Google has said today that it has converted 80 percent of all YouTube videos into the open-source WebM video format, while at the same time working with manufacturers to add more hardware support for the codec.
WebM is H.264’s largest rival in the video format world.
Product Manager John Luther noted that Google has been diligent in developments over the past months, but there is still a long road ahead for WebM.
For now, WebM is not widely supported, but it will be in Firefox 4, Opera 10.5+ and Chrome 6.
You can view the videos via Safari or Internet Explorer using third-party additions.
Google added that the first hardware chips with native WebM support will hit in the Q1 2011.
Result for: hardware chip
According to Atari founder Nolan Bushnell, PC game piracy will be a thing of the past thanks to new stealth encryption chips embedded in your computers.
“There is a stealth encryption chip called a TPM that is going on the motherboards of most of the computers that are coming out now,” he added.
“What that says is that in the games business we will be able to encrypt with an absolutely verifiable private key in the encryption world - which is uncrackable by people on the internet and by giving away passwords - which will allow for a huge market to develop in some of the areas where piracy has been a real problem.”
Bushnell did note however that movie and music piracy can not be stopped. “If you can watch it and you can hear it, you can copy it.”
“Games are a different thing, because games are so integrated with the code. The TPM will, in fact, absolutely stop piracy of gameplay.
“As soon as the installed base of the TPM hardware chip gets large enough, we will start to see revenues coming from Asia and India at a time when before it didn’t make sense.”
