RSSStalemate for Web standards continues with no open video for HTML 5
By Scott M. Fulton, III | Published July 22, 2009, 12:01 PM
The dream of a completely free platform for online video has run up against a significant roadblock, and it's another drama that Microsoft appears happy to watch play out from the sidelines. That dream is that Web developers can embed video into their sites using the <VIDEO> element of HTML 5, without being encumbered by anyone's proprietary technology. If it works, those sites can be assured of being able to stream to browsers' native codecs, rather than requiring users to install usually proprietary plug-ins like Adobe Flash or Apple QuickTime.
The problem with online video is that the technology behind it -- encoding, decoding, streaming and distribution -- is typically owned by somebody. That means it can't freely be distributed in an open source package. The exception here is Ogg Theora, the leading open source codec, and the hope of the community for a royalty- and penalty-free Web video platform. Yet its underlying technology may not only be outmoded, some are arguing, but may also actually still be owned by someone who has yet to assert patent rights.
In any event, for Ogg Theora to be accepted, it needs to be used; and this time it's Google, the proprietor of YouTube which leads the online video community by a wide margin and the maker of the up-and-coming Chrome Web browser, that's putting the biggest damper on that party. While the DailyMotion Web service has made the biggest inroads toward adopting Ogg Theora, and thus allowing new Web browsers like Firefox 3.5 to show video without plug-ins, even Mozilla's engineers are admitting to the W3C's Web Hypertext Application Technology Working Group (WHATWG) that it's not a big enough dent. Not only that, but they're blasting Google for essentially neutralizing free video's chances of success.
"I do not like the situation on the Web today, where to use all the content you need to have a license to Flash," wrote Mozilla Director of Ecosystem Development Mike Shaver last June 12 to the WHATWG, "and I'm saddened that Google is choosing to use its considerable leverage -- especially in the Web video space, where they could be a king-maker if ever there was one -- to create a future in which one needs an H.264 patent license to view much of the video content on the Web."
Shaver discussed a situation where the difficulty in adopting Web video does not come from actually adopting the Ogg codec itself -- transcoding, he argued, was relatively simple -- but from sites that are forced to develop systems for supporting both Ogg and "legacy" codecs, mostly because YouTube substantiates that legacy. He brought up the case of DailyMotion, which has made the move to Ogg and has thus become the largest video site to be supported by Firefox 3.5's native codec. (Google Chrome for Windows also supports Ogg as well as H.264, but Google is not in a position to extend that capability to the Linux version of Chromium, which is completely open source.) But that can't make the dent it needs to make, because as Shaver said, "basically all the content on the Web is Google's!"
That prompted this response on the WHATWG mailing list from Google's open source program manager Chris DiBona: "Comparing DailyMotion to YouTube is disingenuous. If [YouTube] were to switch to Theora and maintain even a semblance of the current YouTube quality it would take up most available bandwidth across the Internet. The most recent public number was just over 1 billion video streams a day, and I've seen what we've had to do to make that happen, and it is a staggering amount of bandwidth. DailyMotion is a fine site, but they're just not YouTube."
The argument, and Google's unwillingness to give in, led HTML 5 principal author Ian Hickson late last month to suspend work on the <VIDEO> element. "I have reluctantly come to the conclusion that there is no suitable codec that all vendors are willing to implement and ship," Hickson wrote. "I have therefore removed the two subsections in the HTML 5 spec in which codecs would have been required, and have instead left the matter undefined."
Hickson would be willing to pick up the project again, he went on, if one of two situations were to play out: 1) if Ogg Theora support were to be embedded in more graphics firmware, enough for Google's position on the standard to thaw and thus support Ogg as an alternative for YouTube (although if not enough players have declared Ogg's foundation obsolete already, there certainly would be plenty by then); 2) the patent license holders for the H.264 codec were to let their claims lapse, enabling it to be supported without license fee requirements.
Presently, Mozilla and Opera Software are the two major players that remain on-board with the idea of Ogg Theora support built into the browser, especially now that Firefox 3.5 is shipping. Apple is reluctant to provide similar support in Safari, stating its fear that holders of the patents for video technology upon which Ogg is based -- technology that used to be considered proprietary at one time -- may exercise their rights under "submarine patents" and take Mozilla and others to court.
Meanwhile, Google sits pretty with its colossal provider of Flash video that some key platforms, including the iPhone, still refuse to support; and Microsoft is very happy to have absolutely nothing to say on this subject, letting everyone else fight it out indefinitely.
Yet its underlying technology may not only be outmoded, some are arguing, but may also actually still be owned by someone who has yet to assert patent rights.
That holds also true for h264!, why the FUD about the theora codec?
If [YouTube] were to switch to Theora and maintain even a semblance of the current YouTube quality it would take up most available bandwidth across the Internet. The most recent public number was just over 1 billion video streams a day, and I've seen what we've had to do to make that happen, and it is a staggering amount of bandwidth.
This is going to be deprecated (and become FUD) in a pretty short time frame.
The current implementation has some pretty big bugs and inefficiencies, libtheora v1.0 that is.
The next version of this library will have efficient encoding, there is already a comparison with fresh code from some days ago that implements a new efficient fDCT algorithm:
http://people.xiph.org/~...compare/comparison.html
Theora even outperforms h264 for some files with the new algorithm!
Well, well, well, who would have thought that to happen?
That version of the library (libtheora v1.1) is scheduled to be completed end 2009/begin 2010. (currently that is the roadmap, it can be changed if more or less time is needed)
Apple is reluctant to provide similar support in Safari, stating its fear that holders of the patents for video technology upon which Ogg is based -- technology that used to be considered proprietary at one time -- may exercise their rights under "submarine patents" and take Mozilla and others to court.
That holds also true for h.264! Why the FUD about theora?
Because Apple has patents on h.264 and has come up with the idea of making people scared with patent and court ideas. They also count for your codec Apple!
Apple has a submarine-patent for h.264!
Presently, Mozilla and Opera Software are the two major players that remain on-board with the idea of Ogg Theora support built into the browser, especially now that Firefox 3.5 is shipping.
Opera hasn't got a stable version with theora in and because Google's Chrome doesn't contain ogg in the Linux version YET, it doesn't count or what?! (There is no reason why Google won't add it to the Linux and Mac version too.) I think it does because google also has the idea of ogg support in the browser! Why the FUD about it?
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|Btw Expression Encoder's 3 just been made free for WMV/VC-1 encoding like Windows Media Encoder. See http://blogs.msdn.com/ex...2009/07/22/9845044.aspx. The version with MPEG codecs encoding support (H.264, AAC, MPEG-2) which are royaltee-bound is still commercial. Good move MS.
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|Free and open source is not the only thing that matters, and not even amongst the important ones that matter. The quality and bandwidth efficiency vs bitrate matter the most which is where H.264 or VC-1 excel. Theora (derived from VP3) comes nowhere close though for low bitrate low quality, I dunno how it compares to Sorenson (FLV1 or tweaked version of H.264 as Wikipedia says) or VP6 (FLV4) that most use in Flash Video. Microsoft also appears to have hit a brickwall after introducing WMV Advanced Profile in 2004.
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|That's because there are some serious bugs in the encoder.
(libtheora v1.0)
Just wait a year or two and compare again.
(The bugs are getting fixed in libtheora v1.1, this version is scheduled end 2009/begin 2010.)
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|Why do they need a built-in codec for this? Can't they still use the [video] tag, and have something like [video type="quicktime"] or [video type="h.264"]? It would still require a plugin or player addin, but would certainly make the html easier to code which is the whole point.
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|"It would still require a plugin or player addin, but would certainly make the html easier to code which is the whole point."
No, the "whole point" is to open up the web so *anyone* using *any* OS and browser can utilize it completely.
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|Congratulations, you've just described the OBJECT element. It already exists, it's what we use now, and surely everybody knows of the associated plug-in nightmares.
In any case, how is what you're suggesting easier than <video src="file.ogg">? The HTML is just as easy, and you don't need to mess with plug-ins. The browser would provide everything you need, including video controls like volume, play/pause, etc., in addition to (if it is ever standardized) the codec. (Even if the codec is left up in the air, it's still neat that the browser will provide playback controls--at least there can be some consistency between sites, then.)
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|Is it not possible for the browser to pass the audio/video to the OS's underlying multimedia framework (such as DirectShow/Media Foundation)? I'd think it's better to be format-agnostic.
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|This is a stupid decision.
(Sorry but it really is.)
The browser can determine the codec and container of the file from the file name or MIME-type.
Your solution isn't a solution because there isn't a problem there.
Adding that tag only makes it more difficult because you're adding stuff.
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|There'd be nothing to stop a Web browser from implementing this particular solution on a given platform, but the point was to have a common, standard codec for all users--not having to provide (for example) a QuickTime version of the file for your OS X users, a WMV for Windows users, and Ogg Theora (or something else?) for Linux and others.
If HTML5 decides on this issue, then if a platform happens to support the format already (as, for example, OS X with H.264), there'd be nothing stopping the browser from piggybacking on this support for that platform rather than implementing its own--but, in any case, to conform with the standard, the browser would have to supply some way to display the content. *How* it implements this support, however, is entirely up to the browser maker, and in some cases could be done as you suggest.
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|What about http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dirac_(codec)]Dirac?
...I suppose there's the "submarine patent" issue here, though, as well.
Sadly, this indecision pretty much makes the [VIDEO] tag worthless. Google and Apple won't support the open standards while Mozilla and other publicly licensed browsers can't use H.264 without licensing it (which, depending on the license of the respective browser, may not even be possible).
I hate to say it, but unless MPEG LA decides to open up the licensing for H.264 (yeah, right...) we're right back where we started.
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|At least the Dirac codec would appear to resolve the bandwidth issue!
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|2) the patent license holders for the H.264 codec were to let their claims lapse, enabling it to be supported without license fee requirements.
Are you kidding me. Why on earth would the H.264 people do this? These open source people crack me up. They think everything should be free. Developing this stuff costs money. Money that giving your product away for free can't make up for.
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|Why on earth would the Theora people do this?
Why on earth would Dirac people do this?
Why on earth would x264 people do something very similar - implement H.264 (which does take a lot of effort, even if you have already developed H.264 specs) for free?
Wake up.
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|MPEG LA is making money off of this. Ogg and the BBC never have.
How many times have you seen situations where any group cuts off one of their main sources of revenue...willingly?
Wake up, indeed.
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|Did you know that Apple has some patents on MPEG4 h264!
The MPEG group wants to make it free but they can't because of Apple.
(The JPEG-group has made their core-technology free.)
Ivthunder, have you heard of Linux? It's a free operating system!!!!
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