On 25 Sep 2004, at 23:45, Gerard Meijssen wrote:
<snip interesting ogg-related stuff>
Gerard --
Apologies in case I'm not telling you anything new.
IMHO the story of the .ogg sound format qualifies as a classical Greek
tragedy.
Maybe it will get better in the future, but at present it's best
described as [[snafu]].
The .ogg sound format was a very noble attempt -- driven by the desire
to create an entirely free, high performance audio codec.
(MP3 by comparison is not at all free as there are patents/license fees
to the Fraunhofer institute involved.)
The problem is that many months and years on, about all mainstream
audio players still don't friggin support .ogg -- so well over 90% of
desktop users don't do .ogg, don't know .ogg and can't be 4rsed to
learn about .ogg.
The situation may improve as there is a plugin available (not installed
by default) that can make QuickTime play .ogg and Real have started to
embrace .ogg.
Also, it's possible that the main codec pushers locking horns over
Real, WMA and AAC coupled with the public's distaste for getting DRM
LindaLovelaced on them may help .ogg adoption.
But let's face it: it doesn't look too good so far and -- call me a
gutless turncoat if you must -- I'll switch over to ogg when there is
actual music available in it. Try googling for an ogg file. See what I
mean? You'd likely find that you have to use a P2P program (which many
users don't even know much about and are scared away from using thanks
to RIAA FUD) to actually *FIND* ogg files on the 'Net.
For these above reasons, I say IF we keep insisting on "ogg only" (and
I really doubt that that's a good idea), again IF we insist on "ogg
only", then AT LEAST we should make it VERY clear and painfully obvious
to our users how to get these bleedin ogg thingies to play:
SHORT, SIMPLE and SUFFICIENT links and help pages, w/ a link to only
ONE player per platform -- the most user friendly one.
(cf. Buridan's ass:
http://www.cenius.net/refer/display.php?ArticleID=buridansass (yeah, I
should have improved our WP article, which is shite, but I could not be
4rsed (no pun intended)))
(NB: People are becoming less and less ready to install a plugin "just
for one website". Sometimes not even ABLE to install, as w/ desktop
lockdowns in a corporate environment.)
Then again, as we're not actually in the business of writing audio
encoding software, we might just as well put up with reality and allow
mp3 uploads.
-- ropers [[en:User:Ropers]]
www.ropersonline.com