[AshleysBrain]

This all looks very cosy with all these companies supporting it, but I wonder how this site will deal with the more political aspects of web technologies. For example, it's still totally ridiculous that there is not one audio or video format that plays everywhere. You have to dual-encode to two formats. So if you make a game with sound effects, you have to find both a Vorbis and AAC encoder, and if you want to host a video you'll need Theora and H.264 or whatever the deal is there, and so on. So what will WebPlatform.org recommend, given how obvious it is that one format would be far simpler and make for a better platform? Will it side one way or another? Will this upset their "stewards"?

[graue]

For audio at least, things are looking up. Opus, a new royalty-free codec backed by both Mozilla Foundation and Skype (Microsoft), has been standardized as an RFC[1], and will likely be mandatory in WebRTC[2]. So we should be seeing that across all major browsers in a year or two.

Opus beats almost all other codecs (MP3, AAC and HE-AAC, Vorbis) in subjective quality[3], so it's a good standard to have.

[1] https://tools.ietf.org/html/rfc6716

[2] http://jmspeex.livejournal.com/11042.html

[3] http://www.wired.co.uk/news/archive/2012-09/15/opus-codec, also http://people.xiph.org/~greg/opus/ha2011/

[vr000m]

The IETF is forming a new working group for an open video codec[1]. It is still a BoF and will be chartered in 3-6 months, which is when the real work will begin. More details on the charter can be found in this email [2].

As for the audio, WebRTC chose G.711 and Opus as mandatory to implement (MTI)[3]. The reason for G.711 is so that WebRTC can interoperate with legacy devices.

[1] http://www.ietf.org/mail-archive/web/video-codec/current/mai...

[2] http://www.ietf.org/mail-archive/web/video-codec/current/msg...

[3] http://www.ietf.org/mail-archive/web/rtcweb/current/msg05267...

[voltagex_]

Isn't Opus for speech?

[graue]

Not solely. Opus is a hybrid of the SILK codec, which is more for speech, and CELT, which is more aimed at music. It can seamlessly switch between the two methods and use them simultaneously: https://wiki.xiph.org/OpusFAQ#Why_not_keep_the_SILK_and_CELT...

The main goal was streaming (of both music and speech), and hence, low latency. Matching or bettering high-latency codecs (like Vorbis) on quality was just a bonus, and I believe somewhat of a surprise to the developers when listening test results came out.

[VMG]

Apparently not

http://www.opus-codec.org/

> Opus is a totally open, royalty-free, highly versatile audio codec. Opus is unmatched for interactive speech and music transmission over the Internet, but also intended for storage and streaming applications

[paulirish]

While everyone is involved, the site serves web developers. So the best practice for developing for the platform at large is the target. http://docs.webplatform.org/wiki/WPD:Policy/Pillars outlines a bit more of the thinking behind the priorities.

In the case of <video>, the site will recommend encoding to both Theora and H.264, and serving both sources, yes. It's the practical (although not necessarily convenient) answer.

[rmccue]

On the video front, WebM is supported by most of the major browsers excepting IE and Safari, both of which support WebM via extensions or MP4/H.264. WebM might make its way into IE/Safari once Microsoft and Apple decide that there's no chance of being ambushed by patents [0].

[0]: http://blogs.msdn.com/b/ie/archive/2011/02/02/html5-and-web-...

[stephenr]

Remind me again which devices decode webm in hardware?