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YouTube Offers Experimental Opt-In HTML5 Video

Posted by CmdrTaco on from the step-in-the-right-direction dept.

bonch writes "YouTube is now offering the experimental option to view all YouTube videos using HTML5 in H.264 format. Supported browsers are Chrome, Safari, and the ChromeFrame plug-in for Internet Explorer. Captions, ads, and annotations aren't yet supported but are coming soon."

20 of 265 comments (clear)

  1. Should be a selling feature... by Orne · · Score: 5, Insightful
    Captions, ads, and annotations aren't yet supported but are coming soon.

    The three most annoying features of YouTube won't display? Where do I sign?

    1. Re:Should be a selling feature... by mcspoo · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Some of us are deaf, and would much rather Youtube caption their videos. You don't HAVE to watch it. That's why it's called CLOSED CAPTIONING. Don't like it? TURN IT OFF.

    2. Re:Should be a selling feature... by slim · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Good to see Firefox not opting into a system that pushes us towards a non-free de-facto standard.

      We don't want to sleep walk into a situation where anyone who wants to encode video that they expect to be widely usable, must pay for a non-free license.

      True, Firefox walks a fine line, because it could lose market share, in which case it will all be in vain. We need ubiquitous, cheap chipsets that support Theora - or something else free. That won't happen if everyone just rolls over and pays for H.264.

    3. Re:Should be a selling feature... by Yvan256 · · Score: 5, Insightful

      And if they don't want to mess around with the licensing terms, just embed VLC player and be done with it. Firefox not supporting H.264 helps Flash Video to survive.

      If Firefox doesn't care that Flash can play H.264 videos then they shouldn't care that VLC can play H.264 videos.

    4. Re:Should be a selling feature... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Insightful

      "Apple and Microsoft and Google all buy the licenses for you"

      Apple doesn't. Apple is one of the patent holders in the H.264 pool. As a result, they can instead cross-license with all the other pool members outside of the pool. This is why you don't see them listed as a licensee (google and msft are fully paid up).

      In Google's case they are already so far beyond the annual organizational maximum that H.264 is fairly cheap for them, and they can't reduce their costs by using something else. But the costs are quite oppressive to start-ups and new players and makes great ammo against open source solutions.

    5. Re:Should be a selling feature... by OMGcAPSLOCK · · Score: 3, Insightful

      You've got it the wrong way round. Yes, some of us are deaf, but most of us aren't. So if you need it, turn it on, not vice verse. I'm left handed, so I have to move the mouse to the other side of the keyboard every time I use someone else's computer or a public terminal. Do I have a problem with this? No. It's hardly a huge inconvenience (much like enabling annotations on a per-video basis isn't either), and the people that DO "suffer" this inconvenience represent only ~10% of the population. The hard of hearing I'm confident make up an even smaller group. I'm all for making things accessible, but having things turned on by default just so that a tiny % of the population don't have to omg click a button is political correctness gone insane. Besides, I don't know why you're getting so hot and bothered. As was clearly said already, this is only a limitation of the current beta. These features will undoubtedly be back to annoy the majority of us and appease yourself by the time it's fit for a full release.

    6. Re:Should be a selling feature... by Sir+Homer · · Score: 2, Insightful

      That's not true. They just haven't gone after the rest of the Internet yet. H.264 is like a new GIF in the making (remember why PNG was created?). People don't realize how dangerous this can be, it's more then just a ethics thing.

  2. Well, that kind of sucks by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Insightful

    Where are the open codecs that everyone was begging for?

    1. Re:Well, that kind of sucks by gad_zuki! · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Like Theora? The problem with that codec is that its based on pretty old technology. Google probably isnt interested in paying a bandwidth premium. It looks like this move is Google telling the rest of the industry to standardize on H.264 via licensing deals.

    2. Re:Well, that kind of sucks by Frank+T.+Lofaro+Jr. · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Have any proof Theora uses more bandwith? Old doesn't mean bad, HTML is old, so is TCP/IP and UNIX

      --
      Just because it CAN be done, doesn't mean it should!
  3. Re:Hmm by Qwerpafw · · Score: 1, Insightful

    You can't use it in firefox because mozilla refuses to support H.264

    Wake up, nobody uses ogg theora. Sorry guys, patent/royalty-free is great, but in this case it's just not happening.

    H.264 is hardware accelerated on just about every mobile device. Ogg Theora won't even play on them.

  4. I wouldn't want a HTML5 only Web now by Ilgaz · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Flash is already on my Symbian phone and various other platforms. Will HTML5 advocates spare time to non cool (!) platforms to code a codec/driver along with testing thousands of different setups to show their Theora video which is clearly missing 2-3 generations in video codec development compared to H264?

    Google, a multi billion giant can roll out a good "quicktime interface" for youtube, can even add extra features to it but it doesn't really mean HTML5 with codecs which nobody can agree will crush Flash.

    BTW; if you are concerned about Flash CPU usage, use 10.1 beta which has GPU decoding under Windows. I have seen it using almost nothing while playing 1080P video over youtube.

    I keep testing Theora and sorry to say, I don't think it will take off unless Google does some amazing thing and make the VP7+ codecs open, free as in freedom. Now that would really change entire media universe. Hopefully they purchased that codec company for that reason.

  5. Re:Plugin/Add-on? by Ken_g6 · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Adobe already released a closed-source plugin to play H.264. It's called Flash Player.

    --
    (T>t && O(n)--) == sqrt(666)
  6. Re:No. Firefox is Ogg/Theora + Vorbis only by Spad · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Technically, the European parents aren't legally enforceable as there is currently no provision for patenting software (even though the EPO accepts applications for and issues such patents) within the EU.

  7. Re:h264 being "not open" confuses me... by spyrochaete · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Is there really any demand to burn Youtube videos to DVDs in 1080p? Sounds to me like Google picked an inappropriate codec for their medium. Perhaps they chose it simply to drive a wedge between their Chrome browser which supports this codec, and IE and Firefox which do not.

  8. Re:Hmm by Randle_Revar · · Score: 3, Insightful

    As long as h.246 is non-Free, it is irrelevant.

    --
    Climate Progress - Hell and High Water
  9. Re:Hmm by Randle_Revar · · Score: 3, Insightful

    >Theora is on par with other formats such as h.264 in all relevant categories such as file size, bandwidth and encoding quality

    Much as I support Theora (i.e. totally), that is not even close to true. It is maybe comparable to MPEG-4 ASP (divx, xvid).

    --
    Climate Progress - Hell and High Water
  10. So, how is this better than Flash? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Insightful

    I remember reading the request was for "Support HTML5 open web video with open formats" not just "Support HTML5"

    So now we have HTML5 with a closed video format which Firefox and other free browsers are never likely to support.

    We've already seen comments on how Adobe is beginning to use the GPU for video decoding. So, remind me, how this is any better than the existing situation with Flash?

  11. Re:Plugin/Add-on? by nine-times · · Score: 2, Insightful

    No problem with that. You should already be able to do that with a 3rd party plugin.

    Sorry, I was thinking in terms of the whole thread, starting with, "You can't use it in firefox because mozilla refuses to support H.264". Mozilla isn't going to bundle h264 support in the browser, but it's not an open-source/closed-source problem and it has nothing to do with your willingness to pay. It has to do with their unwillingness to pay a licensing fee per download.

    Mozilla could rely on 3rd party plug-ins, or they could do what Apple does in Safari and basically pass decoding duties back to the OS, thereby avoiding responsibility for deciding which codecs to support. Either of those seem reasonable to me.

  12. Re:Now all we need... by bill_mcgonigle · · Score: 2, Insightful

    But I bet they will bitch and scream again, mentioning some "non-freeness" of H.264, despite nobody having cared about GIF support or anything, and ffmpeg being free and with H.264 support.

    In many jurisdictions, ffmpeg is only Free as in Beer, not Free as in Speech. Firefox doesn't want to give up broad international distribution or its corporate status.

    --
    My God, it's Full of Source!
    OUTSIDE_IP=$(dig +short my.ip @outsideip.net)