[zambelli]

First of all, to anyone interested in the "behind the scenes" history of WMV9 and VC-1 development, I recommend you read this AmirM's post on AVSForum: http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showt...&&#post9931723

Also, in the interest of full disclosure, I will remind everybody that I do in fact work for Microsoft as an engineer in its video codec group.

@Puzzler:
You seem like a smart guy who can make valid arguments so I'm finding it really puzzling that you insist on using that ridiculous "M$" acronym in your references to Microsoft. I hate to nitpick but it really makes it hard to take your arguments as unbiased. It gives the whole thing a bit of a playground namecalling flavor.

Originally Posted by Bond

in the vc1 case they have been forced by the dvd/bluray bodies to make the prior closed vc1 "standard" an open standard, harming microsoft's tactic of exlcuding competitors but still being better than being not included in hddvd/bluray

This wasn't exactly a surprise to Microsoft or a challenge to its business model. It's a fact of the media and consumer electronics industry that a technology such as a codec needs to be adopted and governed by an industry organization. Microsoft is certainly not the first company ever to take its proprietary technology and open it up to standardization. Dolby Digital and DTS Coherent Acoustics both came from commercial companies, yet they also both exist as standards adopted by ATSC and ETSI, for example. In fact, let's not forget that even the ubiquitous MPEG-1 Layer 3 format was developed based on patents by Fraunhofer IIS, Thomson, Alcatel-Lucent and others.

Originally Posted by Puzzler

My beef is the fact that they went ahead and led a party to create a completely different, and inferior, standard. There is no excuse for this other than their greedy desire for control, and by unfairly using their position with their O/S to give us all the impression that VC-1 is "THE" standard.

Control of what? It's already been established here that Microsoft has little more to gain financially by supporting VC-1 than it does by supporting H.264. It doesn't own VC-1 standardization nor licensing. Microsoft's chief investment into VC-1 right now is into its encoder implementation.

Originally Posted by PuzZLeR

And to furthermore force it down our throats packaged with Windows, purposely EXCLUDING H.264 with the excuse, and insult, that it may be unsafe and one of the "too many codecs out there". This will certainly cause alot of friction.

You're speculating, or at the very least misintepreting Ben's words. H.264 supports wasn't purposely excluded from Windows because the codec is unsafe. Nobody ever said that and it's certainly not true. In fact, I would like to point out that an H.264 decoder - as well as a number of other "industry standard" decoders such as MPEG-2, AAC and AC3 - has been made by Microsoft and has thus far been bundled with the Zune Player, Xbox 360 Dashboard and Xbox 360 HD-DVD unit. The fact that it hasn't yet made it into a standard Windows release has been more a result of tight schedules and strict release guidelines than of some conspiracy plot to thwart H.264 adoption. Vista DXVA 2.0 API, for example, natively supports H.264 decoding HW acceleration. Future releases of Windows are pretty much guaranteed to have some form of H.264 decoder included (though whether simple DirectShow playback of MP4 files will be supported remains at the mercy of the mighty Vista planners whose decisions often baffle even us MS codec folks ).

Originally Posted by PuzZLeR

And let me remind you that the Zune is NOT an attempt to compete with Apple and its iPod as the traditionalists might think. The Zune emphasis is a means to win more exposure for VC-1. This is a desperate attempt by M$ because VC-1 is getting beaten convincingly. When the iPod pounds Zune, this will set VC-1 further back, where it belongs.

And let me remind you that you are now recklessly speculating. I hate to be blunt, but that's a pretty ridiculous statement - which once again doesn't do any favors to your many other valid arguments presented thus far. Do you seriously think Microsoft would've put all its money and resources into producing the Zune only so it could secure support for a codec standard it doesn't own in a market of limited product penetration (just compare the number of portable media player owners to the number of people who own cell phones or PCs)?

Originally Posted by PuzZLeR

What concerns me most about VC-1 is not that it will beat H.264. It won't. The real nuisance is in the fact that it will not die for a long time. M$ will not let it go and will keep irritating us over and over again, constantly poking at the industry and the dream of fluid compatibility.

Right, because if H.264 wins, surely nobody will ever come up with a competing codec solution ever again and everyone will live happily ever after in digital peace and harmony.
Sorry, but in my opinion having multiple codec standards benefits the consumer by urging the codec implementers to continually keep improving their quality and efficiency. There's certainly room in the world for VC-1 AND H.264, just like there's room for Dolby Digital and DTS, MP3 and AAC, ZIP and RAR, etc, etc, etc.

Originally Posted by Tack

I wonder why Windows doesn't support Ogg Vorbis out of the box? Are the licensing costs too high, perhaps?

No, but the cost to plan, develop, test and support Ogg Vorbis might be. Technology resources might be free, but human resources aren't. And for what? To cover the <1% of user playback scenarios? Sorry. Asking for MP4 and MPEG-4 SP/ASP/AVC support in Windows is a perfectly valid request given the amount of content available and ease of access to it. But Ogg Vorbis? Yeah, not so much.

FWIW, the reason Microsoft removed all 3rd party codecs from its WMP codec download server (back in the old days Indeo, ACELP.net, Voxware, and a bunch of other now obscure codecs were hosted online) was because it couldn't vouch for the security of components whose source code it didn't own. This wasn't entirely without merit - codecs such as Voxware were notorious for having memory leaks and bugs which their parent company never bothered to fix. I'm not saying it was a decision which benefited WMP users, but it certainly wasn't entirely unwarranted.

Originally Posted by Shapierian

Even just with illegitimate usage only, MPEG-4 was not a flop. It is the MP3 of video.

Originally Posted by benwaggoner

Except that it isn't being used significantly my major content producers. .mp4 mainly gets used for user generated content, not commercial publishing, and most of that .mp4 is H.264.

Well, I think you both have a point. MPEG-4 SP and ASP have certainly made a significant impact in online video delivery, but compared to MPEG-2, it certainly hasn't had the same impact in the professional video market. MPEG-2 is still the de facto standard for digital broadcasting, archiving, digital tape storage, etc.