What the hell? It's sad that Google's corporate strategy is starting to override what's in the best interests of it's users. Web video is finally, after so many years, actually encoded in H.264. Who besides YouTube uses WebM or Ogg? I'll be going back to Safari if this happens.
An open solution isn't the best interest of the users? Surely this is just like Apple not supporting Flash in the hope that people go create HTML5 stuff which is open. Both companies have taken strategic and gutsy moves that will temporarily inconvenience users in the hope that long-term it pays of to both the companies and the users.
An ubiquitous solution is in the best interests of users. My parents could care less about whether the video is encoded in H.264 or Ogg. They just want it to work on their iPad.
> Surely this is just like Apple not supporting Flash in the hope that people go create HTML5 stuff which is open.
It's not the same at all. Google, through YouTube and Chrome, helped make H.264 the defacto standard it is. Now they are trying to pull the rug out from under it. Apple never had support for Flash. Not to mention that Flash is a POS and doesn't work well on mobile devices anyways.
> Both companies have taken strategic and gutsy moves that will temporarily inconvenience users in the hope that long-term it pays of to both the companies and the users.
Long-term this isn't a game that Google wins. They've inconvenienced their users and the web will go on with H.264.