The Youtube app for Android is developed by Google
The Youtube app for iOS is developed by Google
The Youtube app for Windows Phone is developed by Microsoft, with some reverse engineering, at first not serving ads on purpose.
It is easy to argue that a Youtube app for Windows Phone would be nice for WP users. It is also easy to argue that MSFT writing such an app would be a tad antagonistic, seeing as the first version released contained no ads. One might suspect Microsoft wanted a PR fight more than they wanted a Youtube app, or that they wanted both.
Alas, we can read for clues.
The title of the article is: "The limits of Google’s openness"
But the tags are: "marketplace, Windows Phone"
It's not an article about Google now, is it?
~~~
The article doesn't help WP users. Instead they get no Youtube app while watching a hissy fit occur if they google (ha) to find out why the app is gone.
I like both these companies, but for however-much of a PR stunt this is, Microsoft does not come out looking good.
Yes? It's about Google not making a YouTube app for a platform, so the platform vendor makes one themselves, which then gets blocked, leaving users in the middle.
Cry me a river. If users buy a Windows Phone expecting to have a YouTube app, when one is not legally available, it is their problem. There is no inherent right to a YouTube app on a phone.
Just as it was the problem of users buying early Linux notebooks / eees and expecting it to run Windows software.
And it's not like the WP users are left out in the rain. They can just use the browser to view YouTube videos. Lesser experience, sure. I might care when Microsoft implements or makes it possible for others to implement e.g. SilverLight for linux.
- Yes, I do want to view SilverLight videos on Linux. But I can't. Because Microsoft won't let me (or Xamarin or Ximian) implement the DRM parts.
- Yes, I do check that an nvidia card is supported on Linux before I buy it; That's why, for example, I avoid AMD, and it IS my problem if I buy an AMD card for which there is no good driver on Linux
> I think Microsoft is more open than Google in a broader sense. My mantra is: you can't reverse engineer the cloud.
The implied argument (Microsoft is more open because you CAN reverse engineer their products) is complete bullsh*t. Evidence: http://www.advogato.org/article/101.html
I am neither trying to write a formal proof here nor defending Microsoft in all their battles. I tried to argue against pervasive double standards: we love free software but Google business is not harmed publishing Chrome source code like Microsoft business is publishing the code of Microsoft Windows. Google is harmed if everyone install AdBlock (you can read something along these lines in their investor reports) or connects to their search engine without showing any ad.
- Samba and Wine were both created using reverse engineering. Microsoft frequently made changes that broke both products. Don't get me started on Microsoft's PPTP and Kerberos.
- Nvidia produced their own closed drivers on Linux. How does that involve Microsoft?
Are you really making the argument that if your application doesn't encrypt its interfaces, then you're open?
Samba and Wine were both created using reverse engineering. Microsoft frequently made changes that broke both products. Don't get me started on Microsoft's PPTP and Kerberos. - Nvidia produced their own closed drivers on Linux. How does that involve Microsoft?
You agree with me then! that was my point. You can't reverse engineer Google Search, you can't connect with it in an unlimited way (except using web scraping techniques or using the restricted local search API). With Microsoft you can reverse engineer it.
And I have an story to tell: my company started selling a full API for a Microsoft product without one. Not only we reverse engineered the product but we built a complete API on top. One day Microsoft QA call us if they can help to test the compatibility of our product in operating systems under development.
One difference is that Microsoft and Nvidia are considered evil and are derided for it and they don't pretend that SMB or graphics drivers are open. While Google has a 'do no evil' official policy which many folks seem to think they comply with. Similarly, with regards to openness.
This has to be a joke.... Microsoft has tried their best to prevent Linux from working or even existing... The fact that Linux hackers are smarter than them doesn't make them open...
The article makes it seem like Google was working with Microsoft on allowing a Youtube app until Microsoft said they didn't want to play by Google's rules and published an app anyway. I don't think being open means you have to let third parties dictate the terms of their use of your stuff.
The whole article was written to point out that Google's not as "open" as they proclaim they are. In reality, they're just another one of the big guys. Apple is "Beautiful", Google is "Open". Neither of them is either. It's all marketing.
It's in Microsoft's favor to damage that image. Don't take it personally.
>I don't think being open means you have to let third parties dictate the terms of their use of your stuff.
Then what does open mean? To me it means to provide an API on an equal footing among the various platforms. If Google is providing access to secret Web service APIs to their Android and iOS Youtube Apps, but not to Windows Phone, how is that open? Requiring to show ads is still understandable, but requiring HTML5? Why do they care if it's HTML5 or something else? It sounds fishy, and Google should come out with a real reason for requiring HTML5 if there is one, after all they call themselves open.
It is probably well within their rights to screw around since it's their stuff, but lets not pretend it's open. Didn't MS get lambasted for private APIs in Windows? Why does Google get a free pass now and get away with calling itself open?
I am pissed because the outcome of my choice shouldn't be affected by faux restrictions. I was a Youtube user before Google was its buyer. So my choice to go with a windows phone shouldn't to be dealt with a degraded experience. Had MS or Apple pulled a similar crap, everyone would be crying an antitrust river and carrying a nail to the cross. Why does Google get a free pass at this? Its by now clear that Google wants to provide a degraded experience to the windows phone users, thus deliberately rigging the market place. What guarantees that the same wouldn't be pulled when Firefox OS or Ubuntu OS comes to the market? If so what can possibly replace Youtube? 90% of the video links on the web are to Youtube.
Um, if Firefox OS needs a native app for YouTube, something has gone horribly wrong. The whole point of Firefox OS is to demonstrate that a phone can do everything it needs to with web apps in the browser, without native apps outside it.
> I was a Youtube user before Google was its buyer. So my choice to go with a windows phone shouldn't to be dealt with a degraded experience.
If you were a youtube user then, you were using the website - which is PERFECTLY USABLE on your windows phone. Your experience is not worse in any way than it was then (although it might not be as good as android or ios users; but then, you didn't buy an android or an iphone)
> Had MS or Apple pulled a similar crap, everyone would be crying an antitrust river and carrying a nail to the cross. Why does Google get a free pass at this?
Google is asking Microsoft to respect terms of service - nothing more, nothing less. Twitter does it every other week, and so does facebook - and people are upset, but everyone understands that this is entirely within their rights. (Unlike stuff Microsoft did, for which it was convicted of antitrust violations).
> Its by now clear that Google wants to provide a degraded experience to the windows phone users, thus deliberately rigging the market place.
The only thing that's clear is that Microsoft is using its customers as pawns in a PR game against google. I know what my response to that would have been: No more MS products.
> What guarantees that the same wouldn't be pulled when Firefox OS or Ubuntu OS comes to the market? If so what can possibly replace Youtube? 90% of the video links on the web are to Youtube.
AND THEY ALL WORK PERFECTLY WELL ON YOUR WINDOWS PHONE, INSIDE THE WEB BROWSER, LIKE LINKS ARE SUPPOSED TO! WHAT ARE YOU UPSET ABOUT?
>If you were a youtube user then, you were using the website - which is PERFECTLY USABLE on your windows phone.
No its not, you know since flash is disabled.
>Google is asking Microsoft to respect terms of service - nothing more, nothing less.
And they did respect the terms of service with their new app - nothing more, nothing less. Using a HTML5 client is not part of that terms of service.
>The only thing that's clear is that Microsoft is using its customers as pawns in a PR game against google.
I would have to agree with you on that, especially with their scroogled ads campaign. However without such public announcement, no one will ever know what the reason behind the app's breaking. Remember when google maps was blocked on Windows phone's browser? A negative PR was required to caused Google revert the stance.
>AND THEY ALL WORK PERFECTLY WELL ON YOUR WINDOWS PHONE!
Again, no they don't work perfectly and Youtube is sadly not something you can just substitute!
>The only thing that's clear is that Microsoft is using its customers as pawns in a PR game against google. I know what my response to that would have been: No more MS products.
Wait a minute, isn't Google using YouTube content providers and advertisers as pawns in this game to hurt Windows Phone?
Windows Phone holds about 3.5% marketshare, and by refusing to make an official app (with ads) or allowing Microsoft's version which shows ads and because of the degraded experience of the mobile site which discourages people from searching, watching related videos etc. , they're hurting revenues of content providers to help Android.
So if you're a content provider, you can and will be used as a stick to further Google's selfish interests even if the actions hurt you.
Sounds like a reason for "No more Google products" if anything.
> There is no inherent right to a YouTube app on a phone.
IMO, it's not about rights. It's about anti-competitive behavior of Google. WP might easily get on par with Android and OS and this why Google doesn't allow Youtube there.
It actually does. It not only means that, but its one of the outcomes if you are truly open.
I think a bigger problem here is why people think YouTube or Google are "open" to begin with. There are some areas in Google businesses that being more open than the alternatives (note the emphasis on more, sometimes they are just "open" in comparison with Microsoft and Apple policies) serves them well, thats why the do it, but it's not a dogma inside the company and will never be.
Silverlight for Linux has existed through the Mono platform since 2007 under the name Moonlight: http://mono-project.com/Moonlight . With Microsoft's blessing I might add.
Without the DRM parts, making e.g. NetFlix streaming unusable on Linux (until recently, when someone managed to get Wine to the point where it can run Microsoft's own SilverLight DRM properly).
Even without DRM, Moonlight never worked correctly. I don't care for Netflix, it is not available in my country anyway. But I do care about other sites, for example autosalontv.cz and it never worked with Moonlight.
Great point. Amazon should do the same thing. Since they host all these sites on their cloud. The only browser that should be allowed to access it should be Amazon's.
This is completely different, YouTube is a free service, Google has no obligations to third parties. AFAIK Amazon Web Services are not free, if Amazon imposed this sort of restrictions on their customers, I am sure they would show Amazon the door.
Amazon is actually relevant here, because their Kindle Fire browser is partly cloud based. Microsoft may say that HTML5 on the Win Phone isn't feasible, but they own a giant cloud based server farm (Azure) just like Amazon. So if Amazon can make a browser that splits tasks between the cloud and the physical device why can't Microsoft handle HTML5 this way?
Google doesn't have to make a YouTube app for every platform, especially when people can still use YouTube via the browser on the phone.
The Platform Vendor making the app ignored the rules for using that API and got blocked.
Instead of changing it, they spend time deciding not to change it, release it again with only some of the issues fixed, and are then surprised when it gets rejected due to the outstanding issues already mentioned.
They did change it, except for the one thing the provider of the so-called "open" API doesn't even do - HTML5. Why should Google hold MSFT to that standard when it doesn't even do it itself?
I smell the same anti-trust bullying that MSFT did in the 90s and early 00s.
Because it's their product. They're permitted to do whatever they want with it.
They decided that they wanted a set of rules for when other people play with their toys. If Microsoft had followed the rules, instead of ignoring them, after saying they were going to follow the rules, it's their problem, not Google's.
I actually think Google's response is very civil and restrained.
A much more suitable response would be to serve movies, but e.g. prefix every video by a 30 second "informercial" saying "You are using an unlicensed application. Please contact your OS vendor Microsoft, and inquire why they are not complying with the YouTube terms of service. Alternatively, you can use your Web Browser app to view YouTube. Incidentally, check the Android YouTube app when you can. It's awesome".
Or maybe just every 10% of the views randomly. I suspect that would simultaneously get the message out, shame Microsoft, and get them to comply with terms & conditions in record time.
Even if Google put the informercial in, this is Microsoft. They would probably write an article on technet about how unfair it was, then pretend everything was A-OK.
Except, Google might not be able to show that prefix video using the API MS is/was using, but they would be able to do it if MS supported the standard HTML5 iframe API...
Google sorta did have an issue, and Apple's Youtube app it was built on borrowed time, under a "license". It was then (forcibly, or per-license) removed when Google decided its time was up, and notably before the Google Youtube app was finished. From Aug 2012:
> Apple said in a statement that “our license to include the YouTube app in iOS has ended.” It added that owners of its devices would be able to use their Web browsers to view YouTube videos, and that Google was working on a new YouTube app that would be available through the Apple App Store.
That transition did not seem very positive for Google, although maybe the new app lets them monetize better; I'd be interested in hearing more detail about the various aspects of this deal. (I see what the massive theme community from Cydia cares about being themed, and while I insist that featured themes theme the YouTube icon, the feedback I get is that very few people actually bother to install the app now that it is separate. As for the website, it was the case that you could view YouTube's content from the website since at least the era of iPhoneOS 2.) I thereby would have assumed that the situation went in the other direction: Apple chose not to renew their license for YouTube, as they no longer felt it gave them enough value for the cost.
YouTube isn't open source or open content, they're a business and their services aren't free, they're subject to the wishes of YouTube and its content owners.
The iOS app would've been developed in partnership and with the blessing of Google (aka Co that owns YouTube).
Microsoft had no such relationship with Google and instead chose to release their own unofficial YouTube app (first without ads) clearly violating the YouTube API TOS. Knowingly breaking the law and expecting a favorable outcome reminds me of "Queue Jumpers" who illegally enter Australia, they're not legally allowed to enter, but they continue to do so because the outcome is more favorable to their lively-hood when they do.
So Google blocks Microsoft, who wants to turn this into a anti-Google PR stunt and is openly crying foul trying to rally public support for their plight since they have no legal recourse.
Which is odd for Microsoft who loves exploiting the legal system to others detriment. I'm honestly shocked that Google isn't bending over backwards to help a competitor who is actively extorting the Android ecosystem through patent litigation (on tech created by Google), who makes more money on Android sales than even Google does (who has contributed significant resources into making Android).
It's not argument, it's a carefully crafted anti-Google PR statement with the goal of getting the public to do their own bidding for them, so they can get Google to do as they wish and further their own competitive platform.
>So Google blocks Microsoft, who wants to turn this into a anti-Google PR stunt and is openly crying foul trying to rally public support for their plight since they have no legal recourse.
And there's nothing wrong with that. Google might be doing a legal thing, but they're still doing the wrong thing.
>Which is odd for Microsoft who loves exploiting the legal system to others detriment. I'm honestly shocked that Google isn't bending over backwards to help a competitor who is actively extorting the Android ecosystem through patent litigation (on tech created by Google), who makes more money on Android sales than even Google does (who has contributed significant resources into making Android).
I dont think not actively preventing them from doing the same thing your apps do is 'bending over backwards'. The other points are irrelevant. If you claim to be open, you must be open to everyone, not just the people you do not consider competitors.
The original iOS app only showed videos that did not require ads. Microsoft's YouTube app used to work the same way, until they updated it to show all videos but still not show ads.
EDIT: According to itafroma, the Apple-authored YouTube app for Apple TV will play all videos without ads.
> The original iOS app only showed videos that did not require ads.
That's not correct. The original iOS app played all videos, regardless of whether they were monetized, as long as the creator checked the "make available for mobile devices" option. It works the same with with the current Apple TV app: monetization options have no effect on videos' availability.
Are you sure? I believe I remember my iPad being unable to play videos with ads, and having such videos not even show up in search results. Separately, some videos would not play on mobile or when embedded, but those seemed to be much more rare.
Yes, I'm quite sure. Load up any monetized video on Apple TV or any iOS device that's still running iOS 5 or earlier. It will work just fine and play no ads. Here's an example video I just tested to confirm: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B2HZWHimKas On the web or in the official YouTube apps, there's a required pre-roll ad; on iOS5- and Apple TV, nothing.
Except that the original iOS app was developed by Apple and Google had no issues with that
Today is not 2007, and Google has different motivators. It was also my understanding that Google worked alongside Apple on that original app, and then licensed the same to Apple, with the app being removed once that license expired.
I don't know which of the two is in the wrong here, but Microsoft's history makes their protestations rather difficult to accept at face value. There are some gross misreporting occurring on this (the most common being "Google worked with Microsoft on new app and then banned it!", which it seems is entirely incorrect. Google worked with Microsoft on a new app...and then Microsoft decided to release the old, blocked one just to get the press rolling again).
Didn't Apple and Google explicitly work closely together for the original YouTube app? I thought that Google even encoded all their videos to h.264 specifically so they could be easily viewed on iPhones (and subsequently other smartphones).
Disclosure: I am a Googler, though not working on anything remotely near YouTube. Obvious caveat: this is just my personal opinion.
> With this backdrop, we temporarily took down our full-featured app when Google objected to it last May
If I remember right, this full-featured app included features like:
1. Allowing users to download videos even when the content provider disallowed that.
2. Allowing users to not view ads even when the content provider specifically required ads to be shown.
3. Using YouTube's branding without permission.
I am but a lowly engineer and the actions of executives confuse me, but I don't see how Microsoft didn't realize the above was batshit crazy. I can only assume this is some sort of weird ploy.
YouTube's entire business model is about getting content providers to put videos up there so that people will watch ads to see them. If you let people take videos off the site, or just skip the ads, that breaks the fundamental business proposition.
This would be like me making an Android app called "Bing from Micrsoft" that let you perform bing searches but then stripped out all of the ads. Microsoft would shut that shit down, with good reason.
> When we first built a YouTube app for Windows Phone, we did so with the understanding that Google claimed to grow its business based on open access to its platforms and content, a point it reiterated last year.
"Open access to content" doesn't mean "ignore the requirements of the people who created that content". People make their livelihoods producing YouTube videos and the only way that money flows to those creators is because of ads. If you make a Windows Phone app that lets you watch Cooking with Dog without the ads, you aren't doing Francis any favors by giving out "open access" to his content.
(Yes, I did just imply that they are the dog's videos. He is the host, after all.)
> 1. Allowing users to download videos even when the content provider disallowed that.
This was poor judgment from Microsoft, and as far as I can see, was addressed in this new version of the app.
> 2. Allowing users to not view ads even when the content provider specifically required ads to be shown.
Blocking on this basis alone is a double standard from Google. As others have pointed out, the iOS app developed by Apple never showed ads, even if the videos were monetized. Google never unilaterally revoked Apple's API access over it.
Though one could argue that they did and that's why iOS 6+ doesn't include it. But that doesn't explain why Apple TV, to this day, still plays all videos—even with required monetization—without ads. Why is it okay for Apple to do this, but not Microsoft? Why won't Google license YouTube API access on the same terms?
> 3. Using YouTube's branding without permission.
As above, why won't Google license this to Microsoft on the same terms as other competitors? Why is it tying a "must be HTML5" requirement to Microsoft alone, and no one else? Apple's Apple TV app isn't in HTML5 and uses the YouTube branding.
Heck, there's even a third-party app for iOS called Jasmine[1] that is a native app (embedding just the HTML5 video player inside the app as y2bd points out below) and uses YouTube branding. Why is Google making it more difficult for Microsoft to do the exact same thing? We're clearly not getting the full story from anyone here.
> Blocking on this basis alone is a double standard from Google. As others have pointed out, the iOS app developed by Apple never showed ads, even if the videos were monetized. Google never unilaterally revoked Apple's API access over it.
It has been mentioned else where in the thread that apple had licence from google to use youtube without ads and when that licence ended they removed the app from the market.
>Though one could argue that they did and that's why iOS 6+ doesn't include it. But that doesn't explain why Apple TV, to this day, still plays all videos—even with required monetization—without ads. Why is it okay for Apple to do this, but not Microsoft? Why won't Google license YouTube API access on the same terms?
Apple may very well have a licence for this as they did previously with the iphone app.
> As above, why won't Google license this to Microsoft on the same terms as other competitors?
The article does not even say if Microsoft has been seeking such or if Google has denied them. If they are/have been seeking then the author of the article should have included this fact to make their argument stronger, but if it is there I missed it.
> Heck, there's even a third-party app for iOS called Jasmine[1] that is a native app (embedding just the HTML5 video player inside the app as y2bd points out below) and uses YouTube branding. Why is Google making it more difficult for Microsoft to do the exact same thing? We're clearly not getting the full story from anyone here.
Big players get more attention because they have a larger effect. It would be unprofitable and unproductive for its long term survival for google to pay equal attention to small players transgressing rules as they do larger players.
I believe, and I could be wrong, that the iOS YouTube app was developed jointly by Apple and Google back when iOS first came out in 2007, when YT and mobile video was in an entirely different place than it is today.
Google signed some sort of license with Apple for access to YT via that app, and when it was up, they pulled the app (despite there being no official Google YT app at the time) from iOS. It's very possible that the ATV app for YT is still under some sort of license with Google, which is why it can play videos ad-free.
It all comes down to the fact that iOS is too significant source of users to give the cold shoulder. Windows Phone is still sufficiently small fraction of the market, that Google has more interest in degrading the Windows Phone OS instead of earning from the additional users.
I think this is purely a game of numbers, and if/when WP gets big enough that the additional income from eg. youtube outweighs the income generated from users who picks android next time.
A nitpick, but although Jasmine is a native iOS application, when it comes to actually playing a video, it opens a YouTube video embedded in a web view. That is why you see the YouTube player for a brief moment before the video starts.
That's true; I updated my comment to clarify that. If that's the difference between Google being okay with it and not, I guess I don't see where the chasm of difference is:
* Microsoft claims they've enabled ads on YouTube videos. How, if they're not using the same technique as Jasmine?
* If they are using the same technique as Jasmine, why is that not enough? Why is Google still saying (or at least Microsoft is claiming that Google is still saying) the entire app must be HTML5?
* If the technique Jasmine uses does, in fact, satisfy Google's "HTML5" requirement, but for some reason Microsoft isn't using it (but somehow is playing ads anyway), why doesn't Microsoft just do it? Embedding a web view into a native app isn't exactly rocket surgery: why do they claim it's technically difficult and time consuming?
Assuming they figured out how to display ads without using the embedded HTML5 player, a guess I can offer (as a WP user) as to why they don't is that if they do, the video would launch in the default webview video player, which is honestly pretty terrible. You can't even scrub through videos. The MS-built YouTube application however had a much-more featured video player[1].
Quite a few WP applications that are video-centric (such as the non-MS YouTube apps, Netflix, etc.) use their own much-improved video player. Even Microsoft provides a better video player for usage in WP/W8 applications[2]. Making an improved video player on a per-app basis probably would require a lot less overhead than changing the system-wide video player.
My gut tells me that everything falls down to your last bullet, i.e. Google does not care if the full app is HTML5, but they want the an HTML5 YouTube player with appropriate DRM to be embedded in the app so they have full control on the ads and other stuff they are serving, and Microsoft is deliberately trying to avoid it and misleads everyone into thinking that they require full HTML5 app to be implemented.
You know what? If it is time consuming to implement, it's Microsoft's problem, not anyone else's. Lots of people would be happy to get shitload of money from Microsoft and assemble a team to implement it if their problem is difficulty and they are so generous to be willing to pay cash, as they brag about in their blogpost ("...at Microsoft's expense...").
> 2. Allowing users to not view ads even when the content provider specifically required ads to be shown.
This one isn't quite so clear. Microsoft had no way of showing ads, and Google provided them none. Google's "solution" for them was to direct them to a skinned version of mobile YouTube... which also didn't show ads.
The mobile version of YouTube also didn't show videos that the uploader had blocked from displaying on mobile (for example, because they didn't want people watching it without ads). Microsoft's app ignored those restrictions amd showed the videos anyway without any ads.
Note that, according to point 1 & 2, adblockers should be forbidden by law and browsers should all include DRM by law.
HTML5 provides the video, the client just choose to stream me but can choose to save it as well, that's no constrain here.
Likewise, the browser can choose to display whatever it pleases, adverts or not.
You realize that they're probably investigating or lobbying for doing just that, right? AFAIK, the only reason no one has gone after AdBlock yet is because they do not actually have enough users to make a demonstrable dent on the advertisers' revenue streams.
I really wouldn't be surprised to see this kind of legislation in 5-10 years, or sooner.
This whole thing is passive aggressive, but the best part is:
>"Google objected on a number of grounds. We took our app down and agreed to work with Google to solve their issues..We enabled Google’s advertisements, disabled video downloads and eliminated the ability for users to view reserved videos. We did this all at no cost to Google, which one would think would want a YouTube app on Windows Phone that would only serve to bring Google new users and additional revenue."
"We stopped breaking Google's ToS at _no cost_ to Google"
And after they stopped breaking Google's ToS, they decided to re-release the application that was breaking the ToS, and decided to cry foul on Google, for not liking that they re-released the old app.
Apple, Google, Microsoft: they each act like bullies when they have the upper hand and whine when someone else makes them dance.
If you react emotionally to arguments between these companies (unless they pay you to) you should find something worthwhile to be angry about. They're all whores who would screw every customer they have for a dime.
Use them any way you can but don't invest in them emotionally. It's a waste of your time.
We, as consumers, may still identify with issues imposed (e.g. content owners charging extremely high prices to Netflex). I'm not saying Microsoft is right and Google is wrong. I'm saying that I agree that Google is not helping the ecosystem and should be shamed for it, in this one very specific instance.
Well 1st people often don't have an alternative (driver and app support of Windows, Google's search results quality).
And 2nd people do like to be screwed, if that means less effort and lower risk. The vast majority of civilizations in human history were slave based, with the majority of people being slaves.
Karma is finally biting Microsoft in the ass. Who else remembers the refrain "it ain't done 'til Lotus won't run!" from Microsoft's earlier years?
Having said that, I would expect the "do no evil" company - directly referring to not being like Microsoft - to do the right thing, if, in fact Microsoft is being fully forthcoming in stating they have complied with all of Google's objections.
In the end, both companies have blemishes and so far I can't determine who's really at fault here. The soap opera will continue, I'm sure.
The article says that they decided to release the app over Google's objections:
There was one sticking point in the collaboration. Google
asked us to transition our app to a new coding
language – HTML5.
[...]
For this reason, we made a decision this week to publish
our non-HTML5 app while committing to work with Google
long-term on an app based on HTML5. [...] Google, however,
has decided to block our mutual customers from accessing
our new app.
Well if Google are claiming their platforms are open, then as long as Microsoft can comply with content providers (showing ads, etc), Google should not have a problem with them hooking into their platform?
Google is not interested in "openness" except where it benefits them. They are just as controlling as Apple when it comes to their viable properties (and rightly so, but they should stop using "open" to describe their platforms).
Where is the claim that YouTube is some big open ecosystem? Google provides APIs for working with YouTube, which to me seems the only sane way to protect its content providers. MS refuses to use those APIs. What is hard to digest about this situation?
Whatever about this particular instance, there are documented incidents where Microsoft deliberately made things not work; in particular, the Java thing, and the DR-DOS Windows thing (where Windows would run on DR-DOS if it pretended to be MS DOS, but not otherwise).
Since it did not make it into a released version of Windows, it did not actually affect DR-DOS. Still, Novell eventually got an 8-digit settlement out of Microsoft.
Sure it's in vogue to say Microsoft is "finally" getting their comeuppance whenever something like this comes along, but I wonder how long they can be held responsible for past sins.
Are we really going harp on Lotus Notes, or, heaven forbid, IE6, five or ten years from now?
Note that I think that the post from Microsoft is 90% self-serving. It's just a general thing I notice with Microsoft bashing.
> I wonder how long they can be held responsible for past sins.
They are still threatening Android handset makers with patent lawsuits, and in fact making more money from Android patent extortion than they are from Windows phone.
The whole UEFI Secure Boot requirement is designed to thwart Linux adoption under the guise of safety.
It is NOT sins of the past. The only reason they're not pulling another IE6 or Lotus Notes is because they aren't as dominant now, not because they aren't as evil. (The UEFI thing is on the same league of evil, if you ask me, just not as successful)
As a Windows Phone user I am just going to have to accept I will never get YouTube, G+ or Google Drive while Android and iOS users can get onenote, lync, skydrive and the Xbox companion shit.
Personally, I wrote a blog post on the decades old MS OS/2 2.0 fiasco, just to make it clear that it was pretty seriously bad (I don't see PX00307 mentioned anywhere before I mentioned it for example), even though I know it is too late (fortunately the x64 transition went much better).
It seems Google will allow them to build an HTML5 app, even though Microsoft has repeatedly breached their TOS multiple times (like allowing users to download the videos). If Microsoft's WP8 platform is so behind the times, it can't even make an HTML5 web-app possible, that's really Microsoft's problem.
If I'm not mistaken all the other "native" Youtube apps on other platforms are Google's own apps, and it's also their prerogative to choose the platforms they want to make native apps on. For example, they haven't made one for Roku either, and it's the #1 media streaming box right now.
So I don't see the problem here?
EDIT: One other thing. Google told them from the beginning that they'll only allow an HTML5 app. So what does Microsoft do? They make a native app - again. And then Microsoft releases the native app to their store, without Google's approval, even though they were supposedly "collaborating" on this, and then seeds press releases to the media that Google-the-bad-guy blocked them "again" - like it was "completely unexpected" or something.
There's no problem with banning products that use your service but violate your Terms of Service; it just doesn't jibe with what is usually understood by "open". "We're open"/"we encourage openness"/"our platform is open" implies acceptance, transparency, a warm welcome, permissiveness even.
It kind of makes "open" another doublespeak term: we're Open, but terms and conditions apply...
Of course we can have debates on the semantics of the word "open": should it be assumed to mean tolerance?
Semantics aside, Google's "open" is marketing artifice, akin to Apple's many pompous adjectives for mundane or even inferior things ("beautiful", "revolutionary", "insanely great" etc.) or Microsoft's old message of empowerment ("where do you want to go today?") to sell an unremarkable but popular OS and productivity suite.
Prerogative or not, it's still douchey of Google to outright block Microsoft. The original Apple version of YouTube only shows videos that do not want advertising (granted a smaller and smaller # of videos).
I genuinely don't get this line of thinking. This isn't about Google or Microsoft, rather it's about the end user who is essentially a customer of both parties. IMHO, Google aren't just screwing MSFT, they are screwing users, which doesn't really hold with the image that they like to portray. It's actually rather spiteful.
I love it how they never really say that Android == Google in the article and instead play it like the Youtube apps were somehow made by iPhone and Android OS/platform engineers.
The original iOS YouTube app was done by Apple. Google also has a YouTube API with easy code examples and resources for iOS developers, today.
I have to agree with Microsoft here. It seems they are doing everything they can and getting no clear responses. It's funny because this is the same type of junk that happens to small dev companies submitting to app stores in general, however that doesn't make it right. And when you are talking YouTube, which pretty much has a monoppoly on many different types of video content online, it's quite ridiculous to say its ok for Google to do this in the long term.
> It seems they are doing everything they can and getting no clear responses.
... except complying with Google's terms for displaying YouTube videos.
> And when you are talking YouTube, which pretty much has a monoppoly on many different types of video content online, it's quite ridiculous to say its ok for Google to do this in the long term.
It's definitely OK for google to do this for as long as they want, and then some. Windows Phone users are not blocked from accessing YouTube, so it's perfectly OK (and even if they were, it might arguably still be ok, but that's not even the case). They just have to spend 3 more seconds waiting for the first page to load.
Sophistry. Users expect a Youtube experience on an average mobile device, and by dictating the language it must be written in (WHY? What possible legitimate reason does Google have to do this?), they are effectively forcing Microsoft's hand.
Just because it's in a ToS doesn't mean it's reasonable or immune from complaint or criticism. I can require in my ToS that everyone who uses my Awesome(C) API to do a headstand on first access, that doesn't make it reasonable.
It's completely unreasonable, to the point of being WTF-worthy, to require the app which accesses the API to be in a certain language.
Seriously. I'm having trouble phrasing how dumb this is. As long as the app can generate the appropriate requests and serve the appropriate data, who cares? What possible legitimate reason does Google have to decide if the app is written in HTML5, Java, INTERCAL, brainfuck, or lolcode? Why provide an API at all if you're going to do platform restrictions?
It's my understanding that YouTube officially supports access via either a Flash applet or the HTML5 <video> tag. Windows Phone doesn't support Flash[1], so the only option for writing a mobile app using the official API is to use HTML5.
It's not obvious why using the HTML5 API is "impossible". Windows bundles a <video>-capable browser; assuming IE's capable of playing either H.264 or WebM, it should be relatively easy to build a YouTube app on top of it. Maybe there's some internal reason why an app can't easily embed an IE widget.
As far as I know this is exactly how the popular third-party iOS Youtube client Jasmine works. It used to be better than it is, but a couple of versions ago the developer mentioned that he was changing the means of showing the video to comply with Google's requirements, and it became a (relatively well-concealed) embedded HTML5 video pane.
Yes but as you say, the user experience became worse after that change. Google is forcing developers to implement a lower quality experience. This seems bad. Is it so they can maintain more control?
The Youtube website works fine in the browser. The point is to make a native app that launches instantly without taking up my mobile bandwidth, looks good with the rest of the OS, allows uploads with WP8's lack of file manager, can show me notifications, and so on.
The experience you can provide with an HTML5 app are many times subpar as compared to a native app. Note how facebook abandoned their HTML5 app and went native.
YouTube's API only requires the video player itself to be in HTML5, the rest of the app can be native or whatever the hell you want. The engineering work here is youtube hands you an HTML snippet (specifically an <iframe>), and you plop that into a UIWebView where you want the inline video to be and you're done.
The issue then is that Google will complain that the rest of the app doesn't adhere to all of Google's terms of services regarding displaying of ads, which are difficult to implement without their blessing.
Calm down. So you think a youtube app with a big rectangle that plays video and another one that allows you to type the url is the right experience? Video playback is just one aspect of it. search, lists, subscriptions, commenting, uploading, tagging, etc.
As for facebook's app, I was commenting about HTML5 still not being the best option for mobile app development.
LinkedIn also abandoned their HTML 5 mobile app experiences.
the biggest problem with HTML 5 video is that it does not support adaptive bitrate streaming. notice that the desktop experience of YouTube still uses a flash player instead of an HTML 5 video player. notice that apple used QuickTime as their default player on their site.
in short, HTML 5 video player is an absolute last resort player.
Don't get me started on how terrible all of it is on Linux. Incapable of dual screen full screen in flash, HTML5 has to buffer every time you enter full screen mode.
Incredible slow performance, buggy, crashes.
I actually have to boot into Windows VM just to watch flash/youtube.
Sencha's app was a proof-of-concept. Their motivation was to show how and where facebook was "full-of-shit" which they did beautifully. If you read their respective articles, you can discern for yourself.
This is just like Google blocking Maps on Windows Phone; there's a video where someone changed the agent from "Windows Phone 8" to "Windows Phne 8" and suddenly maps.google.com actually worked. I'm not a Microsoft fan, but I do rather like my Windows Phone, and I wish they would stop squabbling so I can have a YouTube app and change the search engine from Bing.
At some point, google were sabotaging any page visited through their domain using WP8.
It would proxy everything alla google translate and serve a text only version of the whole web under the pretext that "my phone's browser sucked and they were helping me".
Really annoying Google blocks IMs from other services now as well. Lots of people complain to me they can't IM Google users any more. Apparently Google removed server to server XMPP support, a standard open IM protocol, in favor of their own lock in protocols. Other products are following suit, Chromecast doesn't include support DLNA or other standards for example, but tries to force you to use Google proprietary stuff instead. In many cases this is a worse situation for users and only benefits Google by locking more people in and forcing more people to use services that aren't superior. Many people have their own media center or media server setups that are incompatible for example, like XBMC, a popular media center.
> Really annoying Google blocks IMs from other services
> now as well. Lots of people complain to me they can't IM
> Google users any more. Apparently Google removed server
> to server XMPP support, a standard open IM protocol, in
> favor of their own lock in protocols.
Google Talk still works, and still supports server-to-server XMPP federation.
Some users have chosen to switch to Hangouts, which is a separate product (affiliated with Google+) that doesn't support federation.
> Chromecast doesn't include support DLNA or other
> standards for example
I'm of mixed opinion on this. On one hand, it's obviously better to use an open standard when available. On the other, DLNA and UPnP and all the other associated standards were terrible. As a user I was never able to get my TV to stream music from my computer, and as a developer I couldn't wade through all the XML and acronyms to get something that worked.
Sometimes "open standard" is code for "designd by committee, compliantly implemented by nobody".
> Some users have chosen to switch to Hangouts, which is a separate product.
This is only partially true. Many folks had no choice.
For example, on Android, anyone who had automatic updates enabled was automatically upgraded to Hangouts. No choice involved, Talk simply worked one day, and was gone the next, replaced with an purposely-incompatible 'Hangouts' app.
Additionally, if your device doesn't have the Talk apk already on it, there's no user facing way to get it back. (you can only 'uninstall' Hangouts if it Talk shipped on your device. The 2013 Nexus for example, is blocked from installing Talk from the Play Store, and blocked from uninstalling Hangouts. Users have to either root, or hunt down the APK from random internet sites to get Talk back).
They have also tightened the screws and raised prices on the only alternative, MSDN subscriptions. Plus cranked the prices on SQL Server, fucked the GUI up in Windows, screwed the pooch on RT and back-peddled on the new Xbox, etc...
I thought Reddit was fairly pro-Microsoft? I mean, if we're talking Reddit as a whole and not /r/programming. Reddit has a lot of general users who use Windows, especially any gamers, so they take kindly more to Microsoft. I remember articles on Reddit that mocked Bing and most of Reddit seemed to support Microsoft.
I'd be more inclined to give Google a bit of leeway here if they hadn't already pulled out some petty behaviour against Windows Phone.
This is somewhat similar to Google's blocking of Maps from the Windows Phone web browser. A feature that worked fine originally and once there was uproar from users came back and continued to work fine.
Google is attempting to deny service to Windows Phone users to avoid competition in the handheld market. It isn't pretty and it does make me rethink my daily usage of Google services. Windows Phone users are Google customers too and I couldn't care less about their petty rivalry with some other mega-corp.
Some background for people who may not have followed this:
In May, Microsoft released a YouTube app for Windows Phone that didn't show ads and allowed users to download videos. Google said no.
Microsoft removed the download capability but didn't restore the ads. Google said no.
Then the PR comes out that Microsoft and Google are working together on a new app. I'm guessing that was PR from Microsoft's side.
Now Microsoft has tried to release an app that follows the rules but Google looks like they are being petty about it after Microsoft has repeatedly violated their terms of service.
So Microsoft posts a blog article angling for FTC intervention, and here we are.
Microsoft could not restore the ads because Google provided no API access to them. They weren't being contrary, they were making due with what they had.
"Your honor, Microsoft did not provide me with a way to sell Windows 8 for $3, so I had to find my own way to crack it. It's not my fault, it's Microsoft's fault for not giving me any way to do that"
Another too wordy document on Microsoft's part. The core of the issue is that Google is forcing Microsoft to jump through hoops that it is not forcing iOS devices to jump through.
Its clear this is an anti-competitive action on Google's part and while they have that right (if they aren't a monopoly, which is increasingly unclear), they really can't claim with the other side of their mouth that they are open.
Yup, there is at least one major third-party one, though (Jasmine), which complies with the API requirements that Microsoft is apparently not willing to deal with (presentation of the actual video via HTML5, etc.)
Does Google abide by its own API usage restrictions? It might seem like a trite point, but it's important given that it publishes for the two dominant platforms. It'd be an easy way to edge out competing applications restricted to a less feature-rich toolset.
M$: "Google also says that we are not complying with its 'terms and conditions.' What Google really means is that our app is not based on HTML5. The problem with this argument, of course, is that Google is not complying with this condition for Android and iPhone."
Google's T&Cs that M$ is citing, it would seem to me, apply to third-party use of YouTube data. Since Google wrote the Android and iOS YouTube apps, this is not "third-party use." Google makes the rules for YouTube, and can therefore bypass them with impunity. M$ cannot.
Presumably, a Google-written YouTube app for WinPhone would also be allowed to be non-HTML5. However, I'm sure readers here have a pretty good grasp on the chances of that happening.
> Google makes the rules for YouTube, and can therefore bypass them with impunity. M$ cannot.
Well, yeah. But for a company so heavily invested in HTML5 to demand another company apply it, while simultaneously not doing so themselves, is a little hard to stomach.
I've ben using thé web app on iPhone and iPad recently, and I'm guessing thats not flash. Whats wrong with thé WinPhone browser that it xan't use that?
You can down vote me all you want, but I feel zero sympathy for Microsoft. If their app is being blocked from YouTube is because they deserve it. Google has all the right to choose which third parties can access YouTube. Microsoft is in no positing to criticize the actions of other companies.
I'll take Google over Microsoft anytime. I believe there are no absolutes everything is relative, everything depends on the context, on our scale of values. Personally I don't care about such concepts as open or evil. If the actions of a company are illegal they should be punished. If they are not but they ought to be, you can try to build enough consensus to legislate on the matter.
I personally feel more wronged by Microsoft than by Google, I've never been forced to use Google products. The pervasive dominance that Microsoft still holds on the desktop is poisonous. Until I am free to choose or not to choose Microsoft products I will feel wronged by Microsoft.
This discussion brings up the point about how the usage requirements and restrictions of the API applies to third-parties and not Google itself. If Google, for example, wanted to keep the iOS platforms and Android platforms in an advantageous spot for whatever reason, they could just write the apps for those platforms themselves and say that the terms don't apply.
I'm not saying that's what happened in this case. It sounds like Microsoft's application added features that even Google wouldn't give its own apps. However, the argument that Google is simply allowed to write its own apps, for its own platforms and them impose extra restrictions on third parties who use its APIs is anti-competitive. This is the kinda crap that got Microsoft in trouble in the first place.
Again, I'm only speaking to the argument I see in the threads here, not the reality as it appears in the story. In reality, it appears Microsoft may have overstepped a bit.
The author was given the tricky task of padding out 60 or so words to nearly 1000, it's almost prose.
The hypocrisy is truly hilarious, lambasting others for "Antitrust violations". They can still be the victim here though, I'm not ruling that out at all.
Microsoft is truly synonymous with Antitrust in my mind, on an unparalleled level. With regards to Windows/Xbox/anything they can really.
I don't think Google are playing fair here either, but MSFT are hitting new levels of childishness in my mind. If MSFT truly believe it's unfair, why not take them to court in CA for Antitrust? Take a shot at being on the side receiving the settlement for once.
This has always been somewhat true, but this is a definitive sign open has lost all meaning. Now it means you have to allow third parties to use your resources to do what they like?
Could this post be designed to provoke a reaction that might lead to (or contribute to pre-existing) FTC anti-trust inquiries about Google's practices?
The only thing is that this isn't anti-trust. If you want to use a google product, then you have to follow the google rules. I think the rules are a bit ridiculous, but YouTube doesn't have a monopoly on online videos. Well, except maybe cat videos.. so there might be a case in there somewhere. No app or company has a "right" to create Youtube apps. For anti-trust, one would have to prove a monopoly and they would be difficult despite the ubiquitousness of Youtube.
Also, Google isn't preventing Microsoft from creating a Youtube app, they are only requiring that it meet certain requirements. Since Microsoft is a direct competitor in the search (and therefore advertising) space, it's not unfounded that Google do what they're doing.
I personally think it's crap, however Microsoft brought this on themselves by blatantly violating the Terms of Service.
However, when all is said and done, Microsoft deserves it -- they are, after all responsible for Internet Explorer and while it isn't related to Youtube, they deserve to suffer for all of the hours and hours developers have spent trying to make their products compatible with that hell-demon of a browser.
I'm not so sure. You don't have to prove a monopoly. You have to show a selective targeting of a competitor. Manufacturer's using Google as a search engine allegedly have a different set of standards for their YouTube app than manufacturer's that don't use Google as search default. Whether or not that's how things actually transpired, it sure smells awfully fishy to an FTC regulator. This isn't about following rules or APIs, it's about provoking regulatory authorities to investigate Google so they maneuver more conservatively. And watch, now that Windows app will be approved post haste!
You actually do have to show a monopoly. A monopoly is prohibited from doing certain things that would be perfectly legitimate if a smaller competitor did it.
Example 1: The EU required Microsoft to offer a version of Windows with a browser choice screen. However, Apple does not have to offer an alternative to Safari. Reason: Windows was a monopoly, but Mac OS X wasn't.
Example 2: The EU permitted Windows Phone and Windows RT to default to IE, without offering a choice of other browsers. Reason: Windows Phone does not have a monopoly of the smartphone market, and Windows RT does not have a monopoly of the tablet market.
According to http://www.ebizmba.com/articles/video-websites YouTube gets 450,000,000 uniques against NetFlix who get 55,000,000. I'd argue there different markets and the key comparable would be dailymotion at 27,000,000. I think there is a good chance it'd pass the monopoly test.
The lead that Youtube has over Dailymotion is enormous. It's higher than the ratio of PCs to Macs at the time of the Microsoft antitrust case.
(Which is why the DOJ defined the market as the one for x86 PC operating systems. That excluded Mac OS from being considered a competitor to Windows, as it ran only on PowerPC at the time.)
But that's impossible: the company is French, and partially owned by the French government which keeps its companies valuation as low as possible by forbidding US companies to acquire DailyMotion. Yahoo! wanted to buy the company, and the "French Productivity Minister", no joke, killed the acquisition.
Your disclaimer probably says it all. Why bother when there just aren't that many people on windows phone. It seems like a matter of "who is helping who?". if Google didn't support the iPhone, there would be an outrage and people would move to other video service because of the number of people on iphone. If google didn't support android... well that would be silly, wouldn't it? But there aren't enough people on windows phone for it to matter to google, however, there are enough people on youtube for it to matter for microsoft.
> ... Document I suggests that one reason that open source projects have been
> able to enter the market for servers is the use of standardized protocols.
> It then suggests that this can be stopped by "extending these protocols and
> developing new protocols" and "de-commoditize protocols & applications."
> This policy has been nicknamed "embrace, extend, extinguish".
Now all of a sudden Microsoft is the underdog, and you're whinging in public when the dominant player locks you out?
Cry me a river.
(Not that this is a defense of Google, mind you: I think MS is right on the money w.r.t. to their behaviour. Just saying that Google's tactics couldn't be employed against a more deserving target).
I wonder if the HTML 5 requirement might be Google trying to use the YouTube app as a bargaining chip when it comes to HTML 5 video codecs. Google & Microsoft have locked horns a bit in that area.
What does Google even mean when they say that they want it HTML5? Do they want it as a web app? Running inside a WebBrowser control? Do they just want the video to be an HTML5 video tag? I feel there is some very important piece of information missing from this discussion.
Eventually both Google and Microsoft give a damn about openness. They all care about their own profits. "Openness" is just a cute cover. Microsoft's own track record in such things has been very bad (hint: Samba, Wine).
I think that Google has a Search app on Windows Phone. If the platform does not have the numbers, then why make the Search app? When Search app is released, why not release Youtube and other apps?
There are only a handful of people who actually know what transpired between these two corporations. I would guess that none of that small group actively comment on hacker news.
It's a bit worse than that. There's a dedicated button on every Windows Phone (that I know of) used for searching with Bing. You can't change the search engine that's used, you just have to live with it.
It's hard referring to something as a "default" search engine when you can't change to another search engine.
The Youtube app for Android is developed by Google
The Youtube app for iOS is developed by Google
The Youtube app for Windows Phone is developed by Microsoft, with some reverse engineering, at first not serving ads on purpose.
It is easy to argue that a Youtube app for Windows Phone would be nice for WP users. It is also easy to argue that MSFT writing such an app would be a tad antagonistic, seeing as the first version released contained no ads. One might suspect Microsoft wanted a PR fight more than they wanted a Youtube app, or that they wanted both.
Alas, we can read for clues.
The title of the article is: "The limits of Google’s openness"
But the tags are: "marketplace, Windows Phone"
It's not an article about Google now, is it?
~~~
The article doesn't help WP users. Instead they get no Youtube app while watching a hissy fit occur if they google (ha) to find out why the app is gone.
I like both these companies, but for however-much of a PR stunt this is, Microsoft does not come out looking good.