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MS Releases New Media Player Firefox Plugin
SilentChris writes "Microsoft today released a new Media Player plugin for Firefox that resolves the problems users of the older version were experiencing. According to the company's Port 25 blog, it's backwards compatible with Windows Media Player 6.4. The plugin is for Windows XP and Vista only, but if you have to watch WMV video at least it's less likely to crash your browser."
Wow. I'm actually pleasantly surprised. Did anyone see this coming?
eh.. so what's wrnog with mplayerplug-in?
It smacks of desperation that Microsoft tries so hard to exclude Linux from any software they release. If they don't loosen up that strangle-hold, their company is going to choke to death.
It's sad that a company with so much money and talent is completely unwilling to adapt to the times. They're clinging to an age of computing that has long since passed. 10 years ago, web tools, platform interoperability and independence, and transparent company operations could have been classified as a trend, but those practices are now solidified.
It would just be nice if Microsoft made even a single genuine move towards cooperation instead of their current modus operandi of "exclusion at all cost".
This is good news for Windows users, but actually, in Ubuntu, VLC's plugin is useless, for some reason I'm not really aware of. MPlayer's works... when it wants to.
Nothing against Microsoft, per se, but half the security of my browsing experience
is that my Firefox has no Flash, MS, Acrobat, or Active-X plugins. If I really
want to see content because someone has a flash-only site or WMV content, it gets
downloaded and/or viewed on a UNIX machine. From a user account. On a machine I can afford
to reformat at any time.
WMV plugin? Why would I load that?
I remember playing WMV files using proper media player ends up storing traces in Internet Explorers history list.
Strange considering I was using firefox.
Does the new one still have the same problem?
liqbase
I now use VLC as a substitute for everything, even as a DVD player. All commercial players, WMP, Quicktime, Realplayer are suspect. They all have the ability to take over the computer and launch other apps, at least the browser. I know the integration can be helpful, but we are not in the 1980's. I do know how to open an application on my own.
"She's a scientist and a lesbian. She's not going to let it slide." Orphan Black
You know who's guilty of using crappy MS streaming media? None other than NPR.org. You have 2 choices - Windows Media or Real. How's that for crappy choices.
So what does Microsoft get from this - besides that ephemeral "protect WMV market share" stuff?
How about usage data? Media Player has been sending information back to MS for years; OS version, GUID, etc. Now they can also collect data about Firefox installs. I suspect that data has value to MS - and very well may be the reason for this unexpected release.
It's not as though Firefox users haven't been able to view WMV files, is it?
Just do what I do - decode the Javascript to find the actual location of the Real streams (I like the quality better than the WMV streams), then use command-line mplayer to stream it out and reencode it to MP3.
Now if Apple would just release tools or docs for creating enhanced podcast files for something other than a crappy command-line tool for OSX, I could make a rocking NPR podcast with skippable segments, but noooo...
could this imply that MS considers Media Player more important than Internet Explorer now? I mean I couldn't really see MS providing apple with a plugin for Quicktime. Is MS getting serious about the media player war...and MP3 players?
Zune 2.0
From the plugin:
You may not:
- work around any technical limitations in the software;
Isn't this what 90% of IT is about?I understand the boilerplate "you may not reverse engineer/disassemble...blah blah blah" but "work around...limitations" seems a bit over the top.
Why do the capchas always seem pertinent? this post was "kludge"...
Criminals can get way more than $500 with that certificate. Criminals have been known to do identity theft on whole corporations.
So, by the economics of it all, this is a crime that pays quite well.
But anyway, look. Sure, we authorized Rapetech DickShove LLC and they totally screwed your system before we could stop them. But, I mean, is there any way we could have seen this thing coming? Certainly not unless we watch porn, which we don't.
OK, that wasn't very fair of us. Let me explain. Rapetech DickShove LLC's business PO Box checked out and someone answered the phone! Our lawyers thought they sounded nice enough!! What more could we have possibly done?! You clicked ok to the vista warning! Furthermore, spyware creators are just as capable of filling out stacks of forms and paying $500. And they'll get plenty of practice. Who is this masturbatory program meant to benefit? It doesn't even benefit masturbators!
Microsoft has a clever strategy (they usually do).
What it boils down to is fighting Linux. I'm a regular Linux user myself, and I'm in the habit of recommending certain cross platform applications for my friends and family to use. Browsing the web? Get Firefox. Chatting online? Get Gaim. Writing a paper? Get OpenOffice.
These programs aren't right for everyone, naturally, but a lot of people actually do end up loving them. They can install them on Windows, try them out, and get comfortable with them. Later, when they are experiencing OS related issues, I can say "Oh, well why don't you install Linux?" Once they find out that Linux runs all the programs they use every day, they don't freak out or anything. It makes the migration completely natural.
Plugins like this are sneaky because Microsoft is saying, "OK, you're going to use Firefox... I see how it is. Let's tie it to our platform to make sure you stick with our other software."