Read this instead: http://lists.whatwg.org/pipermail/whatwg-whatwg.org/2009-Jun...
Straight from the horses mouth, that is the state of HTML5 video and why we got there. The posted article is built on the idea that HTML5 requires H.264 when that is not the case at all. The spec does not specify a codec for use on the video tag, just as it doesn't for the img tag.
More importantly, the authors claim "we can cut to the chase and try to get the HTML5 spec fixed--in which case the commercial vendors would have to fix their implementations in order to be considered compliant." is bogus as well. The spec is a delicate balance. If something is spec'd out, but major vendors are not going to implement it, then you have accomplished nothing by putting it in the spec, and in fact, the spec actually harmful at that point because people will believe it is implemented correctly. The spec is only useful insofar as it is a set of things that all the players can agree to implement.
I do recommend reading through the email I linked to, in it Ian Hixie, by responding to emails he received, lays out a lot of the thinking that guided the making of the spec.
If that's the case then why did Hixie spec an interoperable codec in the first place? I think the answer is obvious when you count the number and quality of competing, royalty-free image formats that uphold the basic principles of the web versus the number and quality of competing, royalty-free video codecs.
Claiming that not specifying a codec will lead to anything other than a de-facto standard of the non-royalty free H.264 is ridiculously, shockingly disingenuous. It's just shady lawyering to claim that pushing for a codec, that by its very nature can't be in the spec, and having its rivals removed from the spec, is anything other than the equivalent of having it in the spec.
So if Apple aren't the right people to complain to, I don't know who is. (Probably if Microsoft had implemented Theora then it would have been added back to the spec, as Apple would have been in a clear minority then, so complain to them too).
>Google ships both H.264 and Theora support in Chrome; YouTube only >supports H.264, and is unlikely to use Theora until the codec improves >substantially from its current quality-per-bit.[1]
If the most popular video destination on the web continues to use H.264, then Theora adoption is a little less meaningful. (but still meaningful)
[1]: http://lists.whatwg.org/pipermail/whatwg-whatwg.org/2009-Jun...
If anyone is going to make extra work for themselves by using multiple codecs, or be subject to licence fees then it should be the giants of the web, not folk uploading videos of their cats to their blog (a demographic for whom Theora is a perfectly good solution if it was supported by Apple and Microsoft).
I think this is a very valid point, w3c is suppose to promote open tools for the web of consumers and authors regardless their technology. A patented tool does not promote this.
If the spec forbade "the" codec, the offending vendors will simply violate the spec and claim some kind of justification for it.
Yes, we're complaining to the wrong people. No, going to the W3C is not the answer.
I tend to think that if we can get people to stop using h.264 for anything, then freer codecs could gain traction - particularly On2's (now Google's) VP8.
Or, taking the bigger perspective, we should be complaining to the US Congress: patents are the problem, not Microsoft's choice in codecs. If there were no patents to license, this wouldn't be an issue at all.
