Microsoft Going Its Own Way On Audio/Video Specification

An anonymous reader writes "Several groups are currently working on specifications for plugin-free, real-time audio and video communication. The World Wide Web Consortium has one called WebRTC, rudimentary support for which is found in Chrome, Firefox, and Opera. Back in August, Microsoft announced its own specification, CU-RTC-Web, because it thought WebRTC wasn't worthwhile. W3C carried out a vote to choose between the two specs, which came out strongly in favor of WebRTC. Microsoft went ahead anyway, and it has now published a prototype for the proposed specification. 'So what's Microsoft playing at, persevering with its own spec in spite of its rejection by the WebRTC group? The company's argument is twofold. First, WebRTC simply isn't complete yet, and Microsoft believes that working on its proposal can shed light on how to solve certain problems such as handling changes in network bandwidth or keeping cellular and Wi-Fi connections open in parallel to allow easy failover from one to the other. Even if Redmond's spec isn't adopted wholesale, portions of it may still be useful. Second, the company believes that WebRTC may not be as close to real standardization as its proponents might argue.'"

Comments

Re:Good luck with that MS

[icebike]

Any web developer worth their salt will at least use IE for testing purposes

If you write to the standards you don't need to test in IE any more than any other browser.
If IE can't handle standard code, its somebody else's problem.

Re:Old dog

[catchblue22]

I don't see any of these things happening at Microsoft, with this project, at this time. Sure, it may have happened in the past, but it's hardly a microsoft thing to do - all the big kids do it.

It is more a matter of history. Considering what they have done in the past, I am NOT ready to trust them. They are a pernicious monopoly that is now beginning to realize that they are threatened. They are starting to act like a cornered animal, trying to pull out many of their old monopolistic tricks out of their war chest.

Re:Good luck with that MS

[osu-neko]

If IE can't handle standard code, its somebody else's problem.

Spoken like a man without clients/customers...

Re:Old dog

[amiga3D]

I suppose you could be right. The odds are against it though. Microsoft is like the guy who has been married 10 times and cheated on every single bride. Now they are going to the altar again promising to be true this time. Want to bet on it?

Re:Old dog

[ilsaloving]

Or 4, they think they can get away with screwing everyone else and taking control of a potentially very lucrative market, like they did with:
* Internet Explorer and their custom implementations of HTML/CSS
* Their custom windows-only version of Java
* OpenXML and their subverting an entire standards body to get it ratified as a 'Standard' just so they could go after special government contracts requiring an open format, without having to give up control of the office suite space.
* Custom extensions to LDAP to hinder interoperability with Active Directory.
* Countless other things that anyone could find doing a few searches of Microsoft's history.

There's a reason Microsoft's catch phrase is "Embrace. Extend. Extinguish." and it's sad that, like an abused spouse, people keep giving Microsoft another chance because, "They will do better this time."

Re:Old dog

[Jah-Wren Ryel]

I guess you see what you want to see. Yes, they have a spotty past.

Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me 5-10 times, and I deserve to have a gorilla throw chairs at me.