It was a little bit on Hubris on Google's part to think they can get an end run on this.
Google needs to come up with a solution though, because this really hinders their ability to distribute Android on any platform, because either they will have to pay the licensing fees or those who use their product will.. and that mucks things up for them greatly.
I'm sorry, 'desktop OS' might be YOUR limited personal definition of IT, but reality looks a bit different. In case you haven't noticed, Linux is also having a lot of success in the smartphone market right now and it will power most iPad competitors (you may have heard that 'mobile devices' are the next big thing).
Besides, if you really think that it's the LICENSE that keeps Linux from having success on the desktop, then you are probably the most uninformed person ever. You should not make statements about I.T., it makes you look ridiculous.
Microsoft also supports WebM in IE9. They will make you install the codec yourself, but this kind of hurdle didn't stop Flash, and it won't stop WebM. The codec is just a very small piece of software and installation takes about 10 seconds.
Boom there goes your argument.
Hmm let me think...
Reason why Opera + Firefox don't and will never support H.264: license fees
Reason why no one will develop a free H.264 plugin for Opera + Firefox: license fees.
H.264 as a web video standard will be history very quickly unless they decide to drop their license fees. You guys are forgetting that H.264 is not even an established web standard. Flash uses it within their proprietary container, but you wouldn't even notice when they start using something else (you also didn't notice when they introduced H.264 in the first place, and that was not so long ago). And those very few sites with HTML5 + H.264 are just what they are: very few sites. The whole hardware acceleration thing: the GPU makers are in this with Google. There isn't even a non-beta acceleration for H.264 yet, people don't care that much about it. Stop using it as an excuse.
One thing people don't understand about HTML5 or HTML in general is it is not some kind of implementation that is fully implemented and working or not.
The browsers are adding pieces of the technology as it goes along. So it is meshed in with the current HTML standards. It is not an "either/or" situation but an extension what already exists.
Over time the browsers will implement and solidify more and more components, and web developers will begin using those components. The movement over to HTML5 is a fluid one though, and is really done with no actual interruption of development or presentation.
It is not like today the website I have is using HTML4 and tomorrow I have to update all my websites to HTML5. It does not work like that. The smart web developers (ie those who don't use flash), will integrate the new features of HTML5 as their users have access to them via whatever browsers their userbase is most familar with... In some cases a new feature may be useful enough to get a website to encourage its users to use a specific version of specific browser. That would only be in short-term though, into the standard is fully implemented.
The bottom line is when people say things like HTML5 is not ready, they don't know what they are talking about. HTML5 is being used today all over the place by a lot of websites. And you won't notice it or care for the most part, as it is a seamless integration and transition. It will happen bit by bit and piece by piece over time. The end user will in most cases never have to do anything.
The browsers are adding pieces of the technology as it goes along. So it is meshed in with the current HTML standards. It is not an "either/or" situation but an extension what already exists.
Over time the browsers will implement and solidify more and more components, and web developers will begin using those components. The movement over to HTML5 is a fluid one though, and is really done with no actual interruption of development or presentation.
It is not like today the website I have is using HTML4 and tomorrow I have to update all my websites to HTML5. It does not work like that. The smart web developers (ie those who don't use flash), will integrate the new features of HTML5 as their users have access to them via whatever browsers their userbase is most familar with... In some cases a new feature may be useful enough to get a website to encourage its users to use a specific version of specific browser. That would only be in short-term though, into the standard is fully implemented.
The bottom line is when people say things like HTML5 is not ready, they don't know what they are talking about. HTML5 is being used today all over the place by a lot of websites. And you won't notice it or care for the most part, as it is a seamless integration and transition. It will happen bit by bit and piece by piece over time. The end user will in most cases never have to do anything.
As long as the standard stays open and will be used, of course. Why wouldn't they?
Please educate yourself.
MP3 and GIF have never been patent-free and no one ever claimed that.
Has Ogg Theora ever been successfully attacked for patent infringement? No? Well where's your argument then?
It's not up to Google. Party A can't give me a license to infringe the patents of Parties B, C and D.
Problem is no one knows what will happen. So far no major players have adopted any of the open codecs (be it audio or video) as a main component. What would happen if MS, Apple and google switched to VP8? I tell you that the patent holders would bring out the tar and feathers.
Don't compare apples to ... mousepads.
The licensing terms for MP3 are very different to H.264
Have you noticed that there ARE actually free, open source players with MP3 support? And even encoders.
I contend that Ogg Theora has not seen any wide implementation enough for anybody to sue it over. That doesn't mean much.