Google, Microsoft, Mozilla and others partner-up to create next-gen video formats

Martin Brinkmann
Sep 2, 2015
Music and Video
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17

A conglomerate of streaming media providers, web browser makers and hardware manufacturers have partnered up to create next generation royalty free video formats.

The member list reads like the Who is Who in the streaming world as Amazon and Netflix, Cisco and Intel, and Microsoft, Mozilla and Google have joined the alliance to further that goal.

The idea behind the alliance is to join forces, use knowledge gained in previous attempts to create future video formats, to create a universal standard that is open and royalty-free.

Several companies that are now part of the alliance have been working on their own video format. Mozilla worked on Daala since 2013 for instance, Google on VP10, the next iteration of the company's video coding format, and Cisco announced Thor just last month.

standards
via xkcd

Technology and ideas that went into the creation of any of those formats may find their way into the new video format that the members of the alliance attempt to create.

While the alliance has yet to release technical information, it has published a document that outlines the initial focus of the project.

According to the information, it wants the format to be interoperable and open, scalable to any device and bandwidth, optimized for the web, optimized for hardware with a low computational footprint, capable of highest-quality real-time video delivery, and suitable for commercial and non-commercial content.

While not mentioned explicitly, the last feature indicates that it will support content encryption, one of the main requirements for commercial streaming companies such as Netflix or Amazon.

The distribution of legal legwork, reviewing patents for instance, was one core reason for Mozilla to join the alliance.

The code will be released under an Apache 2.0 license, the alliance operate under W3C patent rules. What this means is basically that alliance members are waiving royalties for the codec implementation and any patents on the codec itself.

Summary
Google, Microsoft, Mozilla and others partner-up to create next-gen video formats
Article Name
Google, Microsoft, Mozilla and others partner-up to create next-gen video formats
Description
Internet companies such as Google, Microsoft, Mozilla and Netflix have teamed up to develop a next generation royalty free video format.
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Comments

  1. Anonymous said on August 1, 2010 at 12:43 pm
    Reply

    Why not make use of the mplayer.conf?

  2. Mike J said on August 1, 2010 at 2:58 pm
    Reply

    Huh, I have never even seen this “font cache” pane; videos play at once for me, using VLC & XP SP3.

    1. Martin said on August 1, 2010 at 3:39 pm
      Reply

      Mike, in theory this should have only been displayed once to you, at the very first video that you played with VLC. The time this window is displayed depends largely on the number of fonts in your font directory.

      1. Mike J said on August 2, 2010 at 2:30 pm
        Reply

        huh, I lucked out for a change?? Amazing!!
        Apparently VLC keeps this info through version updates, but I didn’t see this message after a fresh OS install about 8 weeks ago, & a new VLC.

  3. myo said on August 1, 2010 at 5:52 pm
    Reply

    yes, yes, i have the same problem. sometimes, VLC crashes when it is playing .mov file.

  4. Kishore said on August 13, 2010 at 2:55 pm
    Reply

    Error:
    Buidling font Cache pop-up

    Solution:

    Open VLC player.

    On Menu Bar:

    Tools
    Preferences

    (at bottom – left side)
    Show settings — ALL

    Open: Video
    Click: Subtitles/OSD (This is now highlited, not opened)
    Text rendering module – change this to “Dummy font renderer function”

    Save
    Exit

    Re-open – done.
    Progam will no longer look outside self for fonts

    Source – WorthyTricks.co.cc

    1. Martin said on August 13, 2010 at 3:10 pm
      Reply

      Great tip, thanks a lot Kishore.

  5. javier said on August 14, 2010 at 1:50 pm
    Reply

    @Kishore, I’ll try your tips, but does this mean it will no longer show subtitles either?
    I do use subtitles, but the fontcache dialog box pops up (almost) everytime I play a file.

    Could this be related to the fonts I have installed? Or if I add/remove fonts to my system?

    I’ll try to do a fresh install also, if your tips does no work. I’ll post back here later…

    /thanks
    /j

  6. Kishore said on August 15, 2010 at 12:38 pm
    Reply

    @ Javier, The trick i posted will show up subtitles too. If not,

  7. Kishore said on August 15, 2010 at 12:39 pm
    Reply

    @ Javier, The trick i posted will show up subtitles too. If not,Dont worry, VLC is currently sorting out this issue and the next version will be out soon.

    No probs @ Martin !! Its my pleasure

  8. Ted said on October 22, 2010 at 3:57 am
    Reply

    Try running LC with administrator privileges. That seemed to fix it for me

  9. Evan said on December 8, 2013 at 1:48 am
    Reply

    I am using SMplayer 0.8.6 (64-bit) (Portable Edition) on Windows 7 x64. Even with the -nofontconfig parameter in place SMplayer still scans the fonts. Also, I have enabled normal subtitles and it is still scanning fonts before playing a video. Also, it does this every time the player opens a video after a system restart (only the fist video played).

  10. Mike Williams said on September 6, 2023 at 1:26 pm
    Reply

    Does that mean that only instrumental versions of songs will be available for non-paying users?

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