It is of absolute importance for major projects to push for free formats,
and to avoid hosting encumbered formats -- even while supporting
compatibility to improve access and usability. This is one of the
more effective ways to change the format universe.
We can do more than be firm about a commitment to open formats, we can
make some noise about it. The Xiph Foundation is still around, though
its members are rather busy; some sort of regular announcement -- for
instance, as part of the announcements of where the free format
communities and projects are heading in the next year -- would be welcome
by everyone.
A good place to start, regardless of larger partnership, would be helping
the Archive identify and implement a fast transcoder. They would do that
in a heartbeat.
SJ, looking at some ogg-encoded language learning materials
On Sat, 21 Jul 2007, Gregory Maxwell wrote:
On 7/21/07, Tim Starling
<tstarling(a)wikimedia.org> wrote:
[snip]
I too want to have content that you can freely
reuse, and that can be
edited with free tools. But I want to support popular non-free client
systems as well, to improve access for readers.
Just to correct a piece of misunderstanding some may have after
reading the above:
The free formats we use are not copylefted. They are not fundamentally
incompatible with non-free software.
The reference implementations are BSDish licensed. They are available
for use in closed software, and are widely used in closed source
software.
Microsoft ships Ogg support embedded in many games for their internal audio.
Opera is closed software, and the upcoming version will have
Ogg/Theora support. Ogg/Theora for video support is now part of the
standing WHATWG HTML5 standard specification.
All in browser web video playback today requires some sort of software
install on typical non-free desktop systems. For some sites it is
flash, others Java, and others require other types of plugins or
players. Flash penetration is somewhat higher than Java, the magnitude
of which depends on the type of audience you service. (All three of
the financial services sites I use require Java for something, as does
some VPN software I use... So while Java is in decline for webtoys it
still dominates web tools for professionals)
The player we have today works for a significant majority of the
people who try it.
You certainly can't argue that the use of Ogg/Theora excludes non-free software.
Two years ago you could have argued that the use of only free formats
was significantly hurting access by readers. Today that argument is
much harder to support. Within a year as nave support goes into
released versions FireFox and Opera that argument will be far harder
still.
Wikimedia's exclusive support of unencumbered formats has had a
material impact in their general viability. To concede on this after
so much progress, when the benefits of doing so are the least they
have ever been would be foolish.