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[nutballs]

What are the thoughts on it?

It enables a lot of stuff that you would normally have to use JS for, but instead is built in. Even a bunch of plugins will no longer be needed for at the very least some simple stuff, like playing music and videos.
And i think embedded fonts (my wife will love me again).

[perkiset]

I love the notion, but who's really using it? IE8 doesn't have a full implementation, even FF is different. I think Safari 4 only supports "most of the HTML 5 spec" ... I love what all they are trying to do, but jeepers I think you'd just have an iHardon and nowhere for the happy ending.

I read up several months ago and literally pushed it to the back of the list because it seems so far away yet. I'd love to be proved wrong here...

[isthisthingon]

I'm not there yet personally but I've been excited about the promises.  I did a little reading on the subject today and found the following interesting points:

• Last month, the free software codecs - Theora and Vorbis - were dropped from the spec due apparently to pressure from Apple and Nokia. Therefore...
• HTML 5 does not have a common video codec for Web development - making one of the largest promises of HTML 5 nonexistent
• Interestingly, the editors of the specification are Ian Hickson (Google) and David Hyatt (Apple), which considering current tensions might make things interesting
• Apparently the specification may yet take another few years to finalize

It's a shame since plug-ins account for so many web experience problems and security issues.  I was also dumbfounded to find that just two people with potentially very biased positions are heading up the spec.  Apple will never want Quicktime to not be the dominant player just as everyone else with similar offerings would attempt to secure.  I think free software with open source and a binding contract regarding future use is the only way HTML 5 will get completed and widely adopted anytime soon.

Selfishly I say go for it and kick ass nuts!  The more people putting pressure on this the better.

Unselfishly I say don't waste your time on it until the dogfight winners claim their titles.

But if you do, any experience you'd like to share with us would be greatly appreciated 

[perkiset]

However, Theora and Ogg Vorbis have been deprecated video formats for quite a while... they don't have anywhere near the capabilities of the newer formats. The scuttlebutt seemed to be that simply BECAUSE Apple was pushing for Quicktime and/or H.264 people didn't want it. The push for them would be like pushing for .GIF files to become the graphical standard of today. To me it's a somewhat silly disagreement, because we've seen this already with the <img> tag: define the tag then let the the market/users/browser makers define what they'll support. Yes, it's true that .PNG(24) support was delayed because of the likes of IE, but things have ground out pretty well as users have made their desires known.

I personally would like to see Quicktime as the default only because it has the widest range of capability and it'd make my life as a webmaster a lot easier. However, simply because Apple wrote it, I doubt it will go anywhere. All that said, I totally agree that users should push the hell out of them to get a spec readied and into the hands of developers. Additionally, pressure should be put on developers to adhere to the damn thing. I'm pointing specifically at MacroShaft now.

[isthisthingon]

I personally would like to see Quicktime as the default only because it has the widest range of capability and it'd make my life as a webmaster a lot easier. However, simply because Apple wrote it, I doubt it will go anywhere. All that said, I totally agree that users should push the hell out of them to get a spec readied and into the hands of developers. Additionally, pressure should be put on developers to adhere to the damn thing. I'm pointing specifically at MacroShaft now.

  , except for Quicktime as the default.  And Apple writing anything is nothing but a positive in my opinion.  The problem is whether it's open, free, and contractually protected such that ownership issues can never arise.  Sun transitioned from proprietary to a partial yet respectable free software approach.

MacroShaft: The king of agenda-based technology "adoption".  Assimilate it, kill it dead, then resume predatory licensing in the name of "better features" (See J++)    This is one reason why I'm so on it about tech diversity and free software/open source.  If IE had no formidable browser competition the whole standards point would be moot, since as you know quite well, people will always design & code for the end user experience.  I keep proponents of free software (Adobe, Google, Sun) in check as well, since anyone with a board, shareholders and an agenda of competitive growth will predictably choose self preservation & advancement over the benefits of consumers - IF you give them enough power to do so.  As I see it, Apple gets credit for its remarkable history of innovation and trend-setting creativity.  I do appreciate their relentless pursuit of perfection.  But regardless of their brilliance, Apple needs as much policing as Monoposoft and IBM IMO.

Totally get your .GIF point.  The wide adoption of .PNG makes the existence of .GIF pointless, since .PNG has an additional channel and is identical otherwise.  Similarly, why settle on sub-par video codecs when better is available. 

If you remember, about 20 years ago I wrote a video and sound editor in Borland C++ 3.1 using Microsoft Video.  The app was fun to write, but Microsoft Video was so inexcusably terrible and "buggy" it was a crime to release it to developers.  Quicktime, however, is the unsung hero of PC video innovation.  This was especially true back then.  Only thing I don't like about it is it forces an inconsistent UI experience on the user, rather than keeping in theme with whatever OS it runs under.  Same with iTunes.

In the end it's a catch-22 with standards.  On one hand, people regret the hell out of widely adopted and sub-par standards (early HTML).  However, as a result I think standards take way too long to finalize with too much influence from tech lobbyists that can't escape their myopic self interest.  Sometimes you just have to get a little @nuts and let the rest follow

[nutballs]

Pretty much what I figured. And I agree.
I bring it up because the noise in the blogosphere is starting to register on the meter finally.

I Wont jump in until I know the main 3-4 browsers are going to support it completely. Even if they said, 2 years out, I would start learning now. But only if its roadmapped.

[perkiset]

Back at the video thing: frankly, if they simply made a <video> tag and then, much like images, you would have attributes like src="/myFile.qt" or "/myFile.flv" or "/myfile.ogg" then the browser devs could simply write adapters for the suffix of the file akin to .jpg, .gif, .png. Simple attributes like height and width, or better, CSS attributes like height, width, background-image etc, then we'd all be in the pink.

And you know how I love being the pink.

[vsloathe]

1) Theora and Ogg Vorbis are superior in every way that matters to H.264, last I knew. I could be wrong, but it was light years ahead of MP4 and MP3.

2) Google has just bought the company that originally wrote those codecs, leading to speculation that they might be trying to reintroduce them for consideration.

[isthisthingon]

This is not my area of expertise, however, after reading further on the subject I have to admit that nothing appears to be more comprehensive than H.264.  The specification was finalized in 2003 but unless I'm missing something there's nothing out there that compares.  Furthermore, it's free software, which kicks additional ass 

@perks - is there a superior codec I'm missing here?

The following chart shows how this "set of standards" is quite capable:

[perkiset]

Nope, I'm all good with H.264 which looks to be winning because of YouTube in any case. But note that this has little to do with the player. I believe that the argument is more about the player than the codec. With Ogg or Theora, you need their players, because I don't think any of the largest contemporary players execute them. Quicktime, WMV, Flash ... I don't think any do. Flash only does itself AFAIK, but it's worked OK for them since there is so much out there.

The WMV and Quicktime players seem to be the most broad players because they'll handle the most codecs and formats, but in this arena, the QT player beats the hell out of them all because of what else it will do - including 3D file control and such. It is very powerful, and, BTW, free. But, since Apple owns the rights to it, unless they GPL it then it's probably a bad choice to have a for-profit vendor be the viewer of choice for the future of HTML.

Actually I could care less, except that I don't believe Ogg or Theora to be the best choices. H.264 will probably (and probably should) win as the default codec, with players being defined by the browser ie., so long as IE will play H.264 and Safari and Mozilla will play H.264 by default and out of the box, I could care less.

[perkiset]

Waitaminnit... didn't Apple write the H.264 codec? I thought I read that somewhere...

<edit>
Nope, I'm wrong, but here's why Apple is in favor of it: http://www.apple.com/pr/library/2004/jun/23quicktime.html
</edit>

[isthisthingon]

Nope, I'm wrong, but here's why Apple is in favor of it: http://www.apple.com/pr/library/2004/jun/23quicktime.html

Apple's desperately in favor of it, that is the licensed h.264 that they planned to reap huge future profits from.  Back in 2004 they gambled on the codec direction and were right - except for the profit picture.  That's why heels are dug in and the specification remains idle.  After reading more, I believe @vs understands this:

Theora and Ogg Vorbis are superior in every way that matters to H.264, last I knew.

I'll try not to get fired up about this one like the VoIP thread.  But Christ on a spit, it appears Apple is effectively stalling HTML 5 because their codec gamble didn't pay off 

Here's a recent article discussing the issue: http://www.techcrunch.com/2009/07/06/html-5-ogg-theora-vs-h264-in-the-battle-for-a-web-video-standard/

Sorry @perks - hate to seem like a broken "bad Apple" record but certain things need to be honestly examined.  I could be wrong but if not I hope we can all agree that this is not a cool thing to do

[perkiset]

Of course no offense taken... but I don't see Ogg or Theora as superior either, and it could be argued that the push to NOT have H.264 is equally silly. Apple didn't write it, it's just a damn fine codec. I think you're seeing demons where there are none. Apple's stake in the game here is superior browsing, not their own stuff.

You are a broken bad apple record but that's beside the point