- Jan 24, 2011
- 9,378
Google just fired a broadside in the Web's codec wars.
With its alternative WebM video-encoding technology now entering the marketplace, Google announced plans today to remove built-in Chrome support for a widely used rival codec called H.264 favored by Apple and Microsoft. The move places Google instead firmly in the camp of browser makers Mozilla and Opera, who ardently desire basic Web technologies to be unencumbered by patent restrictions.
"Though H.264 plays an important role in video, as our goal is to enable open innovation, support for the codec will be removed and our resources directed towards completely open codec technologies," said Mike Jazayeri, a Google product manager, in a blog post.
A codec's job is to encode and decode video and audio, a technologically complicated balancing act. Codecs must reduce file sizes and enable streaming media that doesn't overtax networks, but they also must preserve as much quality as possible--for example by trying to discard data that the human senses won't miss much and cleverly interpolate to fill in the gaps.
One big change coming with the new HTML5 version of the Web page description language is built-in support for video; most Web video today employs Adobe Systems' Flash Player plug-in, which uses H.264 and other codecs under the covers. Although HTML5 video has promise, disagreements in the W3C standards group have meant the draft standard omits specifying a particular codec. Chrome was the only browser among the top five to support both WebM and H.264, but now Google has swung its vote.
Google's move triggered flabbergasted glee among advocates of the "open Web"--one that employs open standards and shuns patent barriers. "Ok this is HUGE, Chrome drops support for H264," said Mozilla developer Paul Rouget in a tweet.
But not everybody is so happy. Don MacAskill, chief executive of photo- and video-sharing site SmugMug, bemoaned the move. "Bottom line: Much more expensive to build video on the Web, and much worse user experience. And only Adobe wins," he tweeted. "I want WebM. Badly. But I need time for hardware penetration to happen...This means the cheapest way to develop video on the Web is to use Flash primarily. Before, we could do HTML5 with Flash fallback."
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With its alternative WebM video-encoding technology now entering the marketplace, Google announced plans today to remove built-in Chrome support for a widely used rival codec called H.264 favored by Apple and Microsoft. The move places Google instead firmly in the camp of browser makers Mozilla and Opera, who ardently desire basic Web technologies to be unencumbered by patent restrictions.
"Though H.264 plays an important role in video, as our goal is to enable open innovation, support for the codec will be removed and our resources directed towards completely open codec technologies," said Mike Jazayeri, a Google product manager, in a blog post.
A codec's job is to encode and decode video and audio, a technologically complicated balancing act. Codecs must reduce file sizes and enable streaming media that doesn't overtax networks, but they also must preserve as much quality as possible--for example by trying to discard data that the human senses won't miss much and cleverly interpolate to fill in the gaps.
One big change coming with the new HTML5 version of the Web page description language is built-in support for video; most Web video today employs Adobe Systems' Flash Player plug-in, which uses H.264 and other codecs under the covers. Although HTML5 video has promise, disagreements in the W3C standards group have meant the draft standard omits specifying a particular codec. Chrome was the only browser among the top five to support both WebM and H.264, but now Google has swung its vote.
Google's move triggered flabbergasted glee among advocates of the "open Web"--one that employs open standards and shuns patent barriers. "Ok this is HUGE, Chrome drops support for H264," said Mozilla developer Paul Rouget in a tweet.
But not everybody is so happy. Don MacAskill, chief executive of photo- and video-sharing site SmugMug, bemoaned the move. "Bottom line: Much more expensive to build video on the Web, and much worse user experience. And only Adobe wins," he tweeted. "I want WebM. Badly. But I need time for hardware penetration to happen...This means the cheapest way to develop video on the Web is to use Flash primarily. Before, we could do HTML5 with Flash fallback."
Read more
