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HTML5 video element codec debate reignitedHTML5 video element codec debate reignitedPosted Feb 4, 2010 15:49 UTC (Thu) by Simetrical (guest, #53439)Parent article: HTML5 video element codec debate reignited
This article perpetuates a common and insidious myth about the video format war: The HTML 5 standard does not mandate that support be included for any particular format in order to qualify as compliant, however, so a public war is underway between format proponents for de-facto dominance. The cause-and-effect given here is exactly backwards. HTML5 does not mandate any format because the war is underway. The editor, Ian Hickson, is not willing to add anything to the standard if a major player refuses to implement it, because then it's not a standard, it's a work of fiction. Apple refuses to implement Theora support, and Mozilla refuses to implement H.264 support, regardless of what the spec says, so it would be pointless to try mandating either – it would just make the spec less useful to anyone who expects it to be consistently implemented as written. Your own duplication of Ian's mailing list post says this (emphasis added: . . . I have reluctantly come to the conclusion that there is no suitable codec that all vendors are willing to implement and ship. . . . I have therefore removed the two subsections in the HTML5 spec in which codecs would have been required . . . Please fix this error to avoid confusing anyone further. Some other minor errors:
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HTML5 video element codec debate reignited Posted Feb 5, 2010 13:02 UTC (Fri) by DonDiego (subscriber, #24141) [Link]
* Opera also uses system codecs, so H.264 support is available if you have a codec installed on the system.
HTML5 video element codec debate reignited Posted Feb 5, 2010 19:36 UTC (Fri) by Simetrical (guest, #53439) [Link] Not true according to this blog post by the implementer:
On Windows (and presumably on Mac when support for that is added), Opera supports only Theora for video. On Linux/BSD, it uses system GStreamer libraries and will support anything they do.
HTML5 video element codec debate reignited Posted Feb 5, 2010 13:12 UTC (Fri) by DonDiego (subscriber, #24141) [Link]
Another correction:
> H.264 supporters claim that Theora's quality-per-bitrate performance is behind H.264's
This is not a claim but a technical fact that not even the Theora developers dispute. The question is whether or not Theora is good enough for the proposed uses and whether or not other tradeoffs make Theora preferable over H.264.
HTML5 video element codec debate reignited Posted Feb 5, 2010 19:00 UTC (Fri) by gmaxwell (subscriber, #30048) [Link] Yes. As a format H.264 has a lot of attractive things in it and among those tools in H.264's collection is basically a superset of Theora. If your technical comparison points are only quality-per-bit and not decoder computational complexity, decoder implementation complexity, licensing, or... "Assume an ideal spherical encoder in a frictionless market" H.264 has more signal processing tools in the decoder, so it will win that kind of comparison.Though it's important to note that what we can actually compare the quality-per-bitrate of is encoders, not formats. Quoting Timothy Terriberry, "There are _so_ many things you can do wrong in an encoder that do much more harm to quality than a clever optimization scheme or a complicated, patented scheme can improve it. Most encoders do some or all of them, and the original VP3 encoder was no exception. With Thusnelda we're doing things a lot smarter than we used to be, and that will only get better." Libtheora doesn't beat the quality-per-bit of best H.264 encoders (such as x264), and won't if they also keep improving, but it does very well against some very popular ones. So thats another layer to question of 'good enough for the proposed uses and whether or not other tradeoffs make Theora preferable': "You're already using an inefficient H.264 encoder, Theora isn't worse than that. Why not use Theora and help contribute to a world without format royalties?"
YouTube Ogg/Theora comparison Posted Feb 9, 2010 12:02 UTC (Tue) by dwmw2 (subscriber, #2063) [Link] This comparison may be of interest.In reference to Chris DiBona's comments on WhatWG about Theora and YouTube, it says the following: "While different files may produce different results, the allegation made on WhatWG was so expansive that I believe a simple comparison can reliably demonstrate its falsehood.
HTML5 video element codec debate reignited Posted Feb 5, 2010 19:01 UTC (Fri) by n8willis (editor, #43041) [Link] The cause-and-effect given here is exactly backwards. HTML5 does not mandate any format because the war is underway. The editor, Ian Hickson, is not willing to add anything to the standard if a major player refuses to implement it, because then it's not a standard, it's a work of fiction. Apple refuses to implement Theora support, and Mozilla refuses to implement H.264 support, regardless of what the spec says, so it would be pointless to try mandating either it would just make the spec less useful to anyone who expects it to be consistently implemented as written. I don't agree. I don't think it's cause-and-effect, for starters -- these two activities are intertwined and simultaneous. The H.264 stakeholders know and accept that W3C will not include a royalty-collecting format in a standard; they are not seeking to have H.264 be declared part of the standard, they are trying to prevent any competing format from becoming part of the standard, because that decision would seriously hurt them in the ongoing de-facto war for dominance. Nate
HTML5 video element codec debate reignited Posted Feb 5, 2010 19:31 UTC (Fri) by Simetrical (guest, #53439) [Link]
It really is simple cause-and-effect.
1) The spec used to require Theora support. Apple said they wouldn't
2) When the requirement was removed from the spec, the reason given by the
Apple never asked for the requirement to be removed, as far as I know. They
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