IE9 HTML5 Video Will Be H264 Only

“I am almost flabbergasted by the spin and blunt-face upon which
this news is delivered. We were just discussing the pot calling the
kettle black with Apple / Adobe and now Microsoft have also come
out in favour of a closed video format for an open web–IE9’s HTML5
video support will allow H264 only. Update Now that the initial
shock is over, I’ve rewritten the article to actually represent
news rather than something on Twitter.

“With IE9 Microsoft have initiated a drive to bring IE into the
21st Century and even in some places outdo their competitors,
following years and IE stagnation and lackluster updates compared
to features available in all other major browsers. Notably
important is fast SVG, a new JavaScript engine to rival the other
JIT engines in other browsers and importantly, HTML5 support.

“HTML5’s features are rather broad so whilst no word on HTML5
Canvas has been mentioned yet, Microsoft did commit to HTML5 Audio
and Video which were demonstrated at their developer’s conference
MIX10. A preview release of the new rendering engine was made
available, but this release was not the same build as demoed at MIX
and didn’t include HTML5 Audio and Video.”

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