HTML5 Video Update—WebM for IE9
Today IE9 can play HTML5 video in both the industry-standard H.264 format and the
newer WebM format. With the WebM Project’s
release of WebM Components for IE9 (Preview),
Windows customers running IE9 can play WebM videos in Web pages. IE9 is the only
browser today committed to supporting both formats directly.
In the newly published
Video Format Support demo at the IE Test Drive
site, you can try out for yourself Web pages with both video formats on them in
different browsers. You can see how Web site authors can adjust the experience on
their pages based on the browser and operating system the visitor is using. You
can also see the opportunity that HTML5 video offers publishers to make video an
integral part of the Web experience, especially when it is fully hardware accelerated.
Demo page in IE9 before installing WebM components
Demo page in IE9 after installing WebM components and clicking refresh (F5)
Unanswered Questions
In a
previous post about HTML5 video, we described the current situation that
consumers and publishers face, and
others in the industry echoed the
questions for WebM proponents. To summarize the situation:
IE9 supports HTML5 video using H.264, a high-quality and widely-used video format
that serves the Web very well today. Microsoft has released add-ons for both Firefox
and Chrome on Windows to add support for HTML5 video in H.264. “(These add-ins support
the most basic consumer video playback scenarios in other browsers; to support additional
HTML5 video scenarios, other browsers would need better video codec extensibility
support or direct support for OS-provided video codecs.)”IE9 supports HTML5 video using WebM for Windows customers who install third-party
WebM support.As an industry, we still face many legitimate, unanswered questions about liability,
risks, and support for WebM, such as:- Who bears the liability and risk for consumers, businesses, and developers
until the legal system resolves the intellectual property issues? - When and how does Google genuinely make room for the Open Web Standards community
to engage? - What is the plan for restoring consistency across devices, Web services,
and the PC?
- Who bears the liability and risk for consumers, businesses, and developers
Moving Forward
The people who build and use the Web deserve practical and consistent video support
rather than
ideology. Working through these questions is part of moving the Web forward.
The Open Web is a product of consensus and open dialog. This post is part of the
dialog to move the Web forward.
—Dean Hachamovitch, Corporate Vice President, Internet Explorer
Comments
Anonymous
March 16, 2011
"The people who build and use the Web deserve practical and consistent video support rather than ideology." That's exactly right. And it's exactly why a codec licensed freely to everyone is important. A web standardized on a royalty-encumbered codec is neither practical nor consistent.Anonymous
March 16, 2011
eyelidlessness: Stop living in the past. They have explained ad nauseum that H.264 will never have royalty issues.Anonymous
March 16, 2011
That quote summarizes MS exactly. Also, seriously, final version, and no input placeholder attribute support? No required attribute support? No form validation? STILL no support of maxlength in textareas?! You may have border-radius finally but you are severely lacking in ability when it comes to forms!Anonymous
March 16, 2011
Video is all well and good, but SVG filters, that's what we really need! Come on Microsoft!Anonymous
March 16, 2011
Chris: I guess it depends on what you mean by "issues." The reality is that if you want to have an h264 encoder or decoder in your software, or if you want to make money on your videos, you do have to pay royalties. Please do even cursory research before responding on this point. IE Team: While this blog post itself isn't exactly a beacon of good will (protip: IE9 is awesome; stop trying to sell it by tearing competitors down), thank you thank you for being the only browser to offer us actual choice when it comes to video. The <video> situation is unfortunate, but at least IE9 will be the one major part of my audience where the availability of a major video codec won't be dictating the choices my clients and I make.Anonymous
March 16, 2011
So ... when does Opera get an H.264 add-on And no offense, but I really hate that first quesiton there. That is a good talking point, but the fact of the matter is that exactly question applies to H.264 as well. I don't really understand the third question. That said, I applaud Microsoft for at least playing the video if the user has the appropriate codec installed. I really wish all browsers were doing this and we were just battling about which formats are supported natively. This would at least display videos better for more users.Anonymous
March 16, 2011
The comment has been removedAnonymous
March 16, 2011
The comment has been removedAnonymous
March 16, 2011
eventually, were gonna be enjoying www.youtube.com/watch in both, H.264 and VPx, flavours? cool!Anonymous
March 16, 2011
"IE9 is the only browser today committed to supporting both formats directly." -- what exactly is your definition of "directly"? And how does IE support WebM any more "directly" than Firefox and Chrome? All of the browsers need to install (optional) third-party plugins in order to use both formats ...Anonymous
March 16, 2011
The comment has been removedAnonymous
March 16, 2011
@Justification: directly means without a plug-in. The WebM installation is for a codec, not a plugin. The playback is still done by the browser, not a plugin. I'll grant that this is a very fine distinction, but it's still a distinction. I'm more concerned with the "supporting" part. If the third party codec fails, is Microsoft going to provide customer support for it?Anonymous
March 16, 2011
The comment has been removedAnonymous
March 16, 2011
@steve do you have any idea how much of the codec space is covered by patents and how hard it would be to write a codec that delivered quality and didnt break them? And can someone tell me why it's ok to insist that users buy new PCs to get hardware acceleration for something other than H.264 just because one's ideology says that haveing a codec someone earns a royalty from for their work is opposed to their philosophy? because I haven't seen anyone backporting WebM acceleration to the Broadcom chip in my netbook...Anonymous
March 16, 2011
I am really happy with where IE9 is going. However, as publisher of iPulpFiction.com, I have a vested interest in all browsers supporting the CSS 3 multi-column capabilities. IE9 has not shown any progress along those lines. It is the only major browsers not to offer support. Are you working on it? I'd like to be able to recommend IE to our readers.Anonymous
March 16, 2011
Thanks to Microsoft to recognise that we need one (and only one) video standard - a standard that has been proven and embraced in a much wider context than only the browser. A standard that has been adopted by the industry and that we all sustain and pay for through electronics hardware such as compact and video cameras. As a parallel, incompatible "standard" invented by a single company, WebM should go the same way as IE6. Only a lot sooner and with a lot less traction, I hope. if you want WebM support, then install the codec yourself. Microsoft does not want to add another patent trolling risk to their portfolio. It great that Google (and all the WebM implementors) are fine with that, but that's hardly something to hold against Microsoft.Anonymous
March 16, 2011
Which intellectual property issues? Until today there are no known issues, so you should rather say "possible intellectual property issues". And if we are at it, the term "intellectual property" is misleading for a number of reasons and specifically misleading in this case as it is generally used to describe copyright, not patents.Anonymous
March 16, 2011
"The people who build and use the Web deserve practical and consistent video support rather than ideology." That's pathetically low and hypocritical, even for Microsoft scum.Anonymous
March 16, 2011
I'm not sure what "only browser ... supporting both" is supposed to infer. I just tried that test page in Chrome and all four videos played fine. Is IE claiming no non-IE9 browser supports the formats on that test page?Anonymous
March 16, 2011
"Who bears the liability and risk for consumers, businesses, and developers until the legal system resolves the intellectual property issues?" Better go read your H.264 licence, because it doesn't bear any liability either. "When and how does Google genuinely make room for the Open Web Standards community to engage?" When and how does the MPEG-LA genuinely make room for the Open Web Standards community to engage? The answer is not at all, not ever. "What is the plan for restoring consistency across devices, Web services, and the PC?" WebM is the plan. You're blocking it.Anonymous
March 16, 2011
«« IE9 is the only browser today committed to supporting both formats directly. »» False.
- IE9 doesn't support Webm directly. A plugin is not a direct support.
- Epiphany support really directly Webm and Theora/ogg and H264 a long time ago.
- You can thanks Google for that.
Anonymous
March 16, 2011
@snarkmaiden: Do you have any idea how specific most of these patents are and how narrow their claims are in order to not get accepted? Don't forget that abstract ideas by itself are still not patentable. Also, see carlodaffara.conecta.itAnonymous
March 16, 2011
The comment has been removedAnonymous
March 16, 2011
@Kroc Cramen: "WebM is the plan. You're blocking it." h264 is ALREADY supported in nearly everything... What "plan" is WebM compared to that, is it even hardware-accelerated? And how is Microsoft blocking that so-called "plan" by actually supporting WebM?Anonymous
March 16, 2011
The comment has been removedAnonymous
March 16, 2011
@Arieta and everyone else supporting IE's stand or against WebM: MPEG LA does not offer protection to h264 patents outside their patent wall (the same as Google with WebM), h264 can not be accepted by the W3C as a WEB standard due to royalties (thus making it worse than WebM regarding standards), thus also placing the burden to restore consistency in the IE team as they are the ones promoting an unstandardizable codec, while Google is actually trying to promote a web browser and a phone OS which support WebM. Also, WebM already has their first hardware decoder available for use: blog.webmproject.org/.../introducing-anthill-first-vp8-hardware.htmlAnonymous
March 16, 2011
@Dean Hachamovitch: "The people who build and use the Web deserve practical and consistent video support rather than ideology." Backing a format, such as H.264, which does not conform to the licencing norms for Web standards strikes me as being a decision far more driven by ideology than backing a format that does, such as WebM.Anonymous
March 16, 2011
Ignore my link, that's an hardware encoder, but I am aware there is a hardware decoder, if I recall correctly.Anonymous
March 16, 2011
The comment has been removedAnonymous
March 16, 2011
Here's the info about the hardware decoder: blog.webmproject.org/.../availability-of-webm-vp8-video-hardware.htmlAnonymous
March 16, 2011
Question for all people who want IE to support WebM natively: Will you give money to MS when they get sued because WebM is not patent-free? (the fact Google refuses to give legal protection to companies using WebM is the proof they know WebM is not patent-free and, sadly, will never be thanks to the USA's patent system) Google must have been taking lessons from Steve Jobs, their reality distortion field has become pretty big recently.Anonymous
March 16, 2011
Would a Theora Media Foundation plugin work also if it existed?Anonymous
March 16, 2011
@Aethec Have you even read my comment? h264 does not give protection to any patent OUTSIDE their patent wall either (the license is only to protect from patents inside the patent pool, they basically make you pay so no company inside the pool will sue you). If someone has a patent for h264 which is not in the patent pool, they can sue any company, including Microsoft, and MPEG LA will not help Microsoft, nor any other company, in such situation. What you said is a moot point, because both codecs can have submarine patents nobody knows about.Anonymous
March 16, 2011
The comment has been removedAnonymous
March 16, 2011
@Aethec, your comment is deceptive and dishonest. Observe: "Question for all people who want IE to support WebM natively: Will you give money to MS when they get sued because WebM is not patent-free?" There is no evidence whatsoever that WebM violates any patents. In fact, On2's business model relied on avoiding patents. H264, on the other hand, has no such background. H264 is simply a patent pool. No attempt was made to avoid infringement. "the fact Google refuses to give legal protection to companies using WebM is the proof they know WebM is not patent-free" The MPEG-LA refuses to give legal protection to companies using H264. According to you, this is proof they know H264 is not patent-free. And indeed, again, VP8 was created specifically to be patent-free. H264 was created simply by pooling patents without actually looking for any other patents that may affect it. So H264 is MORE dangerous than VP8.Anonymous
March 16, 2011
These codecs are the best http://xiph.org/dshow/Anonymous
March 16, 2011
WebM is a poor choice for IE9 users. It increases the size of videofiles It has fairly poor performing software encoders and decoders It has no hardware accleration support All of this leads to a much less effcient and slower browsing experience for IE9 users if they encouter sites with WebM in stead of h.264 video. For IE9 user that all have h.264 codec additional support for the VP8 codec in WebM is just a menace that has absolutely no value whatsoever.Anonymous
March 16, 2011
The comment has been removedAnonymous
March 16, 2011
One more try for reading comprehension. I'm quite certain that the post says "Directly", not "Natively" There's quite a difference. If you don't understand the difference, maybe you're not qualified to be bashing Microsoft on this topic. If you're mis-quoting/mis-using "natively" or "directly", try re-reading the post. Also review the meanings of codec and plugin, then back up and review what Microsoft and other browser vendors are doing?Anonymous
March 16, 2011
I'm .Net developer, I use Internet for over 15 years I'dont belive how power of Microsoft ignorance is to DISABLE CLEAR TYPE OFF in IE!!!! I change browser to Chrome after 15 years of using IE.Anonymous
March 16, 2011
please excuse my ignorance, whats webm precisely? a codec, a container, an implentation, a standard or yet another attempt of googles to stifle the web?Anonymous
March 16, 2011
The comment has been removedAnonymous
March 16, 2011
Why are people so dumb? Echo 8, the trollers here don't understand computer technology. They can't be expected to understand the difference between a codec and a plugin. They don't have any idea how IE9 uses the H264 and WebM codec in the exact same way. I'm saddened for them.Anonymous
March 16, 2011
The comment has been removedAnonymous
March 16, 2011
@Nooope You want facts: De VP8 codec in WebM is a pure proprietary format owned and controlled by Google. De h.264 codec is not a propietary format but is an ISO/IEC standard There is currently no hardware accelleration for VP8 on existing devices and it might take years before such hardware support will be availalbe to everyone on each device. That is especially anoying for IE9 users that already have hardware accelerated html5 video support using h.264. VP8 is a less efficient codec than h.264 and thus requires larger video files. Files might be 10%, 20% or even 40% larger to have equal video quality to AVC/h.264. That mean extra downloading which (if de codec is massively used) will affect internet traffic and ISPs bandwith and in the end cost the endusers which foot the bill. The current lack of hardware accelleration and the required extra bandwith usage will also mean more energy used for WebM than for h.264. That makes WebM a needless waste of energy and a non-green choice. WebM is not a codec for environmentalists.Anonymous
March 16, 2011
I Will Not Install WebM Unless Microsoft sends it as an update for IE9 or unless Microsoft Creates an IE9 addon for WebM Support. I never trusted google. never will. google is evilAnonymous
March 16, 2011
The comment has been removedAnonymous
March 16, 2011
The comment has been removedAnonymous
March 16, 2011
The comment has been removedAnonymous
March 16, 2011
"Google has been working with Microsoft" scaryAnonymous
March 16, 2011
The comment has been removedAnonymous
March 16, 2011
Update: When I said "'It has no hardware accleration support (...) There is currently no hardware accelleration for VP8 on existing devices and it might take years before such hardware support will be availalbe to everyone on each device. That is especially anoying for IE9 users that already have hardware accelerated html5 video support using h.264.' False: www.webmproject.org/hardware (...)" I meant that although it currently has no hardware acceleration on Windows, the fact that graphic card companies (such as Nvidia and the ATI owner AMD) are supporting the codec, it is predictable that their graphics card's firmware and drivers will receive updates to implement hardware acceleration and probably soon.Anonymous
March 16, 2011
Also, here is proof of my latest comment: www.webmproject.org/.../supportersAnonymous
March 16, 2011
"VP8 has no limitation so far that prevents it to become a W3C recommendation." still google are reluctant to submit it?Anonymous
March 16, 2011
The comment has been removedAnonymous
March 16, 2011
What about if you have Windows N edition installed? Then you need WMP, which is completely unnecessary...Anonymous
March 16, 2011
The comment has been removedAnonymous
March 16, 2011
@Chris: Stop living in the past. They have explained ad nauseum that H.264 will never have royalty issues. Who are "they" and why haven't they made it officially and perpetually royalty-free then?Anonymous
March 16, 2011
Microsoft is probably intentionally trying to give WebM a bad name through making a terrible WebM encode for the demo site. I've done an encode of the trailer at the same bitrate of their encode and here is an image comparison of the result (Microsoft encode on the right): http://ubuntuone.com/p/i4j/ I think the differences are beyond my ability to comment.Anonymous
March 16, 2011
The comment has been removedAnonymous
March 16, 2011
The comment has been removedAnonymous
March 16, 2011
im affraid wiki lost credibility after the the latest google stunt ;( or before?Anonymous
March 16, 2011
The comment has been removedAnonymous
March 16, 2011
This is more FUD tactics from Micro$haft again. This whole PR release is disgusting to be honest. Not a single word of it is objective. Half of it is to cast FUD against WebM and the other half if a pathetic attempt to appear impartial while championing H.264. Please give it a rest M$ - you guys are getting worse than politicians.Anonymous
March 16, 2011
The comment has been removedAnonymous
March 16, 2011
Microsoft is part of the MPEG-LA patent pool and collect massive royalties from H.264. This can't ever be adopted for an free/open web.Anonymous
March 16, 2011
hm, x264?Anonymous
March 16, 2011
> X264 developers have already stated that VP8 uses similar technologies to h.264. See carlodaffara.conecta.itAnonymous
March 16, 2011
The comment has been removedAnonymous
March 16, 2011
"directly"Anonymous
March 16, 2011
The comment has been removedAnonymous
March 16, 2011
@Mike Dimmick: Nice wall of text, unfortunately it is in vain. MPEG-LA's monopoly over the video industry is very dangerous. Simply asking every browser vendor to pay them large royalties is crippling. Does this mean no one in the world can develop a standards-compliant browser without having to pay royalties to MPEG-LA? According to word from x264 developers, VP8 can exceed H.264 given a good encoder (like xvp8).Anonymous
March 16, 2011
@aidusa "Simply asking every browser vendor to pay them large royalties is crippling" Nearly everybody already supports h.264 on their devices beacause is it a common format that everydoby is using already 99% of new computer and smartphones have h.264 codecs on them (Windows 7 , OS X, Ubuntu depending on OEM, Android, iPhone, Windows Phoen 7) Browsers can hook into those exisiting codecs easily. That means browser do not really need to distribute any h.264 codecs or mayby only a few if they aboslutly needed to. So the cost aspect for browservendors is bogus. codec aare already out threre. Browser do not need to pay any significant royaltiies f they use the existing codec on computers. In fact for Firefox the code to hook into the Directshow h.264 codecs on Windows was already developed but it was never used in the browser. Pushing WebM, a codec owned by the main sponsor of Firefox however is not a problem for Firefox. Licensing cost is not the issue here but politics and control over formats.Anonymous
March 16, 2011
If MPEG-LA grants users a worldwide, non-exclusive, no-charge, royalty-free patent license (like what Google did), then maybe I'll consider using their format. There is no guarantee that MPEG-LA will not suddenly change their minds and start asking for royalties on serving video. Also, next iterations of VP8 will always be free and have the same license. When H.264 becomes irrelevant and multimedia needs increase exponentially, you'll find yourself begging MPEG-LA again to make H.265 or (whatever their successor format is) free in the aspects of web video. Spare me that.Anonymous
March 16, 2011
Note: Firefox CANNOT bundle H.264 since as it is a closed proprietary format. Doing so violates their it's open source license as everything included in the package must also be open source. This is true of any application that has a GPL like license and is another reason why WebM is the only sane choice. Microsoft, you are a huge corporation. that is all.Anonymous
March 16, 2011
@hAl: +1Anonymous
March 17, 2011
I still see HTML5 video as a novelty. Until there are some nice jQuery plugins to make the interface decent it's a step backwards in terms of UX. Also how will content providers like Hulu ensure that your videos are interrupted with ads? A 5 yr old could right click and download any video like a jpeg. The open source crowd is really like a bunch of hippies. The world doesn't work that way. I don't see any provider of movies and TV shows making their content available through this medium. This is purely for Joe Shmoe user created videos.Anonymous
March 17, 2011
Now that the Firefox 4 RC is out, will you guys update your H.264 plugin to work with it?Anonymous
March 17, 2011
Please tell me again how many worm spread by people downlowding fake video codec.... Now a lot of people will think it is OK to download a video codec when a website says it needs it!Anonymous
March 17, 2011
Wow, you have been following up with the MSDN blogs so punctually. Apparently, you are pretty inspired by their advancements and products. So do I.Anonymous
March 17, 2011
> The people who build and use the Web deserve practical and consistent video support rather than ideology. MS is of course weak on ideology, but you are missing the point. Practical and consistent technologies for the Web should be free and open by default, and that's how W3C defines them. That's why H.264 will never be good for Web video, unless MPEG-LA will just disband themselves, or software patents will be gone for good.Anonymous
March 17, 2011
someone said: "Wow, you have been following up with the MSDN blogs so punctually. Apparently, you are pretty inspired by their advancements and products. So do I." I was never inspired by Microsoft. Yes, its a great ENGINEERING company. Yes, it produces very tight code, mainly in the Windows division (I remember the pascal calling convention being used to save 4 bytes for every system call). But compare that to bell-labs. Which I'd say was an ARTISTIC workplace. Think about the creation of the C language, makefiles, source-code mangment tools, and on and on. Pure masterpieces with unix at the core. Granted, not everything was new (c has other languages as predecessors), but such a concentration of great things is rare in the field of CS and the mark of an inspiring company.Anonymous
March 17, 2011
@Leave a Comment "Microsoft is part of the MPEG-LA patent pool and collect massive royalties from H.264. This can't ever be adopted for an free/open web." They've stated in earlier blog entries that MS pays far more royalties than it receives in order to include H.264 support in their operating systems, as do Apple does for theirs. They're already paying money for the capability, so why not use it?Anonymous
March 17, 2011
"Unanswered Questions" aka Fear, Uncertainty and Doubt.Anonymous
March 17, 2011
Having said that, in the domain of CS, I believe MS and Redhat etc. (MS majorly as to speak) have played a vital role over the years in academics all around the world. AFAIK, in University & Colleges .NET and earlier Visual C/VB and Sun's JAVA this set of languages helped delivering notable computer scientist, s/w eng, s/w developers etc. Thus, in the life of an average computer scientist, MS, Redhat/other-*nix/Sun(ORACLE) etc. are the known entities. No objectiveC, Go etc. have any significant participation yet.Anonymous
March 17, 2011
You want to play the mutual-assured-destruction patent card? You'd better prepare a liability statement for every single technology used by every single one of your products. Last I checked, Microsoft was locked in any number of struggles against patent holders. All you've really done is call attention to how badly the patent system is broken, and how no one without a cadre of lawyers should feel safe to innovate or create. Do you really want managers starting to question liability and risk for everything they buy?Anonymous
March 17, 2011
@Echo 8: Even if Microsoft paid full royalties to MPEG-LA (which they don't because they are part of it), they won't be affected by it since Microsoft is a massive corporation. For companies and institutions that are not as big as Microsoft, these royalties are crippling. This simply means that no developer in the world can develop a web browser that is standards-compliant, unless he pays royalties for it . That can't ever be adopted for the free/open web.Anonymous
March 17, 2011
The comment has been removedAnonymous
March 19, 2011
@pete - actually, I think that's rather the point; the On2 guys were trying to avoid patents and chose some inefficient options to do so in some cases (that the massive 100 videos they use as their test set are part of the quality problems with WebM as currently available - I haven't seen any of the promised internal improvements make it into the code base, but that's a different argument). The engineering space of efficient, quality video codecs is substantially covered by patents, so just thrashing out some super new codec over beers n wings is pretty unlikely.Anonymous
March 19, 2011
Different does not mean worse. VP8 is better than H.264 in certain areas, it's just that the currently and only implementation is not good enough. Wait for xvp8.Anonymous
March 19, 2011
Why is "hAl" actively lying? Observe: "De VP8 codec in WebM is a pure proprietary format owned and controlled by Google." This is a blatant lie. WebM is an open-source project sponsored by Google and others. Google has given away all rights, and anyone can use it freely for anything. Please stop lying, hAl.Anonymous
March 19, 2011
@"hAl is lying" He is not. But you are very wrong. You can have all source code,but if specification is trumped by code and all relevant things are owned by one compeny we are talking about faux open techology.Anonymous
March 19, 2011
The comment has been removedAnonymous
March 20, 2011
Klimax you are very wrong. Read the patent license; it has nothing to do with code.Anonymous
March 20, 2011
No, you are very wrong. Google own and controls the VP8 format. VP8 is thus a proprietary format (Just like the old MS Office binary formats which are also free to use and have a free patent licence)Anonymous
March 20, 2011
Patents are only part of picture.Anonymous
March 20, 2011
"Google own and controls the VP8 format." MPEG-LA own and control the H.264 format AND ask browser vendors to pay royalties.Anonymous
March 20, 2011
MPEG-LA's monopoly over the video industry is against all anti-trust laws. There is no way a for-profit coalition of companies (who proved evil throughout their existence) can name themselves the authority over a certain industry.Anonymous
March 20, 2011
@Klimax, hAl is indeed lying, because he is making a claim he KNOWS is false. WebM is an open-source project. You can freely take the source code and the specification and do whatever you want with it. It's under an irrevocable BSD license. Now you are a liar too.Anonymous
March 20, 2011
@hAl Please stop lying now. WebM is available under a BSD license, which means that you can basically do anything with it, including fork it and make your own closed-source codec without sharing further work with others. You also have an irrevocable patent license, as Google gave up all patent rights. VP8 is not a proprietary format, because it is an open-source project sponsored by several companies and organizations, including Google.Anonymous
March 20, 2011
@sigh WebM's code is open source. Yes. This has NOTHING to do with whether VP8 is a proprietary format or not. You're trying to conflate two orthogonal things, and yet you have the gall to say that hAl is lying.Anonymous
March 20, 2011
Some sad people here that do not recognize the simple facts, which are that: Google does really fully own and control the VP8 format. VP8 is a proprietary format from Google.Anonymous
March 20, 2011
You are playing with words. Yes, Google does own the patents, but they have give all users worldwide the permission to use all the VP8 patents in whatever way they want free of charge, which MPEG-LA won't ever do. Google never asked anyone to pay them royalties. Obvious troll is obvious.Anonymous
March 21, 2011
@@above Not sure who you're responding to, but if you're trying to imply that people are saying that VP8 is a proprietary format because Google own patents which cover it, you are being just as disingenuous as sigh was previously. Let's say that MPEG-LA's request for VP8 patents gets responses from 10 companies which all have patents which are verified to indeed cover it. Let's say that they go with MPEG-LA and put together a patent pool which people need to buy into to be allowed to use VP8. In this situation the VP8 format is still controlled by and proprietary to Google. Patents are irrelevant to this issue.Anonymous
March 21, 2011
@DT you are very much wrong as is @hAl and @Test Please read the below FAQ and if there are words too big for you, please put in the effort to grab a dictionary. www.webmproject.org/.../faq www.webmproject.org/.../additional Google have donated WebM to the community, they have also granted rights to their patents including any future patents they obtain relating to WebM. The format is complete and is unlikely to undergo any change, therefore to claim Google own it and it is proprietary just shows you fail to understand the meaning of the word. Anyone can contribute to libvpx and anyone outside of Google can become an approver of such patches once they show they know what they are doing. I love how closely Micro$oft fanboys mimic the stupidity of the Republican party in the US with such an extreme lack of understanding, combined with borderline narcissistic traits.Anonymous
March 21, 2011
No, Google have not donated VP8 tot the community. They provide a free specification and and free technology licensing for patents for the format They keep ownership of the VP format They keep control of the VP format and brand. And in addition they control the WebM project as well. This is very similar to Microsoft who have released free specifications for the old binary Office formats and a have released a free technology license for patents for the use and implementation fo the format but who still own and controll the formats. Real open standards are handed over to independant standards organizations that develop and control the format in an open decisions making proces (like members voting).Anonymous
March 21, 2011
Do Not Feed the Troll. Thanks in Advance.Anonymous
March 27, 2011
"IE9 is the only browser today committed to supporting both formats directly." Everyone seems so upset about the word "directly," but its meaning is really open to interpretation. Actually, the incorrect word in that sentence is "only." By the logic used in this post, Safari supports WebM just as "directly" as IE. Just as IE will play WebM if you download the Media Foundation codec, Safari will play it if you download a Quicktime codec. I just find it so ironic that you and Apple are both actually doing the same thing to (not) implement support for webm in your browsers, but while you guys are advertising your support for it, they are actively advertising their UN-support for it (just google "steve jobs webm" to see what I mean). Kinda funny, no?