YouTube now in H.246

[Eugene]

"YouTube now encodes their videos in the advanced H.264 format, and iPhone will be the first mobile device to play YouTube content encoded in the format."
Source: Apple website

[PaulClements]

The fact that most of the stuff is shot with little regard for quality in the first place makes it less of a big deal :)

Still at least they're making it better for filmmakers.

[Clint Johnson]

Now if they will just give us some parameters and let us encode our own videos then we will be golden. As it is they had a very heavy hand with their encoding to Flash and I can't see them being any better for H.264. The lion's share of their target audience doesn't really mind crappy sub-standard definition video that is crushed way past the point of artifacts showing up.

I tried submitting videos encoded cleanly to Flash - they re-encoded them to a muddled mess of blocked up noise and I expect them to do the very same thing with this codec... unless we are willing to pony up some cash maybe? Google has to find some form of revenue generation to stem the millions of dollars hemorrhaging out of Youtube.

[Michael Schrengohst]

Google can afford it. The real deal with YouTube is not the crappy
videos that Joe video sends in. They are laying the groundwork to
become the next "network". Apple and YouTube are getting
buddy and buddy and that is why they are dumping Flash.

[Tom Lowe]

So if we re-upload our vids, they will be encoded with higher quality? Has the bandwidth changed? Screen size?

[Clint Johnson]

Apple has talked about this being an opportunity to get better and higher resolution for videos they vet for their playback devices... but that doesn't mean it extends to us plebes. A guy can hope though.

Youtube is saying that they will have re-encoded every one of the already posted videos by this fall so you can just wait and let it happen or force their hand by re-uploading it next month- I'm pretty sure they aren't doing it for all new videos quite yet.

[Tom Lowe]

So does youtube keep a pristine file of the uploaded vids for archive? that would be cool if they just automatically re-encoded all the vids already up there.

[Clint Johnson]

Youtube is talking about re-encoding the ones already on their site, that would lead me to believe the backups they keep are the original file with an encoding/recovery process in case of data loss. They will have to create a new process for replacing rather than recovery... but of course that is just conjecture on my part.

If I were building a video service, I'd keep all the videos in the exact state that they were uploaded. I would have a fast set of video servers with a monster sized cache that would keep the few high demand clips in their encoded state while the vast majority, that only get a request every few days, would be encoded on demand. This would allow me to switch codecs on the fly or even set up alternative servers for multiple codec delivery.

[Tom Lowe]

That's one awesome thing about Divx's Stage 6 (http://stage6.divx.com/) site. You encode to DIVX, then upload the file. It plays at the full res on their site, just like youtube, but fives times better quality. Not only that, but people can download the full DIVX file you uploaded, unaltered, direct from Stage 6's blazing-fast servers.

[Mark L. Pederson]

I'd suspect this is a behind-the-scenes Apple / Google deal - (which I think is great if that's the case) - maybe we'll see Google Gears in DOT MAC ...? Google has got some cool web based goodies that would fit nice in Leopard ...

http://code.google.com/apis/gears/?utm_campaign=en&utm_source=en-ha-ww-google&utm_medium=ha&utm_term=google%20gears

[Eugene]

Nokia has a phone, N95, that will play the new H.264ed YouTube clips as well.
http://jkontherun.blogs.com/.shared/image.html?/photos/uncategorized/nokia_n95.jpg

Is DIVIX just for PCs? I have a Mac.

[Jeremy Hughes]

I can't wait for YouTube in 2540p.

[pat@hpnc.com]

Just skip youtube and use the DIVX Stage6 site. It has MUCH better video and generaly better content.