[danpalmer]

Just a note on the fact you had to use Safari to watch the video, there's a technical reason behind that, it's not arbitrary lock-in on Apple's part.

Apple use HTTP Live Streaming for their live streams. This is an open technology they are trying to get adopted more widely (RFC: http://tools.ietf.org/html/draft-pantos-http-live-streaming-...). Currently, HLS is not implemented by Chrome or other browsers, in part because Google are pushing a competing standard (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dynamic_Adaptive_Streaming_over...).

I'm not sure it's clear cut if one is better than the other. I've used HLS and implemented a toy HLS server, and can say anecdotally that it was easy to use and quite a nice standard, although not brilliantly implemented by clients so far. Because of this, I understand why Apple continue to push HLS, and why Google continue to push DASH, and why neither will implement the other's technology in their browsers.

[lxgr]

Google actually neither supports nor ignores HLS; they provide a JavaScript interface that allows sites to support HLS, MPEG-DASH and possibly other protocols. Apple's site seems to rely on "native" HLS support; this is probably why Chrome can't stream the video.

https://code.google.com/p/chromium/issues/detail?id=54198#c1...

[snlacks]

Oh, so it's not a ploy to force safari use... it's a ploy to force HLS. Thanks for the heads up.

Edit: Just to be clear, it is really interesting and appreciate your comment, but it's still silly for Apple to limit their advertisements to Apple users.