[whatwg] whatwg Digest, Vol 49, Issue 5

[Robert J Crisler]

On Apr 3, 2008, at 9:29 PM, whatwg-request at lists.whatwg.org wrote:
> Message: 2
> Date: Thu, 3 Apr 2008 10:21:42 -0700
> From: "Charles" <lists07 at wiltgen.net>
> Subject: Re: [whatwg] Video
> To: <whatwg at lists.whatwg.org>
> Message-ID: <00b201c895af$308d9660$91a8c320$@net>
> Content-Type: text/plain;	charset="UTF-8"
>
>> With all due respect: the mission of the WWW Corporation is to
>> create standards, not to create situations.
>
> Not to speak for Robert, but I'm guessing that his point is that the  
> W3C isn't creating a standard here.
>
> My understanding is that the goal is to "bless" some combination of  
> existing video, audio and container format standards.
>
> -- Charles


Thank you, Charles. Yes. The W3C, by offering no actionable advice on  
standards support in this area, is implying by omission that any of  
the existing formats is just as good for interoperability as any  
other. I think in general principle that it would be better to  
"bless" (great word, and that's just it) MPEG-4 AVC for the present,  
despite its legal encumbrances, and to continue to press for a  
technically-excellent format that does not have those encumbrances.

The W3C is not only about web standards. It's also the road map. Right  
now, that road map, where video is concerned, says the following:  
"User agents may support any video and audio codecs and container  
formats." It might as well say "Here be dragons." I think it's time,  
at the very least, to say goodbye to single-company proprietary dreck.  
To say both that existing international standards are OK for now, but  
the ideal as currently expressed in the boxed copy under 3.12.7.1 is  
still not met.

A suggestion, with humility, as I have no standing here  ...

3.12.7.1. Video and audio codecs for video elements

User agents must support either one or more free, open source codecs  
for video and audio content, or one or more ISO/IEC-standard codecs  
for video and audio content. (User agents may also support free, open- 
source codecs AND ISO/IEC-standard codecs.)


-- Robert, a/k/a Bob