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User benefit? They can play videos, vs. they can't. Huge benefit for a vastly used codec.

by gsich 9y ago

untog 9y ago
Vastly used? I'm not so sure about that. Vastly used in tandem with H264 when required? Absolutely. If iOS can hardware decode H264 but not WebM it actually isn't in the user's interest to support WebM, because it'll reduce incentive to provide H264 versions of content, which means iOS users will experience battery drain faster. It might not be particularly fair, but it does make sense.
- wlesieutre 9y ago
  Native apps like VLC can play WebM on iOS with software decoding, but as you say it murders the battery. If Apple supported that in browsers I'd bet that Google or other companies would switch their video hosting over, much to the detriment of anyone who watches videos on an iPhone. It's an open standard so clearly they're doing the pro-consumer good thing!
  - gsich 9y ago
    It would give an incentive to Apple to support hardware decoding.
    - acdha 9y ago
      Again, who benefits from this? You’re talking about duplicating a ton of work simply to have approximately the same quality. You can contrast this with AV1 which is also a lot of work but which delivers better quality at smaller sizes. It’s not surprising that they picked that option instead.
      - gsich 9y ago
        Everyone.
        acdha 9y ago
        You mean “me”. This is not a mainstream issue which normal people care about: they use a browser or app, click play, and it works. Very few people care about what format that uses.
        gsich 9y ago
        Yes. So because few people are about it, it's irrelevant? I don't think so. Most people also don't care how their device works, or basically anything that's not their area of expertise. Are all those irrelevant too?
        acdha 9y ago
        Your problem is treating this as an emotional exercise in team loyalty rather than an engineering problem. Even Apple has finite resources so it’s unlikely that they’re going to spend time on something which duplicates but does not improve existing functionality. The number of people with a large collection of videos which are only available in VP8 just isn’t large enough to justify the investment.
        clouddrover 9y ago
        "Normal" people also don't care about TCP\IP or HTTP or HTML or image formats or any of the detail that makes the web or the internet generally work. It's a pointless argument. "Normal" people do care about their videos starting fast with high image quality. AV1 will deliver them that and deliver it better than H.264 has done. This is true whether they know it or not, whether they care about it or not.
        simonh 9y ago
        That's pure misdirection. If Apple didn't support HTTP iPhones would not be able to use the web at all. If Apple doesn't support VP8 nobody notices a thing. Of course faster load times are nice, they will come, but whether it's through VP8, HEVC, VP1, or something else will take time to shake out. Meanwhile somebody on HN will moan about Apple's monopolistic user hostile refusal to support every single blasted codec released ever. Good grief, there are even people who still think Apple should have supported Flash, and therefore presumably still support it because the world today would be so much better if Flash was still widely used, or something.
    - pwinnski 9y ago
      Apple does support hardware decoding, just not of webm.
- gsich 9y ago
  Yes, vastly used. Just look at Youtube. Besides it's a free codec. How do you know what's in the users interest? A choice between "Video playing" vs. "Video not playing" is pretty obvious to me. (And I am a user too) If battery really is a concern (assuming it is), just make it an option not to play videos if they require software decoding. Besides that, users usually (an assumption I made, just as you did) don't watch lengthy videos (1-2 hours) on an iOS device.
  - Terretta 9y ago
    YouTube is not ‘vastly’. Get back to us when it’s ‘vast’ among commercial content providers. Contrary to your point about not watching on iOS, I, and everyone I know, watch all content on an iOS device, both in the living room and on the go. There is certainly a segment of the market that is using misc devices or “casting” to USB sticks plugged into TVs, but the 4K TV owning cord cutters I know tend to also own iPhones and use Apple TVs. We saw this shift happen even more when iOS (and TvOS) gained SSO across apps with the “TV” app as indexer, and another bump when Amazon Prime released.
    - gsich 9y ago
      Why not? Just go by traffic. Youtube default to VP9 on Chrome, so yes it is vastly used. Netflix can't even display 4K on the desktop properly. If you watch in the living room (on TV) you are not watching it on the iOS device. By that I mean the screen of the iOS device. Being in the living room, watching on TV, means you have no battery issue. Watching on your device means literally that, watching it on your device with your devices' screen. Not some casting or streaming to other displays.
      - MBCook 9y ago
        So what you’re saying is since Google has manipulated the environment so that Google’s preferred codec is the most used on Google‘s website, which happens to be the largest video site on the Internet… that means Google’s codec is better. If we ignore YouTube, which Google controls to their own benefit, what’s the percentage of WebM/VP9 versus H264/H265?
acdha 9y ago
It’s only vastly used if you mean “YouTube transcodes all of their H.264 into VP8 so you can hear your CPU fan”. It’s exceedingly rare to see a webm file without a corresponding MP4 file.
- clouddrover 9y ago
  It depends on the resolution. YouTube stopped offering 4K H.264 encodes about a year ago: http://www.streamingmedia.com/Articles/News/Online-Video-News/YouTube-Stops-H.264-4K-Encoding%3b-Will-Apple-Get-on-Board-115970.aspx http://www.streamingmedia.com/Articles/News/Online-Video-New... Apple might never add VP9 support but 4K video from YouTube will work again once YouTube starts encoding to AV1 and Apple adds AV1 support.

User benefit? They can play videos, vs. they can't. Huge benefit for a vastly used codec.

by gsich 9y ago

User benefit? They can play videos, vs. they can't. Huge benefit for a vastly used codec.

Vastly used? I'm not so sure about that. Vastly used in tandem with H264 when required? Absolutely. If iOS can hardware decode H264 but not WebM it actually isn't in the user's interest to support WebM, because it'll reduce incentive to provide H264 versions of content, which means iOS users will experience battery drain faster. It might not be particularly fair, but it does make sense.

wlesieutre 9y ago
Native apps like VLC can play WebM on iOS with software decoding, but as you say it murders the battery. If Apple supported that in browsers I'd bet that Google or other companies would switch their video hosting over, much to the detriment of anyone who watches videos on an iPhone. It's an open standard so clearly they're doing the pro-consumer good thing!
- gsich 9y ago
  It would give an incentive to Apple to support hardware decoding.
  - acdha 9y ago
    Again, who benefits from this? You’re talking about duplicating a ton of work simply to have approximately the same quality. You can contrast this with AV1 which is also a lot of work but which delivers better quality at smaller sizes. It’s not surprising that they picked that option instead.
    - gsich 9y ago
      Everyone.
      - acdha 9y ago
        You mean “me”. This is not a mainstream issue which normal people care about: they use a browser or app, click play, and it works. Very few people care about what format that uses.
        gsich 9y ago
        Yes. So because few people are about it, it's irrelevant? I don't think so. Most people also don't care how their device works, or basically anything that's not their area of expertise. Are all those irrelevant too?
        acdha 9y ago
        Your problem is treating this as an emotional exercise in team loyalty rather than an engineering problem. Even Apple has finite resources so it’s unlikely that they’re going to spend time on something which duplicates but does not improve existing functionality. The number of people with a large collection of videos which are only available in VP8 just isn’t large enough to justify the investment.
        clouddrover 9y ago
        "Normal" people also don't care about TCP\IP or HTTP or HTML or image formats or any of the detail that makes the web or the internet generally work. It's a pointless argument. "Normal" people do care about their videos starting fast with high image quality. AV1 will deliver them that and deliver it better than H.264 has done. This is true whether they know it or not, whether they care about it or not.
        simonh 9y ago
        That's pure misdirection. If Apple didn't support HTTP iPhones would not be able to use the web at all. If Apple doesn't support VP8 nobody notices a thing. Of course faster load times are nice, they will come, but whether it's through VP8, HEVC, VP1, or something else will take time to shake out. Meanwhile somebody on HN will moan about Apple's monopolistic user hostile refusal to support every single blasted codec released ever. Good grief, there are even people who still think Apple should have supported Flash, and therefore presumably still support it because the world today would be so much better if Flash was still widely used, or something.
  - pwinnski 9y ago
    Apple does support hardware decoding, just not of webm.
gsich 9y ago
Yes, vastly used. Just look at Youtube. Besides it's a free codec. How do you know what's in the users interest? A choice between "Video playing" vs. "Video not playing" is pretty obvious to me. (And I am a user too) If battery really is a concern (assuming it is), just make it an option not to play videos if they require software decoding. Besides that, users usually (an assumption I made, just as you did) don't watch lengthy videos (1-2 hours) on an iOS device.
- Terretta 9y ago
  YouTube is not ‘vastly’. Get back to us when it’s ‘vast’ among commercial content providers. Contrary to your point about not watching on iOS, I, and everyone I know, watch all content on an iOS device, both in the living room and on the go. There is certainly a segment of the market that is using misc devices or “casting” to USB sticks plugged into TVs, but the 4K TV owning cord cutters I know tend to also own iPhones and use Apple TVs. We saw this shift happen even more when iOS (and TvOS) gained SSO across apps with the “TV” app as indexer, and another bump when Amazon Prime released.
  - gsich 9y ago
    Why not? Just go by traffic. Youtube default to VP9 on Chrome, so yes it is vastly used. Netflix can't even display 4K on the desktop properly. If you watch in the living room (on TV) you are not watching it on the iOS device. By that I mean the screen of the iOS device. Being in the living room, watching on TV, means you have no battery issue. Watching on your device means literally that, watching it on your device with your devices' screen. Not some casting or streaming to other displays.
    - MBCook 9y ago
      So what you’re saying is since Google has manipulated the environment so that Google’s preferred codec is the most used on Google‘s website, which happens to be the largest video site on the Internet… that means Google’s codec is better. If we ignore YouTube, which Google controls to their own benefit, what’s the percentage of WebM/VP9 versus H264/H265?

acdha 9y ago

It’s only vastly used if you mean “YouTube transcodes all of their H.264 into VP8 so you can hear your CPU fan”. It’s exceedingly rare to see a webm file without a corresponding MP4 file.

clouddrover 9y ago
It depends on the resolution. YouTube stopped offering 4K H.264 encodes about a year ago: http://www.streamingmedia.com/Articles/News/Online-Video-News/YouTube-Stops-H.264-4K-Encoding%3b-Will-Apple-Get-on-Board-115970.aspx http://www.streamingmedia.com/Articles/News/Online-Video-New... Apple might never add VP9 support but 4K video from YouTube will work again once YouTube starts encoding to AV1 and Apple adds AV1 support.