YouTube going WebM
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- Boz
I guess they are doing this to completely purge h.264 and all licensing fees associated with it in the long run.
So what does this mean to you?
1. Will Apple be forced to support webM?
2. Will this move increase or decrease chances of usability of HTML5 video due to differences in support from platform to platform. Will Flash remain the best cross-platform solution for video supporting all codecs without discrimination?
3. Is YouTube adopting webM the beginning of the end of h.264 for online video due to YouTube really accounting for majority of online video these days and so many devices and services using YouTube will now have to support webM as well?I can see this really only hurting Apple and MPEG-LA.
Use Flash to transition into webM.. Android devices and almost all other devices support Flash and would play YouTube video just fine. Official YouTube apps on Android for example would be updated either way. I believe this is why they integrated Flash into Chrome as well.
Firefox and Opera would support it.. IE9 will support it through Flash or webM plugin...
One of the comments I found interesting in this discussion is the whole 2015 argument where YouTube would have to make massive licensing payments in order to keep serving huge amounts of h.264.. Firefox would be completely screwed if they did support h.264 directly and so on..
So this is really a way to either force MPEG-LA to release royalties on h.264 for web completely or Google will completely kill it. Either way it would be a win for everyone.
- logi0
- Boz0
Yes.. I meant they are now automatically converting new uploaded videos to webM as well.. so when you upload a video it will be converted automatically.. something they really didn't do before.
This all goes to show they are really pushing h.264 out.
- ok_not_ok0
"What makes WebM appealing for smartphones is that it doesn’t require plugins to run video, like Flash."
- I'm talking about H.264.. for a lot of commercial DRM videos and so on you will still need to use Flash.. Plus h.264 will be killed off and the only way to view it on devices will be again through Flash..that's why they integrated it in Chrome.Boz
- killed off and the only way to view it on devices will be again through Flash..that's why they integrated it in Chrome.Boz
- Boz0
@logi
I disagree with that last article.. I read it.. it's nonsense.. there is no increase of cost for anyone.. he assumes that Google will continue serving 2 copies of files to everyone, and somehow create a problem for producers.. which is really opinion and has no real connection with reality.
And come 2015 the costs for everyone playing and showing h.264 content (like YouTube will jump astronomically).
This is one of the best comments to that article and 100% true:
What is Google going to do after 2015 when the current h.264 web licensing agreement expires? Let’s say the licensing agency picks $4/video and sends Google a bill for $1B/yr? You’d be crazy to take a risk like that.
If h.264 wants webm to go away, supply a permanent free license for web use.
1) to have a real option when 2015 when comes around. If the MPEG-LA is unreasonable Google will 100% pull the plug on h.264. The existence of a credible webm option will keep MPEG-LA in check. Do you really want some of your major competitors (Apple, MS) picking the royalty number you are going to have to pay for h.264?
2) Firefox is screwed. Firefox is tri-licensed. One of those licenses is the GPL. From the GPL v2, “b) You must cause any work that you distribute or publish, that in whole or in part contains or is derived from the Program or any part thereof, to be licensed as a whole at no charge to all third parties under the terms of this License.” Firefox’s license prevents them for ever incorporating h.264. Same for Chromium.
So if MPEG-LA wanted to get rid of this problem, they could provide a royalty free license for web use until 2030 when their patents expire and be content with shaking down the hardware manufacturers. Instead they are trying to ingrain h.264 as a widely used standard. Then I fully expect to see robber baron level royalty requirements after 2015 unless there is something around to keep them in check.
- ukit0
Of course its an increase in cost to encode every single video into an additional format, as well as reencode all existing video (of which YouTube has completed about 1/3 according to their blog post on the topic).
I don't think Google will be dropping h.264 support on YouTube. That would be a bad idea considering how widespread h.264 is and how poorly supported Web M is by comparison. IE doesn't support it, iOS doesn't support, and even earlier Android devices don't.
Instead I think Web M is an insurance policy for them, to prevent the chances that MPEG-LA ever charges high licensing fees for h.264. And recently MPEG-LA did announce that h.264 will always be free for any video served free to the user, which is a good start.