Potentially yes. But Microsoft and Apple not supporting VP8 & WebM probably has more to do with these companies being part of MPEG LA (a firm which sell licenses for H.264 related patents).
That seems like a leap. Ogg codecs were always questionable to me because they are owned by xiph.org, rather than some other more widely accepted standards body.
We tried to get IETF and W3C interested. They barely talked to us. The most we could do was a Vorbis over RTP draft that I wrote. The next best option was to incorporate as a 501c3 and run our own standards body, similar to the XSF in the XMPP world.
The times have changed though, and the IETF is now receptive to this type of work (although it didn't happen without a political battle). Note that many of the Opus contributors are Xiph.org contributors as well.
>But Microsoft and Apple not supporting VP8 & WebM probably has more to do with these companies being part of MPEG LA (a firm which sell licenses for H.264 related patents).
Microsoft(and probably Apple too) pays more than what it gets from the pool, so that doesn't make sense.
And everything to do with VP8/WebM being a proprietary, non standard at the time that the world consolidated on H.264. That and the fact that H.264 had hardware support when the iPods and Zunes were taking off.
You keep using this word "proprietary". I don't think it means what you think it means.
How is a codec I can download in complete source form and use in any way I like without licensing anything or answering to anybody "proprietary"?
The fact that we live in a world full of patent trolls that will sue you for tying your shoelaces doesn't make every codebase without explicit corporate patent indemnity "proprietary".
Proprietary: "something that is used, produced, or marketed under exclusive legal right of the inventor or maker."
The WebM trademarks and copyright are owned by Google.
Yes you have a license to use WebM as it is today. But Google can make the next version closed source and you wouldn't be able to do anything about it. And of course companies are going to use Google's 'official' WebM regardless if it is open or closed source leaving you screwed.
Wow you're really reaching here now, aren't you? The bitstream format and software are licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution License and the BSD license, respectively.
By your definition anything not in the public domain is proprietary.
Let's get another definition. This one is from wikipedia: Proprietary software is computer software licensed under exclusive legal right of the copyright holder. The licensee is given the right to use the software under certain conditions, while restricted from other uses, such as modification, further distribution, or reverse engineering.
As far as I am aware of, any user of WebM are NOT restricted from modification, further distribution, or reverse engineering. The beauty of the current licencing is that it can't be revoked; it is already free. Google can develop future versions and lock it down (suicidal move, though), but as it is the community has its hands on it.
So to be clear, you admit that WebM isn't proprietary, but future versions could be? That's true of every open source project on the planet, that's how copyright law works.
