Comments on: Finally! Flash supports H.264 video!

By: DivX Looks Outside The Codec For The Future Of Web Video

DivX Looks Outside The Codec For The Future Of Web Video — Fri, 09 May 2008 13:24:52 +0000

[...] extra restrictions increase the appeal of Silverlight for DRM hungry Hollywood studios, but it also frustrates their customers in the process. Incompatible file formats are the reason why services like Netflix’s Watch Now doesn’t get [...]

By: SmugBlog: Don MacAskill » Blog Archive » I demand video to be awesome.

SmugBlog: Don MacAskill » Blog Archive » I demand video to be awesome. — Sat, 26 Apr 2008 00:17:21 +0000

[...] The state of video codecs online has been a mess and there’s been no clear choice, making it very difficult to do awesome video sharing. Luckily, all of that changed when Adobe finally added H.264 support to Flash. [...]

By: Dave Price

Dave Price — Fri, 28 Sep 2007 09:34:45 +0000

Don — Could you please comment on Darryl’s response above? As you know, Apple’s saying that folks would rather post video online than burn DVDs. I agree with that.

I create slideshows using Keynote and Photo to Movie. I would like to acquire a SmugMug Pro account for clients to view these online. Is SmugMug headed in this direction?

By: Darryl

Darryl — Thu, 20 Sep 2007 05:31:47 +0000

So ahm, I guess this is maybe a hint that SmugMug may some day offer Flash video in H.264 format?

Hooray?

By: Tom

Tom — Tue, 28 Aug 2007 03:51:57 +0000

Don, I’m not sure why there aren’t any open source encoders for VC-1. I’m guessing there will be soon. VC-1 is a SMPTE standard so people are just as free to develop an open source version of VC-1 as they are for H.264.

By: Don MacAskill

Don MacAskill — Mon, 27 Aug 2007 22:11:59 +0000

@Tom:

Point me to a free, open-source VC-1 encoder, and I’ll believe that.

By: Wes Felter

Wes Felter — Mon, 27 Aug 2007 19:36:40 +0000

Given that MS makes a competing codec (Windows Media/VC-1) and MS is MS, why would you expect them to support H.264?

Even if you’re not willing to take the legal risk with ffmpeg, at least there are H.264 encoders from many vendors available at many different price, performance, and feature levels.

By: Tom

Tom — Sun, 26 Aug 2007 04:17:56 +0000

Silverlight uses the VC-1 codec which is just as open as H.264. It is used in more HD titles than H.264.

By: David Harrison

David Harrison — Thu, 23 Aug 2007 02:45:10 +0000

The fact that you mentioned “closed source” encoders gives me reason to believe that you’d be planning to use open source encoders for video encoding - which is fair enough, because generally the free/open source ones are easier to find and easier to use (and of course free) than their commercial counterparts.

However, one issue that we struggle with in the video encoding arena is the legalities of using open source software like this, given that it possibly (probably?) infringes on patents (see FFMpeg’s legal page for some of my concerns).

This has been a major problem for us in deciding where to go with our video platform; I’m curious if this is something that you guys have considered, or if it is not a big deal.

By: Don MacAskill

Don MacAskill — Wed, 22 Aug 2007 00:11:30 +0000

@Chris:

Actually, that’s for something else, Microsoft PlayReady. I’ve been told by Microsoft emloyees that there are no plans to add more codecs, including H.264, to Silverlight in 1.1. They’ve cited the size of the installer as a pain point here.

I wouldn’t be surprised if that roadmap changes rapidly now with Adobe’s announcement - how can they not respond?