YouTube, HTML5, and Comparing H.264 With Theora

David Gerard writes "Google Chrome includes Ogg support for the <video> element. It also includes support for the hideously encumbered H.264 format. Nice as an extra, but ... they're also testing HTML5 YouTube only for H.264 — meaning the largest video provider on the Net will make H.264 the primary codec and relegate the equally good open format Ogg/Theora firmly to the sidelines. Mike Shaver from Mozilla has fairly unambiguously asked Chris DiBona from Google what the heck Google thinks it's doing." DiBona responded with concerns that switching to Theora while maintaining quality would take up an incredible amount of bandwidth for a site like YouTube, though he made clear his support for the continued improvement of the project. Greg Maxwell jumped into the debate by comparing the quality of Ogg/Theora+Vorbis with the current YouTube implementations using H.263+MP3 and H.264+AAC. At the lower bitrate, Theora seems to have the clear edge, while the higher bitrate may slightly favor H.264. He concludes that YouTube's adoption of "an open unencumbered format in addition to or instead of their current offerings would not cause problems on the basis of quality or bitrate."

Comments

The Failure Of Linux,Open Source And Slashdot

[Anonymous Coward]

This absolutely embarrassing Slashdot episode is perfect example of the failure of the open source community.

Over ten years it's been that Linux and its community has moved from being a tiny niche OS to today where it is attempting to be a mainstream desktop operating system for the broad consumer market.

Ten years of rah-rah cheerleading instead of cold hard critics and honest reporting of open source software vs commercial competitors.

Ten years of this site being nothing more than one big +5 Insightful circle jerk within the open source community.

Isn't it time for the open source community to grow the fuck up?

Time for the open source community to finally give those stupid little +5 Insightful and Funny replies like "did you submit a patch?" "well I LIKE the baby shit brown Ubuntu colour scheme" "teh power of choice!" "works for me" and on and on and on with the bullshit.

Linux, open source, and Slashdot are the laughing stock of the computing world for exactly crap like this x246 bullshit.

Writing commercial grade consumer level software is HARD. Spouting bullshit on Slashdot is not a substitute for the arduous and time consuming process of getting software to that level.

 

Re:repeat of ogg?

[Anonymous Coward]

Only 5 years ago, storage space was already cheap enough that you could have easily gone with FLAC, and your problems of today wouldn't exist.

Your problem isn't ogg -- your problem was choosing a lossy codec for archiving purposes (where only lossless makes sense).

Oh FFS

[Anonymous Coward]

For crying out loud, Oggfags, STFU. I am so not interested in your stupid little format. This is exactly the kind of OSS whining that makes Linux so unappealing.

This crap is like anime. I love the product, generally speaking. I hate HATE HATE HATE HATE the others who love the product.

If Ogg were awesome, it would stand on its own. It is not, and thus it does not.

Boo effing hell damn hoo. Too bad, so sad. Play harder next time.

Re:repeat of ogg?

[MobileTatsu-NJG]

Any chance we can blame Slashdot for VHS too?

I don't recall Slashdot users folding their arms and saying (with a +5) "I'm not buying an iPod because it doesn't support VHS".