[whatwg] HTML 5 : The Youtube response

[David Singer]

I think it's interesting to look at these and ask to what extent they are in scope.

> 1. Standard video format
> 2. Robust video streaming
> 3. Content Protection
> 4. Encapsulation + embedding
> 5. Fullscreen video
> 6. Camera and Microphone access

#1 has been debated a lot.

#2 is rather out of scope.  The beauty of HTML5 is that it is the presentational layer, and allows you to embed a video of any type (WebM, Ogg, MP4), delivered over any protocol (HTTP, RTSP, ...).  There is nothing to stop a reference to a robust stream being the URL in a source element, and I don't think it's the W3C's job to make it happen.  3GPP has already defined a solution, and MPEG is also looking.  Open IPTV Forum is basing their work on 3GPP, and others are looking closely at it.

#3 is very easy to do if all you want is protection.  It's when you multi-vendor systems that nonetheless have the appropriate degree of robustness that you get into problems.  But it's like #2;  it's below the presentation layer of HTML5.

#4 is soluble 'on top of' HTML5 and the media formats, if needed.  Web Archives, Web Apps, and so on.  I think.

#5 is a problem only if you care about phishing attacks...or indeed apps that have the gall to believe that you should be able to see nothing else when they are running.

#6 is well, rather different from the problem of delivering a/v to a user.  I'm not enthusiastic about web pages that can listen to me or watch me, myself...

David Singer
Multimedia and Software Standards, Apple Inc.