HTML 5

I was looking at the presentation from Google on the HTML5 Rocks site. I found that the demo works for the most part on Firefox. I imagine that the presentation works better on Chrome, but I am not really interested in installing it. I went to the Microsoft site for HTML 5. It has a lot more quirks in it on Firefox.

It is really horrible that we are on the cusp of changing to HTML 5, and I am seeing the same issues that erupted during the browser wars of the 1990s. I am glad that Google has released the free video encoding codec WebM. It is a nice gesture on the part of Google. I only hope the rest of the vendors like Microsoft promote open codecs. It is not likely.

I am bothered that the HTML 5 Working Group at W3C considered putting a requirement for video codecs in the specification for which there was no freely available software. It is a fine demonstration of the the power of influence over standards bodies.  The W3C should work to keep the Internet free.