I'm actually curious about the differences in the formats. Is H.264 a better format? If so, does that mean that the web will always choose "free" over quality, if so, is there any incentive to create better embedded technologies, if a "free" albeit technically worse "knockoff" is available regardless of how open the other tech is, simply because it wants to be compensated when used by commercial entities that plan to profit off their work. For example, if they had non-commercial, GPLv2 and commercial licensing options.
Google's dropping H.264 in Chrome is not a step backward for openness.
51–60 of 128 posts
Re: Google's dropping H.264 in Chrome is not a step backward for openness.
#52Earlier quoted context omitted.
Why not drop Flash too?
Can't drop something you didn't have in the first place. 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.
From http://techcrunch.com/2010/06/25/google-chrome-flash/
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.
Re: Google's dropping H.264 in Chrome is not a step backward for openness.
#53Earlier quoted context omitted.
> How about a Google monopoly? At least h.264 is owned by a number of different companies. 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 th…
Why doesn't Google release the source code of the flavor of Linux that it uses after earning tens of billions basically leveraging Linux code? 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…
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.
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.
Re: Google's dropping H.264 in Chrome is not a step backward for openness.
#54This is a weak article. > It's called bait and switch. Not really. If anything, it's the eventual use of market power for profiteering. > But it would become another closed de facto standard, just like IE6. Huh? IE6 is a browser not a standard . > This is comparing apples and oranges. Flash is a plugin, This is splitting hairs and a straw man. The user does not care or typically doesn't differentiate between somethin…
> But it would become another closed de facto standard, just like IE6.
Huh? IE6 is a browser not a standard.
Well, neither can H.264 be a standard, it is a non-free codec for video. The key was de facto..
Internet Explorer 6, at the peak of its dominance, became the standard that many web developers developed for. Even though it wasn't a standard, when it had over 90% of the market, it was often the only browser that was developed for and other browsers were locked out or suffered. Browsers like Opera spoofed as IE by default, Netscape had quirks to behave similar to IE in some respects...
It's saying that everyone who wasn't on H.264 would suffer or be forced to conform, as was the case with IE6 for some time.
Re: Google's dropping H.264 in Chrome is not a step backward for openness.
#55Earlier quoted context omitted.
Those who seem to be opposed to Google's decision are often in the Apple camp (disclosure: I am in the Apple camp) but are also the same people who wish Flash to die because of it's closed/proprietary nature. 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 roya…
There will be licensing and royalty issues. 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 a big company in Redmond says stuff like this, its called FUD. This is FUD, plain and simple.
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.
Re: Google's dropping H.264 in Chrome is not a step backward for openness.
#56Earlier quoted context omitted.
From what I understand, the main reason for Mozilla and Opera not wanting to include H.264 is that there would be licensing fees for including a decoder with the browser. Correct me if I'm wrong, but it could potentially cost both Mozilla and Opera a significant amount in licensing fees to include H.264 support. Apple doesn't care because it's already a licensee, the same for Microsoft (including in Win7) and Google…
The fee would be about $5 million a year. Arguably, both could afford it (it would be about 5-10% of revenue, but doable). The reason Mozilla is not wanting to include H.264 is that: 1) It can't do that in the open source version, and doesn't want to have separate open-source and closed-source releases. 2) It feels H.264 would be bad for the web, since it requires paying to create content in H.264. Reason #2 is somew…
Both of those things are misleading or wrong. There's no reason why they would have to make it closed source, especially if they use x264. H264 patents don't require everyone to pay to create content, you should read the MPEG licensing agreement.
Re: Google's dropping H.264 in Chrome is not a step backward for openness.
#57You know what we actually need? A h.264-buyout. Let's ask MPEG-LA how much they are planning to earn by the time their licence runs out (2024?). It will probably be ~200 Million or so. Then ask the whole internet to chip in. Result: all the open source people are happy, and we all get to use the higher quality codec in any application we can imagine. And we also get to keep our devices with their battery efficient de…
Or we could just use VP8. All the open source people are happy, the codec will quickly improve, and the vast majority of your devices with their battery efficient dedicated H.264-decompression chips will be replaced by devices with battery efficient dedicated VP8 and H.264-decompression chips within three years. We also save 200 mill.
>the codec will quickly improve
I am sorry, but codecs don't work like regular software. Fixing bugs and issues in the encoder could make the resulting video incompatible with older decoders (decoders and encoders are not easily updateable in firmware devices such as consoles, set top boxes, mobile devices etc.).
Therefore it's important to have a proper spec in place and then improve encoders and decoders. A dump of C code is not a spec like Google did with VP8.
Re: Google's dropping H.264 in Chrome is not a step backward for openness.
#58Earlier quoted context omitted.
There will be licensing and royalty issues. 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 a big company in Redmond says stuff like this, its called FUD. This is FUD, plain and simple. 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 i…
I brought MS into it, not to bash MS, but to point out how hypocritical these arguments often are. If MS says something with no substantiation, but merely an attempt to create fear, uncertainty, and doubt in the future, people are up in arms yelling FUD. But when Google does it it's about the greater good of humanity.
Re: Google's dropping H.264 in Chrome is not a step backward for openness.
#59Earlier quoted context omitted.
Not so fast. These licensed technologies you speak of are not embedded within web browser standards. It's a big difference. Flash, for one, is a plugin. It hitches a ride with the browser, it's not part of its standardized, internal workings. 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 St…
These licensed technologies you speak of are not embedded within web browser standards. Neither are video codecs.
And not embedding h.264 may prevent it from becoming a de-facto standard while pushing WebM, a fully open competitor (that's not perfect yet), may give it a chance of becoming, rightfully, part of a standard.
Re: Google's dropping H.264 in Chrome is not a step backward for openness.
#60Earlier quoted context omitted.
> How about a Google monopoly? At least h.264 is owned by a number of different companies. 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 th…
Why doesn't Google release the source code of the flavor of Linux that it uses after earning tens of billions basically leveraging Linux code? 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…
> Why doesn't Google release the source code of the flavor of Linux that it uses after earning tens of billions basically leveraging Linux code?
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.