As I predicted and many observers had hoped, Google has released their newly acquired VP8 video codec into the open source wild. To be quite honest, it happened sooner that I expected, and Apple H.264 developers have already chimed in to call the VP8 codec “a mess”. But biased commentary aside, this morning, I downloaded the Chromium daily development release, which now has the VP8 codec installed.

When I installed it, I was not sure where I would even be able to find videos using it, but Google really does not waste any time. YouTube already has HTML5 videos encoded with VP8, and they run flawlessly. The video quality seems good and runs well in HD, without the high CPU load that usually accompanies Adobe Flash.

Yesterday, Google announced the release of their codec, along with plans to use Ogg Vorbis for audio encoding, and a new video format container based on Matroska. Collectively, this will be referred to as WebM. This could very well be the deciding factor in the HTML5 browser wars that we have been covering. Website owners and server administrators who want to give WebM a spin can find links to encoding software options on the WebM website.

Source: Webpronews.com

Continue reading: Google Pleases the Masses

Apple won an important victory with the WIPO this week after it was given control of the name itunes.com.mx. I’m sure Cupertino lost quite a bit Mexican traffic to this domain and owning it will help it protect the Apple brand. The company is also the first multinational corporation to fight for a .mx name.

In addition, world-famous Gucci won the domain gucciwell.com at the WIPO. The company claimed the name violated its trademark and was being used to sell competing products. The registrant denied this, but sent his response one day past the deadline. Protecting domain rights is especially important for companies like Gucci because trademarked domains can be used to dupe customers into buying counterfeit merchandise.

Photo | Flickr

Continue reading: Apple, Gucci win domain disputes

For the past year, we have been following the development of the HTML 5 standard, particularly as it relates to streaming video, an issue of importance for both web hosting providers and their clients. There are some new developments that may change the situation for the better.

Originally, HTML 5 video was supposed to support an open standard, such as Ogg Theora. Mozilla, Opera, and others were in favor of the standardization and began to support it. Apple and Google felt that the Theora codec was not mature enough and did not match the quality of H.264, a proprietary and patented codec. Mozilla, being a provider of a free and open source browser (Firefox), could not legally (or perhaps even ethically) support H.264, while Apple (in Safari) chose to only support it, and Google (in Chrome) supported both.

Not long ago, Google acquired On2 Technologies, the company that originally released the Theora format into the free software community. I speculated that it would be great if Google used On2 to improve Theora or create a new superior open format. Now it seems that Google is going to do just that, and Mozilla will support the new open codec.

Continue reading: The Latest in the HTML 5 Saga

Just as we predicted, Microsoft has announced that their latest incarnation of Internet Explorer, version 9, will included support for some HTML 5 elements, including video. Much to the chagrin of Mozilla and other open standard advocates, however, the new demo build of the browser only supports h.264 video, following Google and Apple’s insistence on avoiding the open Theora codec.

Among the other improvements are support for scalable vector graphics (SVG), CSS3, and built-in hardware acceleration. It is not clear if Theora support will be added (Google Chrome supports both h.264 and Theora). Microsoft joins the list of browser makers that includes Mozilla (Firefox), Apple (Safari), Google (Chrome), and Opera.

For years, Microsoft neglected web standards and increasing security problems with their Internet Explorer 6 browser. The emergence of Firefox and other competitive browsers has encouraged the software giant to slowly adapt and reignite IE development. Nevertheless, up until now, Microsoft had resisted HTML 5 adoption, but with Google pushing it on YouTube and other sites like Vimeo following suit, they could not ignore it.

Continue reading: Microsoft says IE9 will support HTML5

Just days after we posted news about Google’s acquisitions that position it to make a large impact on HTML 5 video development, suspicion is floating around the tech world that Microsoft is planning a big announcement for Internet Explorer 9, the next installment of their declining browser.

If Microsoft intends to keep their commanding share of the browser market, they will need to continue to adapt to web standards. At their MIX 2010 developer conference in Las Vegas, experts predict that Microsoft will unveil a new IE version that takes into account HTML 5 elements, including support for vector graphics like SVG.

Even with IE 8, the current version, Internet Explorer is still far behind competitors like Mozilla Firefox, Google Chrome, Apple Safari, and Opera. If ever there were a time for Microsoft to make a game-changing play, that time is now.

Source: Webmonkey

Continue reading: Microsoft may soon step up its HTML 5 game

Website owners should always be concerned about the latest news and developments with the web browser wars and Web standards. Decisions made by these third parties can directly affect how your website is presented to your viewers and whether you need to make adjustments.

Our original post centered around Apple and Google’s unwillingness to adopt the open Theora format, citing its inferior performance quality to the proprietary and patent-laced H.264. This is still the case with both Apple and Google producing browsers that support the video tag from HTML 5 but do not support Theora. Youtube has added support for it, but it does not work in Mozilla Firefox, which, as an open source browser, cannot distribute H.264 technology.

It seems dismal, and Microsoft has still added little to the discussion, although they have at least joined it. All of this, however, might be about to take an unusual turn for the better. The Theora format was created by On2 Technologies and then released as open source later. On 17th of February, their stockholders approved a merger with Google and possibly future development on open video formats. This could be good for all parties in the end.

Source: On2 Technologies

Continue reading: The HTML 5 video debate revisted

Ever since Steve Jobs announced the iPad some time ago, the new product has received its fair share of hype and heat. A colocation company has taken things to a new level, however, with the launch of iPadcolo.net.

The site advertises iPad colocation with 64 GB of storage in a world-class data center. According to the FAQ page, the iPads all run from Wi-Fi and are clustered together onto racks. Each iPad is allowed to fully charge and then unplugged until the battery requires recharging. Worried about multitasking? The company advertises the ability to remotely start and stop services, which must be run one at a time.

By now you’ve probably caught on that this isn’t real. The site is actually part of a marketing campaign for a colocation provider specializing in the OS X operating system. Pretty cool, huh?

Photo | Flickr

Continue reading: Colocate an iPad?

Picture this. You’re on the go, traveling, working, going on a date, or even just taking a nap, and you suddenly start getting phone calls. Little do you know that those phone calls are from angry customers or your boss. The server went down two hours ago, but you had no idea what was going on.

Many of us in the IT industry, particularly server administrators, have experienced a scenario like this one. It could be something small. Maybe Apache just needs a restart, but instead of it being a small issue, your stakeholders blow it out of proportion. Rather than getting upset with them and possibly losing your job, why not put your iPhone to use?

Root Internet, an Internet service company, offers an iPhone server monitoring tool. It pings HTTP, HTTPS, FTP, SSH, SMTP, DNS, POP3, IMAP, MySQL, and custom TCP/IP services that you specify. When your server experiences trouble, you will receive a notification on your iPhone, through email, and even a text message. Now you can rest easy and enjoy your vacation time - that is until the next disaster strikes.

Source: Apple.com
Photo: Flickr

Continue reading: Monitoring your server from your iPhone

In a previous post, we learned about two streaming media servers, one proprietary (Shoutcast) and one open source (Icecast). But there are other free and open source media servers, and one worth noting is Darwin Streaming Server (DSS), which is based on Apple’s Quicktime Streaming Server (QTSS).

DSS supports RTP and RTSP streaming protocols and will stream both audio and video. It runs as a background service on your Mac OS X Server or Linux server and includes a convenient web-based control panel. You can create playlists, start and stop media, and configure ports for media distribution.

“Both DSS and QTSS are built on a core server that provides state of the art quality of service features with Skip protection and Instant-On, and support for the latest digital media standards, MPEG-4 and 3GPP.

Darwin Streaming Server is available as a free download under the Apple Public Source License.”

Source: Mac OS forge
Photo: Hexley.com

Continue reading: Apple's open source streaming server

Despite working for years to design its iPad tablet, Apple failed to register any domains related to the new product. It doesn’t own iPad.net, iPad.eu, iPad.de, or even iPad.com. What was the Cupertino company, which has filed trademark-related disputes over numerous domains in the past, thinking?

Without owning at least the .com, Apple is losing quite a bit of traffic. Hundreds of thousands of people typed “ipad.com” into their browsers yesterday, but none of them reached an Apple-owned site. The firm no doubt lost quite a bit of traffic.

Interestingly, Apple owns .coms for most of its products, but not all. Other names it doesn’t own include MacBook.com and iBook.com. Maybe Apple didn’t register the domain to keep its product name secret? Or maybe Apple doesn’t see any value in domains now?

Source | Washington Post
Photo | Flickr

Continue reading: Apple misses out on iPad domains

According to Michael Robertson, a digital music expert, iTunes will soon have a feature that allows users to back up all their music to the cloud:

An upcoming major revision of iTunes will copy each user’s catalog to the net making it available from any browser or net connected ipod/touch/tablet

Such a feature would no doubt be very useful to consumers. The ability to access your music anywhere at any time and always have a backup in place will help keep iTunes ahead of the pack. But maintaining a facility large enough to handle all this data is a modern miracle itself.

As it turns out, the Apple data center currently under construction in North Carolina we covered last year will be used to power the iTunes cloud. Once completed, it will be one of the largest in the world– five times the size of its current data center.

Photo | Flickr

Continue reading: Apple to bring cloud computing to iTunes

Last week, Apple won a domain dispute in which it accused a Los Angeles entrepreneur, Daniel Bijan, of cybersquatting. Bijan lost 16 domains to the company famous for its iPhone and iPod products. Now he has issued a public statement regarding the incident.

The domainer says he was “naive at the time” he registered the first of the 16 domains, MacbookPro.com. He states he never received any legal notices from Apple and because of this, assumed he was in the clear. Bijan claims he set up affiliate sites that redirected users to sites selling Apple products and never promoted competitors. Apple’s complaint to ICANN states otherwise.

Continue reading: Alleged cybersquatter defends actions