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The Future of Web Video, Part 2

Mar 2, 2010 12:00 PM, By Jan Ozer

HTML5? Someday. Ogg? Probably not.

Ogg playing where?

Most importantly, of the big four browser vendors, Mozilla is the only one with a real financial interest in promoting Ogg, while Microsoft and Apple are already committed to H.264 encode/decode, and Google to H.264's stream efficiency. Google has already adapted Ogg, but Apple seems to have decided to avoid Ogg at least until all submarine patents are resolved. Microsoft has been completely opaque on the issue, but also sits on the MPEG-LA H.264 committee, and seems unlikely to support Ogg in Internet Explorer until all patent issues are resolved. That means today, buggy Google Chrome aside, Ogg plays in less than 35 percent of all browsers.

Firefox is my browser of choice, and in general, I support Mozilla's efforts for standardization and a "free" web. In this instance, however, Mozilla's refusal to license H.264 may force all websites wishing to support HTML5 to encode two streams of video, easily doubling the related storage and administration requirements. To achieve the same quality as H.264, Ogg will require significantly more bandwidth than H.264, another significant cost to producers who adapt it. Though this is just a guess, it feels pretty certain that these storage and bandwidth costs would far outweigh the $5 million in royalties that Mozilla would have to pay to support H.264. In this regard, Mozilla's stance is almost certainly doing more to retard the future of HTML5 than to promote it.

Going into Carnac mode, what does the future hold? Well, as much as Mozilla likes to play the nonprofit card and its goal of making the "Internet better for everyone," the organization actually grossed more than $78 million in revenue in 2008, with 2009 results as yet unreported, according to internetnews.com. Most of the revenue comes from search fees from Google and other sites. There's nothing wrong with making money, of course, but this revenue highlights the fact that Mozilla is a business just like any other, and the company has to keep its browser competitive to keep the dollars rolling in and the doors open.

I would guess that over the next 12 months, submarine patents on Ogg will begin to emerge, and Mozilla will be forced to either dispute the patents or pay for either Ogg or H.264. Even if this doesn't happen, Firefox's market share may start to decline as web publishers balk at encoding both H.264 and Ogg files, particularly if Internet Explorer starts supporting the video tag with H.264 video. At that point, Mozilla may be forced to choose between the purity of its philosophy and economic viability.

Ironically, if Mozilla doesn't adapt H.264, the major proponent of the HTML5 effort may end up depending upon Flash for its ability to play H.264 video and its continued relevance. Sound far-fetched? Today, the only way to play video from YouTube— by far the world's most popular video-related website— using Firefox is via the Flash plug-in.

Finally, just to confuse the issue even further, Google just completed its acquisition of On2 Technologies, most notably the VP7 and VP8 codecs. Already there have been cries for Google to open source the codec. I haven't seen VP8, but VP6 is superior to Ogg as it stands today. If VP8 includes the quality improvements you would expect, and Google does donate it to the open source community and replaces H.264 with VP8 in YouTube, it could stop Ogg development in its tracks.

Continue the discussion on “Crosstalk” the Millimeter Forum.
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