Mozilla execs capitulate in H.264 Web-video war

From CNET News.com: High-ranking Mozilla staff, believing they've lost a fight to keep patent-encumbered technology off the Web, have concluded it's time to change course and support H.264 video technology.

The H.264, a "codec" to encode and decode video for more efficient storage and streaming, is widely used in everything from video cameras to mobile-phone processors. However, it's encumbered by patent royalty payments that go against Mozilla's goal of fostering an open Web.

The patent issue led Mozilla to strongly endorse Google's alternative VP8 codec that's part of its royalty-free WebM project. But WebM just isn't catching on, and Google hasn't fulfilled a promise to remove H.264 support from Chrome to try to promote WebM, so Mozilla Chief Technology Officer Brendan Eich and others responsible for Firefox have reluctantly endorsed a change of plans.

"The pressure to promote WebM was needed from a bigger player than Mozilla, and it was needed a year ago," Eich said in a long mailing-list discussion. "It might not have worked then, even with Google on-side. Now, with just Mozilla going it alone, all we do is kill our mobile initiatives in order to appear pure...That does not serve our mission or users."

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