
Christopher Blizzard: HTML5 video and H.264 – what history tells us - jmillikin
http://www.0xdeadbeef.com/weblog/2010/01/html5-video-and-h-264-what-history-tells-us-and-why-were-standing-with-the-web/
======
DarkShikari
The amount of intellectual dishonesty here is staggering.

 _On the quality side what we’ve been able to do at Mozilla, with the help of
the rest of the Xiph community, is to show that even though Theora is based on
older, royalty-free technology, it does at least as well as H.264 in practice
(although not always in theory.) If you don’t believe me check our Firefox 3.6
introduction video which is available in both Theora and MP4 formats. The MP4
version of the file is 13 and the Theora version is 8.2MB – about 40% smaller.
(We actually think the Theora video looks better, too.)_

Not only did he intentionally encode the MP4 really badly, which might be
theoretically excusable--the MP4 file has two hint tracks as big as the entire
video and audio stream, doubling the size of the file. In short, he
intentionally bloated the file with junk data to make it larger.

Lying apparently means nothing when you're trying to promote your pet file
format. Why are we letting these people be the voice of the free software
community?

~~~
tjogin
It's not that I don't believe you, but it would be great if someone would
_properly_ encode that file as MP4 so we could see the quality and size for
ourselves. I'd do it but I don't know shit about encoding video.

~~~
yuvi
Encoding it with a good encoder would require access to the source, which I
don't feel like finding if it even exists on the internet.

So instead, here's the same file with the junk stripped out:
<http://www.mediafire.com/?yuwj5zmmw4m>

~~~
tjogin
That works just as well, and it certainly proves you're right.

What I'm wondering is if this was done on purpose or not. If it was on purpose
they're lying bastards, and if it wasn't on purpose, it seems they know jack
shit about encoding, just like me, and should leave the technical discussion
to those who know what they're talking about.

~~~
yuvi
My guess is that the author wasn't the one who encoded either video, and the
guy who did didn't know what hinting meant but enabled it anyway when
exporting from QuickTime. (hinting is only ever used by Darwin Streaming
Server, and only if you're doing live streaming from a pre-recorded file.)

The bad encoder comes from QuickTime having the lowest quality H.264 encoder
out of any commercial encoder (and all of them being worse than x264.)

------
jonknee
So his history is GIF and MP3, two of the most successful and widely used
formats on the internet. Two formats that users don't care/know about the IP
issues and would freak out about if their apps didn't continue to work with.
Ask Apple how bummed they are for boosting MP3.

Mozilla makes a decent browser, I don't need them to fight my moral battles
for me. If they stick with this tactic I look forward to using the fork and
waiting for Google's subsidy of Mozilla to end.

~~~
freetard
> Mozilla makes a decent browser, I don't need them to fight my moral battles
> for me.

It's not only moral, it would illegal for them to ship patented technology as
it would be incompatible with their license. Also, GIF patents have expired
now.

~~~
jonknee
It wouldn't be illegal to allow plug-in support like they do for Flash
currently or to dip into system APIs when available. Nearly every computer
made today ships with native (and legal!) support for h.264. They don't want
to because they don't believe in h.264 for moral reasons.

~~~
freetard
That would make firefox inconsistent for different users that don't have the
codec installed and it would make it look bad. Imagine passing a link to a
friend that is not able to read it because of lack of codec, he'd blame it on
firefox. So, that's not moral either.

~~~
jonknee
It would be no different than the situation with Flash. Not supporting it at
all makes the situation worse--you pass the link to a friend and there's no
way to view it.

Because of IE there will be rollback support to Flash for the foreseeable
future, so the likely result is that FireFox users will miss out on the
benefits of the <video> tag. Stupid.

~~~
freetard
It's not the same because Flash is available for free and on all platforms.
Not the case with h.264.

------
halo
>Google has a near-monopoly in online video thanks to the ubiquity of Youtube.
This means that they are the effective arbiter of codec choices for HTML5
video

I don't believe that to be true, and that the true arbiter of web technologies
is _client_ support. Look at CSS3, XHTML, Silverlight, or even the "q" HTML4
element which IE didn't support until IE8.

The world revolves around what the _clients_ support. This is why Mozilla's
decision is so important. You can bet that if tomorrow Microsoft decided to
support one codec over another, you can bet that everyone would move over to
that single codec, regardless of its technological merits.

------
myobie
My issue is this: I don't want my browser deciding what plugins and/or codecs
I am allowed to use.

I understand that they want to support free software, and that is laudable.
However, if I intentionally install something on my computer that _can_ used,
then I expect that to be used.

I just tested with Safari and I was able to play an mkv 720p file in a video
tag because I installed Perian. __That is how it should work. __

------
benwr
There were no alternatives to GIF; no one did what GIF did. It seems to me
that if every major browser supports Theora and Vorbis in html5 video we will
have come out ahead of where we were with GIF: Licensing policies won't change
because if they did everyone could switch to Theora. The only problem, then,
is getting Theora support in Internet Explorer (it's already in FF, Opera, and
WebKit).

~~~
freetard
Actually there was MNG.

------
DarkShikari
_proprietary H.264 codec_

Can people at least get their terminology right for once here? That isn't what
proprietary means, and conflating "patented" with "proprietary" simply serves
to confuse people.

Many free software programs are covered by at least _some_ patents--most, I
would say, simply given the size of the patent minefield--and I wouldn't call
them "proprietary". It seems to me that "proprietary" has basically become an
insult to be applied towards anything "less free" than what one wants to
advocate.

A proprietary format has no standard you can freely read and implement. At
best it requires signing an NDA and/or paying tens of thousands of dollars to
look at--at worst it doesn't even exist, with the "standard" being "whatever
the official implementation does" (see Microsoft Word for a great example of
this). There are tons of these in video: RealVideo, for example, along with
all of Microsoft's video formats before they finally opened up with VC-1.
Others include On2's video formats (e.g. VP6), Sorenson's (SVQ1, SVQ3), and
many others.

One of the biggest dangers of this conflation is the understatement of the
dangers that proprietary formats can cause. There has never, ever been a
lawsuit over an open source implementation of a "patented-but-standardized"
file format--as far as I know, the common interpretation seems to be that the
sellers and distributors of an application are responsible for any royalties,
placing no restrictions whatsoever on the developers. See LAME, for example.

But proprietary formats are different. The law is very vague and conflicting
on whether or not it is legal to even reverse-engineer such formats (it varies
between countries as well). Doing so almost always requires access to the
disassembled binary of the original application, which violates the EULA and
potentially the DMCA. Developers can be hit with legal threats _merely for
releasing source code_ , as we saw with RTMPdump.

Of course, proprietary formats tend to be patented as well, resulting in a
"worst of both worlds" situation.

Don't mix up the terminology, lest people be convinced that RealVideo or
another proprietary solution is no more evil than a internationally
standardized, albeit patented, option. The greatest accomplishment in internet
video in the past 10 years has been moving away from that horrendous mix of
Quicktime, Windows Media, and Real that was used on almost every site on the
internet. Even if it means we've been stuck with Flash for playback until
recently, it's better than that ridiculous mix of proprietary garbage.

<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1074237> has a great example of what
happens when proprietary and patented are conflated: a piece of proprietary
crap can be promoted in place of a free software solution.

~~~
mmastrac
All the definitions I can find for "proprietary" allow patented inventions to
fall under them. Standardizing and documenting an algorithm or protocol does
not allow developers to use it freely and without royalty.

One example of many from define:proprietary:

[http://wordnetweb.princeton.edu/perl/webwn?o2=&o0=1&...](http://wordnetweb.princeton.edu/perl/webwn?o2=&o0=1&o7=&o5=&o1=1&o6=&o4=&o3=&s=proprietary&i=1&h=00#c)

In this case, I believe Chris' terminology is correct. You are instead
describing the difference between closed- and open-source.

For x264, an implementation of H.264, it is an _open source implementation_ of
a _proprietary algorithm_. In Theora's case, it is _open source
implementation_ of a _free (as in libre) algorithm_. RealVideo is a _closed-
source implementation_ of a _proprietary algorithm_.

~~~
DarkShikari
How is an algorithm proprietary if I can go online to the website of the ITU,
a division of the United Nations, and download a copy of the standard and go
write my own implementation?

ffmpeg's reverse-engineered Real Video decoder is an open-source
implementation of a proprietary specification. _Depending on the country and
legal interpretation, the mere existence of this is illegal._

ffmpeg's H.264 decoder is an open-source implementation of a patented, but not
proprietary, specification.

ffmpeg's Theora decoder is an open-source implementation of a probably-not-
patented specification.

If a definition doesn't distinguish between something freely available for all
to view/implement and something which _cannot even be implemented_ without
potentially falling afoul of copyright laws and the DMCA, it isn't a very good
definition.

~~~
kelnos
_How is an algorithm proprietary if I can go online to the website of the ITU,
a division of the United Nations, and download a copy of the standard and go
write my own implementation?_

Simple: your understanding of the definition of "proprietary" is incorrect.
Keeping a technology secret is a sufficient -- but not necessary -- condition
of it being proprietary.

~~~
mbrubeck
Or it could be that "open" and "proprietary" are two directions on a
continuum, rather than binary, mutually exclusive qualities...

~~~
kelnos
Well, sure, you could say there are different degrees of "proprietary," but
there's really only one "open":

1\. Secret spec, patent-encumbered 2\. Secret spec, patent-free 3\. Open spec,
patent-encumbered 4\. Open spec, patent-free

You can of course expand that out to include other criteria, but... you get
the idea.

I'd argue that #4 is the only one that's really "open," though a case could be
made that #3 is both open and proprietary rather than simply proprietary.

Of course there are those who believe #4 isn't really feasible and that some
patent somewhere can apply to basically everything... even if the patent
holder doesn't know it.

------
DannoHung
Theory: Due to Google beginning to compete with them, Mozilla has sought
alternate revenue streams. One of these streams is Adobe, who in the face of
competition from advanced Javascript support, Canvas elements, and HTML video,
has payed the Mozilla foundation to pull the rug out from under the last
lynchpin in clearing the web of flash: video.

Video codecs may change over time, but once you scrape flash off, it's going
to be gone forever. Theora will _never_ gain support. By refusing to support
h.264 in the near term, Mozilla hamstrings support of HTML5 video and allows
Adobe time to regroup their product strategy.

~~~
krakensden
... except they get a lot of money from Google, not so much from Adobe, and
Mozilla is nothing like a traditional corporation- they would have very public
issues dictating policy like that.

------
GHFigs
_...people don’t understand that something very dangerous is taking place
behind the scenes._

Fear.

 _This means that something that’s free today might not be free tomorrow._

Uncertainty.

 _But I, like many others, have reason to believe that H.264 will not be
Google’s final choice._

Doubt.

------
icefox
Sadly there is a submarine patent related to vorbis.

~~~
thristian
Really? What's the patent number?

------
sailormoon
I think the number 1 thing that Ogg could do to stimulate adoption is to
change its _ridiculous_ name.

~~~
ZeroGravitas
It boggles my mind that a video codec, whose name consists of two actual human
names can be continually ragged on for its name when the competitors are
things like _mp3_ , _AAC [+|HE] LC_ , _MPEG-4 part 2_ , _MPEG-4 Part 10_ ,
_H.264_ , _Advanced Video Codec_. And those last three are all the same thing!

~~~
sailormoon
All the rest are neutral technical names. And mp3 sounds kind of nice to my
ear; easy to remember and rolls off the tongue.

Ogg, on the other hand, is an actively stupid-sounding word, reminiscent of a
particularly moronic caveman's grunt. Theora sounds OK but is ruined by the
first part, and Vorbis is again a silly-sounding word.

All told the names remind me of the worst sort of childish open source
whimsicality. They paint the picture of a bunch of nerds so intent on
demonstrating their lack of care about marketability that they deliberately
name their project the stupidest thing they can think of. Well it worked -
they certainly affected the marketability, and here we are, with the developer
who stands up in a meeting and says "so, what about Ogg Vorbis support?" looks
and sounds like an idiot. Well done.

I don't even like having an .ogg file on my computer, the name annoys me so
much. You might say names are irrelevant and maybe they are to you, but
they're not to me.

~~~
ars
It's not appropriate to downmod someone for an opinion!

If you disagree with something, post a reply. A downmod is for spam, and
(sometimes) for wrong information.

~~~
ZeroGravitas
Maybe it's someone with the surname Ogg who doesn't like the opinion that
their family name is "actively stupid-sounding word, reminiscent of a
particularly moronic caveman's grunt"?

