[whatwg] Codecs for <audio> and <video>

[Sam Kuper]

2009/6/30 Silvia Pfeiffer <silviapfeiffer1 at gmail.com>

> On Tue, Jun 30, 2009 at 2:50 PM, Ian Hickson<ian at hixie.ch> wrote:
> > I considered requiring Ogg Theora support in the spec, since we do have
> > three implementations that are willing to implement it, but it wouldn't
> > help get us true interoperabiliy, since the people who are willing to
> > implement it are willing to do so regardless of the spec, and the people
> > who aren't are not going to be swayed by what the spec says.
>
> Inclusion of a required baseline codec into a standard speaks more
> loudly than you may think. It provides confidence - confidence that an
> informed choice has been made as to the best solution in a given
> situation. Confidence to Web developers, confidence to hosting
> providers, confidence also (but less so, since they are gatekeepers in
> this situation) to Browser Vendors.
>
> In my opinion, including a baseline codec requirement into a W3C
> specification that is not supported by all Browser Vendors is much
> preferable over an unclear situation, where people are forced to
> gather their own information about a given situation and make a
> decision on what to choose based on potentially very egoistic and
> single-sided reasons/recommendations.
>
> In fact, it is a tradition of HTML to have specifications that are
> only supported by a limited set of Browser Vendors and only over time
> increasingly supported by all - e.g. how long did it take for all
> Browser vendors to accept css2, and many of the smaller features of
> html4 such as fixed positioning?


Right. Waiting for all vendors to support the specified codec would be like
waiting for them all to be Acid3 compliant. Better to specify how browsers
should behave (especially if it's how most of them will behave), and let the
stragglers pick up the slack in their own time under consumer pressure.

Sam
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