Camen Design Forum

YouTube and HTML5 Video

append delete JJ

If you notice in the HTML5 beta on YouTube, they will only choose to play the video with HTML5 over Flash if the video doesn't need to contain ads (which is almost no videos anymore).

This makes me wonder, how are they going to go about sneaking ads and commercials into videos after the complete migration to HTML5 video? This sounds like it will be counterproductive for everyone. YouTube will be reluctant to completely switch to HTML5 because they can't slap ads in your face. And because they are *the* video website on the internet, they basically control how videos on the web are used, everyone else will follow suit.

This makes me actually hope that there is a way to stick ads in html5 videos, sadly. Otherwise, the migration to html5 video might take even longer.

I don't have much actual experience with the <video> element or the DOM behind it. Is there a way to actually stick ads at the beginning, middle, or end of a video?

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append delete #1. Kroc

The problem is multi-faceted.

Firstly, Google would not spend $120M on On2 and open source the VP8 codec unless it had intentions to fully use it. HTML5 video doesn't yet provide the full range of features that Flash offers for streaming video (like automatic rate control and DRM). Google will probably address those limitations over time via instant updates to Google Chrome.

Advertising using HTML5 would require a large amount of retooling, which is why I don't think we've seen anything on this front yet. They will likely push out something once it's fully complete since it's for advertising partners, rather than consumers.

Inserting video ads would be quite easy, they could modify their server stream processor to simply inject an advert into the WebM stream; therefore the advert would play as if it were part of the original video. This couldn't be blocked at all then, because there would be no client side file switch. If they just switched the video file about using JavaScript on the client, then advert blocker would just neuter the ad script (as they already do), so doing ads serverside is the best option.

Time, it just needs time. Google have a long plan with WebM and all the parts are not yet in place to switch wholesale.

append delete #2. JJ

That was what I considered as a possibility: Just using javascript to start playing an entirely new video in the midst of the currently playing one. I didn't consider the serverside option.

I hope it all works out. I was just worried this would hinder the migration to html5 video.

append delete #3. adecelle

I'm working on an HTML5/JS video project, so was pretty excited when Vimeo / YT / etc started up their HTML5 betas & promised a way to embed these videos rather than the flash versions. Turns out that their solution wasn't to give us what I think of when I think of <video>, i.e. links with .mp4, .ogg, or even .H24 extensions... but just plain id's & <frame>.

I'm new at designing & programing, but it sounds like <frame> has been around for a long time, it's outdated, & it keeps the control with the video hosting companies. It is *not* a way that promotes people being (particularly) creative with media.

So I've turned to Amazon simple storage for commercial work, and am looking for an open source video storing/sharing site to use when building copyright free multimedia works.

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