> by turning their back on H.264, Google is ensuring that Flash will continue to remain the dominant force in web video for years to come Even if Google didn't

> by turning their back on H.264, Google is ensuring that Flash will continue to remain the dominant force in web video for years to come Even if Google didn't support the video tag at all, people can still use IE and Safari, right? Its looking like H.264 is going to be the dominant codec, after all, so IE and Safari will support it. If you want it on another browser, you'll need a plugin, sorry. That could be Flash, or it could be something else. > but the issue here is that we need the HTML5 standard to fully support H.264, and that’s simply not going to happen without Google on board. No. The answer is no, with or without Google. It's a bad idea to have a per-unit fee for distributing a standards-compliant browser. Go ahead and buy it for the browser you're building--I'm fine with that--but don't make it a requirement. And to anyone who says, "$0.20 isn't that much", you must agree to back it in cash. If you say you'll personally cover the licensing fees for anyone who asks, well, then I'll reconsider.