4 ms·

JPEG XL and Google's War Against It (2024)

26 points by nayuki 1y ago

deleted 1y ago
[deleted]
wronex 1y ago
I’ve tried to convince all my friends to switch off Chrome for years. It’s an impossible battle. I don’t understand.
- drcongo 1y ago
  Same. It feels like intentionally installing and using spyware at this point.
  - goku12 1y ago
    The damage they do is much worse. They practically control the evolution of the web standards at this point, thanks to their market share. They also get to dictate the dominant standard and stifle competition in associated domains like image formats. What makes it so insidious is that this damage is practically invisible to the regular users, unlike the spyware-like behaviors it exhibits.
- lern_too_spel 1y ago
  This isn't a good reason. Firefox also doesn't support JPEG-XL. Let's wait until there is a memory safe decoder.
  - goku12 1y ago
    This is a chicken and egg problem. What is Mozilla's incentive in spending any effort on JPEG XL if Chrome doesn't support it? There won't be any demand for it from content creators until the majority browser adopts it. The only way to protect the web users' interests against Google's commercial interests is to dethrone Chrome - no matter how farfetched that sounds. It's such a shame that the world managed to paint itself into a corner again inspite of the bitter experience with the earlier browser wars.
    - lern_too_spel 1y ago
      Mozilla has stated that they will support it as soon as a memory safe decoder is available. If Chrome doesn't support it then, it's reasonable to have this discussion.
- muth02446 1y ago
  Each new decoder represents an increase in attack surface which is why not all video/audio formats supported by ffmpeg are enabled in Chrome. This is despite Chrome having ffmpeg as a depency. [caveat: this was the status quo when I last checked a couple of years ago]
dmitrygr 1y ago
> GIF [...] and is limited to a palette of a meagre 256 colours I am SO tired of this myth. It is 256 colors per frame, but frames are allowed to overlay each other, have transparency, allowing earlier frames to shine through, do so with no delay, and have their own palettes. Here is a fullcolor gif for your viewing pleasure: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/aa/SmallFullColourGIF.gif https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/aa/SmallFul.... More details: https://web.archive.org/web/20130330081050/http://phil.ipal.org/tc.html https://web.archive.org/web/20130330081050/http://phil.ipal....
nayuki 1y ago
Related to: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44299970 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44299970 , https://spectrum.ieee.org/jpeg-image-format-history https://spectrum.ieee.org/jpeg-image-format-history , https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44304156 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44304156

26 points by nayuki 1y ago

deleted 1y ago

[deleted]

wronex 1y ago

I’ve tried to convince all my friends to switch off Chrome for years. It’s an impossible battle. I don’t understand.

drcongo 1y ago
Same. It feels like intentionally installing and using spyware at this point.
- goku12 1y ago
  The damage they do is much worse. They practically control the evolution of the web standards at this point, thanks to their market share. They also get to dictate the dominant standard and stifle competition in associated domains like image formats. What makes it so insidious is that this damage is practically invisible to the regular users, unlike the spyware-like behaviors it exhibits.
lern_too_spel 1y ago
This isn't a good reason. Firefox also doesn't support JPEG-XL. Let's wait until there is a memory safe decoder.
- goku12 1y ago
  This is a chicken and egg problem. What is Mozilla's incentive in spending any effort on JPEG XL if Chrome doesn't support it? There won't be any demand for it from content creators until the majority browser adopts it. The only way to protect the web users' interests against Google's commercial interests is to dethrone Chrome - no matter how farfetched that sounds. It's such a shame that the world managed to paint itself into a corner again inspite of the bitter experience with the earlier browser wars.
  - lern_too_spel 1y ago
    Mozilla has stated that they will support it as soon as a memory safe decoder is available. If Chrome doesn't support it then, it's reasonable to have this discussion.
muth02446 1y ago
Each new decoder represents an increase in attack surface which is why not all video/audio formats supported by ffmpeg are enabled in Chrome. This is despite Chrome having ffmpeg as a depency. [caveat: this was the status quo when I last checked a couple of years ago]

dmitrygr 1y ago

> GIF [...] and is limited to a palette of a meagre 256 colours I am SO tired of this myth. It is 256 colors per frame, but frames are allowed to overlay each other, have transparency, allowing earlier frames to shine through, do so with no delay, and have their own palettes. Here is a fullcolor gif for your viewing pleasure: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/aa/SmallFullColourGIF.gif https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/aa/SmallFul.... More details: https://web.archive.org/web/20130330081050/http://phil.ipal.org/tc.html https://web.archive.org/web/20130330081050/http://phil.ipal....

nayuki 1y ago

Related to: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44299970 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44299970 , https://spectrum.ieee.org/jpeg-image-format-history https://spectrum.ieee.org/jpeg-image-format-history , https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44304156 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44304156