What It Is

WebM is a new video format which uses the open source Ogg Vorbis audio codec, and the VP8 video codec recently acquired by google which it has made open source.

The Haters Deterents

Who would like to stop the use of Web M (or at least make sure it’s not so free) ?  Most likely the 26 companies contributing to the patent pool for H.264 which is the primary video format for the iPod and a number of other software and consumer electronics. Some of the companies which make up this pool are Microsoft, LG Electronics, Panasonic, Philips Electronics, Samsung, Sharp, Sony, Toshiba, and Apple (news.cnet.com 2010).

Supporters / Software Developers

Some supporters of the WebM project include Mozilla, Opera, Adobe, and Google of course, click here for an official list. Google released the specs for the new video format very recently so most of the software which supports WebM is still in the development / testing phase.

Viewing

• Chromium nightly builds
• Firefox Nightly Builds
• Opera Labs
• VLC Media Player 1.1.0 Pre Release Candidate

Encoding / Transcoding