419685
story
Comments: 395 +- Your Rights Online: Ogg Vorbis / Theora Language Removed From HTML5 Spec on Tuesday December 11 2007, @10:04AM
background: url(//a.fsdn.com/sd/topics/topicpatents.gif); width:75px; height:54px;
patents
background: url(//a.fsdn.com/sd/topics/topicmediaall.gif); width:73px; height:59px;
media
background: url(//a.fsdn.com/sd/topics/topicinternet.gif); width:70px; height:73px;
internet
Rudd-O writes "It's official. Ogg technology has been removed from the HTML5 spec, after Ian caved in the face of pressure from Apple and Nokia. Unless massive pressure is exerted on the HTML5 spec editing process, the Web authoring world will continue to endure our modern proprietary Tower of Babel. Note that HTML5 in no way required Ogg (as denoted by the word 'should' instead of 'must' in the earlier draft). Adding this to the fact that there are widely available patent-free implementations of Ogg technology, there is really no excuse for Apple and Nokia to say that they couldn't in good faith implement HTML5 as previously formulated."
Related Stories
'Tis the dream of each programmer,
Before his life is done,
To write three lines of APL,
And make the damn things run.
All trademarks and copyrights on this page are owned by their respective owners. Comments are owned by the Poster. The Rest © 1997-2009 Geeknet, Inc.
Ogg mad! (Score:5, Funny)
Figures (Score:4, Insightful)
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
I'm sorry, but how is it a loss for the public to remove any reference to specific media formats from a specification that should by its nature be format independent? Ogg had no more business being in an HTML spec than WMV, RA, or some Flash-based video player.
Huh? (Score:5, Insightful)
I have news for you: HTML is a format!
By being half-assed and not specifying a standard for a widely used aspect of the web browsing experience, what is in effect happening is a de-facto endorsement of all of those pet proprietary formats at the expense of clarity and allowing the various companies to rape the public with a million of buggy plug-ins, each with its own flavour of the week. The very anathema of a "standard".
It does not matter if Ogg/Theora were not the most advanced and efficient of technologies as neither is the whole concept of HTML. What mattered was estabilishment of an open standard which would cut down on the chaos of inane plug-ins and made it impossible for companies like CNN to purposefully block all web browsers other then IE from accessing their video contents, as is the case now.
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
YouTube works? Are you joking? Firefox crashes on me every time I view a YouTube video thanks to the wonderfully crappy proprietary, closed source Flash plugin for Firefox on GNU/Linux. It doesn't work at all. Using Ogg/Theora in a video tag, on the other hand, would work perfectly.
Closed source solutions like Flash aren't solutions at all. Flash isn't even a video
Re:Huh? (Score:5, Insightful)
No, they don't. Try a 64-bit Linux, any distro, amongst many other examples. And no, writing entire 32-bit emulator plugins so that the stupidity which is Flash can run in them does not constitute "working" anymore than running VMWare makes Autocad work on Linux.
Bullshit. The "web-using public's" 95%+ membership is comprised of people who would upon seeing "this website needs the The Up-Your-Ass Shit-o-Matic Plugin to Enhance Your Experience" would go "Duh, I better click OK!".
Quality or needs of the public have nothing to do with any of it. Needs of the various idiots attempting to control the public via means such as Flash-only sites have everything to do with it. That is why the public is not involved in protesting Ogg, corporations are.
More bullshit. If it weren't for open standards, the only "web" browser in existence would browse Microsoft "enhanced" HTML. The de-facto, secret, proprietary, patent-encumbered standards, with players available for only a small fraction of platforms are not "sensible" in any way, shape or form.
Politics? Your entire argument can be summarized as "Everyone should use IE and commercial plugins on either Windows (or possibly, grudgingly, Mac)! Everyone who doesn't is a bitter, unpopular political loser!"
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
They do [wikipedia.org]. However having standard codecs and attempting to tie together formats that are orthogonal in nature are two separate matters. The <video> element type works regardless of the video codec in use, so the HTML specification attaching itself to one particular codec is unnecessary.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
MPEG is the name of a working group. Some of the formats they have standardised contain patented technology. It's not accurate to say "MPEG contains patents".
In Hickson explained Apple's situation quite well [whatwg.org]:
Re:mod parent up. (Score:5, Informative)
I liked the idea of OGG being recommended for HTML5, but realistically, there are a lot of problems.
As a container, OGG is pretty heavyweight. It's not going to be good for mobile devices.
All off the Vorbis and Theora decoders I've seen have been extremely resource-intensive. This may well be because more attention is devoted to other codecs like XVid, and so they are more highly optimized. Nevertheless, again, mobile devices will suffer.
Quality-wise, Vorbis is pretty nice. Theora, however, is a generation behind, and rapidly losing ground. HTML5 isn't expected to be ratified for over a year. In that time, Theora's generation of codecs will be even older and less efficient to the then-current codecs. For a field as rapidly evolving as streaming video, it doesn't make all that much sense to include it. It would be like suggesting that Indeo be implemented for HTML4.
The biggest benefit to recommending OGG in HTML5 is that it would get a free format out there, but at the cost of efficiency. While bandwidth continues to grow, and computers get faster and faster, waste is still a concern, and mobile devices are becoming more popular (you have to treat these as if they were 10 year old computers with equivalent bandwidth!) OGG misses the mark in most categories--too big and bulky for mobiles, too old for new computers. It's the worst of both worlds.
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Methinks you are being a bit myopic here. Where would we be today if the HTML spec didn't specify jpg, gif, and png as baseline standards for the image tag? Can you imagine a huge mishmash of competing proprietary image standards, many of which woul
Re:Figures (Score:5, Insightful)
I'm not sure if you are trying to be ironic here or if you are actually serious.
No HTML specification does that. The farthest any HTML specification goes is mentioning that they are common formats.
Yes, in fact that's precisely the state of the world today. For instance, Firefox doesn't support JPEG 2000 [mozilla.org].
Not really, because all major browsers support JPEG and PNG, despite the fact that the HTML specifications haven't recommended them.
It does no such thing. For instance, it doesn't require browsers to implement JavaScript, it provides scripting language-independent hooks that can be used to support JavaScript or any other scripting language. It doesn't require browsers to implement CSS, it provides stylesheet language-independent hooks that can be used to support CSS or any other stylesheet language. It doesn't require browsers to implement JPEG or PNG, it provides image format-independent hooks that can be used to support JPEG, PNG or any other image format. And the HTML 5 specification is taking the exact same approach by not requiring Theora or Vorbis, but providing codec-independent hooks that can be used to support Theora, Vorbis or any other codec.
The choice of video and audio codecs is outside the scope of the HTML 5 specification. Attempting to more tightly couple independent formats is myopic.
Parent
Mod parent up! (Score:3, Insightful)
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Even before mention of Ogg formats was removed, HTML5 would not have required those formats. You correctly note that current the HTML 4.01 recommendatio
Re:Figures (Score:5, Informative)
Yes, it mentions them, it doesn't recommend them. Look at what it says:
It mentions them as examples to illustrate how the <img> element type is used, not in order to promote them and certainly not to "specify them as baseline standards" as Ignorant Aardvark was claiming.
And how in hell did I "fail to note" that it mentions them? I explicitly said it mentions them.
That's simply not true. There is a world of difference between mentioning popular formats as examples and saying that vendors should implement them.
Parent
An alternative... (Score:5, Interesting)
...now that I read the changes... (Score:5, Informative)
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:An alternative... (Score:4, Interesting)
Does that mean that HTML5 should specify PNG exclusively for image content? This isn't so much about a specific standard as it is about *open* standards. Nokia and Apple are hand-wringing and whining because the standard specified a specific format other than quicktime (and whatever format Nokia has up it's sleeve). Provided Apple and Nokia are putting forward new codecs licensed under the same terms as Ogg (or at least in-line with the spec's recommendation), what's wrong with letting them then compete on their technical merits?
I'm not saying I want windows media, quicktime, and realplayer to be considered, but if there was an incentive to honestly open those formats to implementation by anyone, for free, with no catch, I'd be fine with allowing them.
It's not beating around the bush that's causing the document format controversy, it's exactly the same issue that's present here. There's no place where it says "hey, if you create a document, it has to be in a format that has these attributes". *Because* of this controversy, organizations, companies, and governments are actually looking at the issue of access and seeing that open standards matter.
To me, this type of change serves to drag the issue that remains unobvious to most people straight into the light of day. If Nokia and Apple take issue with the changed language, then they have to discuss the differences in licensing between their preferred formats and Ogg before they can do anything else. That ain't a bad thing.
Parent
Re:An alternative... (Score:5, Insightful)
Parent
If HTML5 gets adopted (Score:5, Interesting)
For one, it will mean the death of any lightweight web browser. Web will become something like a TV where you are fed with content you cannot filter (because the TV is too complex to hack). Monopoly through complexity.
A simple new format that is designed from the start for vector graphics and that doesn't try to be backwards compatible with HTML would be the best way for the new web.
Re:If HTML5 gets adopted (Score:5, Insightful)
Having the web be just like TV is exactly what large companies want. The marketting tards want you to see their company website exactly the way they think it's supposed to look. They certainly don't want people filtering content or anything like that. Why do you think Flash only websites are becoming so popular? The problem is mostly due to management and marketting types having no idea how the internet works.
On the plus side, it might be a pretty good filter all by itself. The second you see a site using HTML5, you automatically know it's probably not worth browsing.
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Well, these companies show their true colors (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Well, these companies show their true colors (Score:5, Insightful)
Parent
Re:Well, these companies show their true colors (Score:4, Funny)
WTF. For them to be appologists, they have to have the ability to think something was wrong, and they are so in love with their lord an savior, happily and arrogantly trapped behind the reality distortion field...
BURN KARMA BURN!
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Doesn't make sense... (Score:5, Interesting)
This wouldn't be a story if Microsoft had done it, trying to force WMP codecs into the standard - I'm actually kind of surprised they hadn't yet... but Nokia? wtf
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
FYI yes its patented but its under a 'free for all' licence. Anyone can use it for any purpose for free (both beer and freedom).
Who knows if there are any other patents lurking? We know from the MP3 history: Yes, everyone knew there were tons of patents, but you could buy a license for all the patents for quiet a reasonable fee, which for example Microsoft did. Then suddenly someone comes up with a claim for a patent that is not covered by that pool and sues Microsoft for billions.
Same thing could happen with Ogg as well. Make it part of the HTML5 standard, convince Apple, Nokia and Microsoft to use it, and four years from now w
Not a requirement (Score:5, Insightful)
So what's the point in having it in there then? The vendors who don't want to implement it won't, and the people wanting an open baseline won't get one. The recommendation did nothing for openness or interoperability, it just gave people an official excuse to bash vendors that won't implement it.
All other things being equal, a smaller specification that everybody can agree on is better than one with unnecessary, contentious recommendations. There was never any need for this recommendation, it just bloated the already massive specification.
Web Standards (Score:3, Insightful)
I don't see that the edit makes much of a difference. Even if HTML5 says that user agents SHOULD support Ogg, it doesn't mean they all will. And even though HTML 5 doesn't mention Ogg, it doesn't mean they all won't.
As every web developer knows, what you can and cannot do on a web site has less to do with what the standards say, and more to do with what browsers decide to support. There are web standards that have been specified for years that developers still cannot use (for example, much of the CSS in the Acid2 test), and there are technologies that get widely used before being standardized (for example, XMLHttpRequest).
Wierd. (Score:4, Informative)
From the page [html5.org]:
What part of initially suggesting Ogg Vorbis doesn't fit with the new quote? It just seems wierd. Like they could say what they mean, but not explicitly suggest Ogg.
Re:Wierd. (Score:5, Interesting)
The submarine patent threat. Ogg claims to be unencumbered, but until somebody big starts using it and lawsuits start flying in the Eastern District of Texas, nobody actually knows whether it's unencumbered. And companies which are already carrying a significant risk of submarine patents from other more popular/profitable codecs don't have much incentive to assume even more risk for sake of a codec that's hardly used and doesn't present compelling technical advantages.
Some people think this is FUD. I think those people don't pay attention to patent-related news in the US; the only safe position right now is to assume something is encumbered until someone else has spent millions of dollars litigating it to be sure, which is why you get development models like SQLite: SQLite refuses to accept or use any code based on algorithms or techniques that are less then 17 years old, so that they can prove they're using technologies which couldn't possibly be patent encumbered.. Patent reform would be a nice thing to have for cases like this...
Parent
There really is no excuse? (Score:3, Funny)
Greed.
Avarice.
Stupidity.
Need I go on?
say ogg WAS official (Score:5, Interesting)
make ogg official, and business will ignore it, and marginalize the standard. do we really want the standards ignored?
so allow the businesses their moronic formats, and use ogg anyways
it's silly if anyone thinks the war against proprietary formats is going to be won by a standards body. at the very best, business will embrace standards because the standards body play footsie with business desires, which is what happened, which is good!
at worst, the standards body ignores business on some ideological crusade, so businesses just ignore the standards as well, and we have a worse tower of babel on our hands
folks: this is the best possible outcome, where best possible outcome = ugly begrudging accomodation of moronic business desires. you can't do any better than what happened, unfortunate, but true
The actual mail on the HTML-wg mailing list... (Score:5, Informative)
"I've temporarily removed the requirements on video codecs from the HTML5
spec, since the current text isn't helping us come to a useful
interoperable conclusion. When a codec is found that is mutually
acceptable to all major parties I will update the spec to require that
instead and then reply to all the pending feedback on video codecs.
http://www.whatwg.org/issues/#graphics-video-codec [whatwg.org]
"
The title of the news is a bit misleading
Consensus will never be found (Score:3, Insightful)
attention that mpeg4 guy (Score:5, Insightful)
"Ogg's video codec is Theora, which was proprietary. On2 developed it as its closed competition to MPEG-4's H.263 (DivX) and H.264 (AVC) codecs, alongside other competing proprietary codecs from Real and Microsoft (WMV). The winner to shake out of all that competition has been the MPEG-4 standard, which includes both a container and different sets of codecs. MPEG-4 is open and supported by lots of companies, and is also supported by FOSS (x264 is among the best implementations)." - DECS
I get the feeling that if people would actually sit down and look at the issue objectively then it would be obvious that Ogg/Theora being included in the HTML5 spec isn't that great of an idea. The problem is the Ogg crowd has a huge chip on their shoulder since no one has really given them the time of day. So, here's a chance for them to get some validation for all their hard work but they've been cut out yet again so everyone's all up in arms.
Re:attention that mpeg4 guy (Score:4, Insightful)
MPEG4 is patent encumbered and does require license fees. While there may be patents for Ogg Theora, On2 has made it clear Theora is a genuinely open standard that doesn't require payment of royalties to them.
MPEG4 is only open in certain senses. It is not usable from the point of view of a web standardization body, given the dependence the web has on the free software world.
BTW, DECS runs the supremely awful "RoughlyDrafted" website, a kind of brain damaged Apple advocacy thing. I'd take anything he writes with a pinch of salt.
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Not exactly desirable. With Theora there isnt that problem.
Ogg/Theora only poor against impossible options. (Score:4, Insightful)
Theora is substantially better than any other codec which has a chance of being included. As such it's silly to say that Theora shouldn't be used because it isn't the best... thats a bit like saying "I won't drive any car but a Ferrari" when all you can afford is a used Ford Escort.
Obviously most implementations will also include a better codec than Theora, but Theora is a generally respectable codec at web streaming bitrates and it will provide a viable option for those who can't or won't pay the licensing fees for better codecs. In other words, Theora will be a reasonable baseline which is all it's supposted to be in this context.
Furthermore, the inclusion of Theora will also help keep the licensing costs down for better codecs. Everyone Wins, except companies that make money licensing codecs... and in the long run they'll probably win too, since web video that Just Works will increase the popularity of web video.
Parent
Patent expired techniques (Score:3, Insightful)
Whatever we may want to think, it is true that someone COULD challenge Ogg Vorbis on patent grounds, valid or not. A technique 20 years old and based on expired patents is absolutely unambiguous - the patent office itself is the documentation that the technique is now unrestricted.
For most of what is done on the web the older technologies would work just fine. They are also mainstream, which means they stand a better chance of being used. The HTML standards process is not strong enough to push forward Ogg Vorbis, IMO.
Remember, this is big corporate lawyer turf here. Ogg Vorbis is thought to be free of patent claims but there is no way to prove that. Expired patents are the safest possible way to proceed.
Maybe it's just me.. (Score:3, Insightful)
This is why zeal matters (Score:4, Insightful)
Every little one of these things matters, they all add up like links in a chain. There are people actively trying to destroy freedom and they are doing it slowly with incremental steps. This is just another step. I'm sorry, if you can't be bothered to take an active participation in protesting and exploring alternate systems, then you are letting everyone down. You know the expression: "No one snow flake in an avalanche feels any responsibility."
The *big* picture is democracy itself. Once the information is controlled, the people are controlled. Make no mistake, people are actively working against the free exchange of information. While most are just working for their own self interests, there are others capitalizing on these actions in more nefarious ways.
I know you think this is tin foil hat stuff, but look around, look at what's happening. We have to work against these sorts of things because rust never sleeps.
what a horrible summary (Score:3, Interesting)
"Widely available patent-free implementations of Ogg".
First, saying "Ogg" means Ogg Vorbis to most people. This is about Ogg Theora.
Second, whether something is patent free is not determined by the implementation. You're thinking of copyright!
Ogg Theora uses patented technology. We don't want to enter into a Rambus-type situation where once something becomes popular a company can come back and start dinging people for money.
And the icon doesn't make sense. This isn't about trying to patent existing or trivial things, it's about whether a standard should make mandatory a patented codec that isn't even widely used.
Re:Microsoft, Google, Apple (Score:5, Funny)
Apple = Lawful Evil
Microsoft = Chaotic Evil
Me = Nerd
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
FUD FUD FUD (Score:5, Informative)
Parent
Re:FUD FUD FUD (Score:5, Informative)
And countering yours:
I'm a huge FOSS buff, but that doesn't mean I have to blindly love everything pushed out the door as "freedom friendly". I don't have anything against Theora except that it's just not very competitive. I wouldn't want to see it as the official video file format any more than I'd want to see ASCII text as the official document file format; both have clear limitations when compared to their competitors.
The W3 made the right choice. As much as I like the idea of Theora, I'm glad we don't have to be saddled with the reality of it.
Parent
Yeah, that's FUD (Score:5, Interesting)
1) That is in comparison to h264. And I call it 'embarrassing' because Theora *could* easily be just as good, but it isn't right now. That document is a call to arms and because of it, a new encoder is rapidly taking shape. Its improvements are already making it back to mainline. We'll catch up rapidly.
2) "It's safe to say that MPEG4 and it's codecs have been more thoroughly researched than Theora" Bullshit. MPEG is simultaneously inefficient and narrow in their focus. MPEG-4 / h.264 is a decades old chassis with a few recent research papers tacked on. _Several of the items I identified as 'embarrassing' and 'obsolete' ironically apply to MPEG-4 too_.
3) "I absolutely, positively promise you that Youtube serves more video than Wikipedia, and they don't stream Theora." Irrelevant. This is an argument against Google (Altavista dwarfed them), Microsoft (IBM and even Apple dwarfed them), Toyota (GM dwarfed them), etc.
"As much as I like the idea of Theora, I'm glad we don't have to be saddled with the reality of it."
Why does everyone here think this is a battle of individuals? These are huge multinationals and your puny insignificant selves don't even appear on their radars. Sure, the public will indeedy benefit from a standard multimedia codec set with no proprietary/encumbered strings attached, but that is entirely irrelevant in the process of making money. They're *for profit corporations* doing what for-profit corporations do. Making money. And that is entirely orthogonal to morals, public good, or even competent engineering. They don't have any interest whatsoever in what you think.
Although we're a non-profit (and exist on behalf of the common good), our argument in this battle happens to concern rallying all the sub-$100M companies that will be frozen out by the very biggest players getting their way. When big companies win, little companies generally lose. Although the little compaines greatly out-mass the big companies, they tend to be fragmented. If we can get them all together to fight for a uniform technology recommendation, way more people win.
But you might want to run for cover, 'cause Godzilla has his squishin' boots on.
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
No one actually knows what the patent status of any codec is. More generally, it is virtually impossible to write any computer program longer than "hello world" and be sure it doesn't infringe on someone's patent.
What we do know, though, is an attempt has been made to find patents that Vorbis infringes, and that attempt came up with nothing. Furthermore, Vorbis has been deployed and used for many years now, and no one has sued. As for Theora, it is known