Mozilla Rejects WebP Image Format, Google Adds It 262
icebraining writes with a link to Ars Technica's look at the recent rejection of WebP by Mozilla Developer Joe Drew."Building mainstream support for a new media format is challenging, especially when the advantages are ambiguous. WebM was attractive to some browser vendors because its royalty-free license arguably solved a real-world problem. According to critics, the advantages of WebP are illusory and don't offer sufficient advantages over JPEG to justify adoption of the new format. (...) 'As the WebP image format exists currently, I won't accept a patch for it. If and when that changes, I'll happily re-evaluate my decision!' wrote Mozilla developer Joe Drew in a Bugzilla comment.'" However, as the article explains, Google sees enough value in WebP to add it as a supported image format for Picasa.
Re:Why NOT? (Score:5, Informative)
Quote: "Adopting a new image format in Web browsers is a big decision. Once a format becomes a part of the Web, it will have to be supported in perpetuityâ"adding overhead to the browserâ"even if it largely fizzles and only gains a small niche following."
It's akin to if Web browsers were required to support failed formats like ANIM or HAM or IFF. In other words adding support for WebM wastes space in the program (and computer memory).
And I'm probably going to get modded -1 for comparing WebM to "failed formats" like HAM, but I think it's pretty obvious that WebM is destined for the same place as VESA and HD-VHS landed. Nice idea..... not adopted by the general public.
Seems Solid (Score:5, Informative)
Currently, it only supports a subset of the features that JPEG has. It lacks support for any color representation other than 4:2:0 YCrCb. JPEG supports 4:4:4 as well as other color representations like CMYK. WebP also seems to lack support for EXIF data and ICC color profiles, both of which have be come quite important for photography. Further, it has yet to include any features missing from JPEG like alpha channel support.
[...]
Every image format that becomes “part of the Web platform” exacts a cost for all time: all clients have to support that format forever, and there's also a cost for authors having to choose which format is best for them. This cost is no less for WebP than any other format because progressive decoding requires using a separate library instead of reusing the existing WebM decoder. This gives additional security risk but also eliminates much of the benefit of having bitstream compatibility with WebM. It makes me wonder, why not just change the bitstream so that it's more suitable for a still image codec?
WebP, by Jeff Muizelaar [blogspot.com].
alpha transparency (Score:3, Informative)
If webp supported alpha transparency it would be useful. png is a lossless format and therefore much bulkier. A png is normally 5 times bigger than jpg image. But jpg doesn't support transparency
Re:That's dumb. (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Why? (Score:5, Informative)
Why do we need yet another image format?
If a new format 1. has an alpha channel, 2. has demonstrably better SSIM than JPEG, and 3. preserves Exif and ICC metadata, then it's superior to JPEG. In theory, WebP should have demonstrably because it's based on VP8 keyframes, while JPEG uses much the same technique as MPEG-1 keyframes. But it lacks an alpha channel, and it lacks Exif and ICC.
Re:"Advantages over JPEG" (Score:4, Informative)
PNG is lossless
More specifically it's a lossless representation of a single layer RGB image.
better for photos then JPEG.
For display of photos on the web the huge filesize advantages of JPEG outweigh the minor reduction in quality.
Re:Why? (Score:2, Informative)
JPEG uses much the same technique as MPEG-1 keyframes. But it lacks an alpha channel, and it lacks Exif and ICC.
JPEG supports a plethora of metadata including Exif, IPTC, XMP and according to Wikipedia [wikipedia.org] also supports ICC.
Re:Interesting... (Score:5, Informative)
Your history is backwards:
The iPod first launched on October 23, 2001, and it played MP3s just fine at that time.
The iTunes Music Store opened on April 28, 2003. Prior to this, Apple didn't sell content for the devices.
Apple never "caved," they simply built an MP3 player which happened to be successful. Later on, they started selling content for it (in the arguably more space-efficient AAC format).