PBS, what kind of Mac you running?

actually, it has to do with the format of the WMV files, as you well know Robert.

WM 10 has not, does not, and I dare say, barring a radical correcting of distance between cerebellum and rectum in the halls of the WM team, shall never play on a Mac, until such time as WM on windows is sufficiently advance past that so as to allow an “upgrade” to the WM ghetto the WM team makes sure non-windows/plays for sure platforms are relegated to.

Even with WM9 and earlier, most of the DRM choices will not play on a mac.

Just in case you attempt to do this, let us be clear: the reason for this is solely due to MS’s choice. There is nothing Apple has done, indeed, nothing they *can* do to prevent this. MS does not want WM on the Mac to have the same quality or capabilities on Windows, so as to force those needing to use WM to use Windows.

You can of course prove me wrong with a hard ship date for either a Microsoft or Flip4Mac - provided upgrade to WM features on the Mac that shall bring it up to FULL parity with the windows version, and a commitment to timely upgrades.

Barring that, please, don’t bother, as no one would believe that you have the standing to argue against my statements.

actually, it has to do with the format of the WMV files, as you well know Robert.

WM 10 has not, does not, and I dare say, barring a radical correcting of distance between cerebellum and rectum in the halls of the WM team, shall never play on a Mac, until such time as WM on windows is sufficiently advance past that so as to allow an “upgrade” to the WM ghetto the WM team makes sure non-windows/plays for sure platforms are relegated to.

Even with WM9 and earlier, most of the DRM choices will not play on a mac.

Just in case you attempt to do this, let us be clear: the reason for this is solely due to MS’s choice. There is nothing Apple has done, indeed, nothing they *can* do to prevent this. MS does not want WM on the Mac to have the same quality or capabilities on Windows, so as to force those needing to use WM to use Windows.

You can of course prove me wrong with a hard ship date for either a Microsoft or Flip4Mac - provided upgrade to WM features on the Mac that shall bring it up to FULL parity with the windows version, and a commitment to timely upgrades.

Barring that, please, don’t bother, as no one would believe that you have the standing to argue against my statements.

Flip4Mac sucks. I know it is free but it just does not work most times. I need to figure out how to uninstall it. I mean Windows Media 9 for Mac is decent but it messes up on the Chris Prillo show so I am left to just the podcasts.

Flip4Mac sucks. I know it is free but it just does not work most times. I need to figure out how to uninstall it. I mean Windows Media 9 for Mac is decent but it messes up on the Chris Prillo show so I am left to just the podcasts.

Scoble,

For those of us with intel macs (oh MacBook Pro, how I love thee), we absolutely cannot play WMV files. Flip4Mac is only available for PPC and hasn’t be released for x86 macs yet.

Why doesn’t everybody just use mpeg files anyway? I’ve never understood what makes WMV files, well, good.

Scoble,

For those of us with intel macs (oh MacBook Pro, how I love thee), we absolutely cannot play WMV files. Flip4Mac is only available for PPC and hasn’t be released for x86 macs yet.

Why doesn’t everybody just use mpeg files anyway? I’ve never understood what makes WMV files, well, good.

It’s not so much that it is a WMV file, but for some reason AP are requiring IE6 to even get to the file. That is, you click the link to watch the video but get a popup window with a message stating that “This product requires Microsoft© Internet Explorer 6, Microsoft© Media Player 10, and Macromedia Flash 7″. And there is no way to get to the video file itself.
So this is actually more of a ‘bad design’ problem. They are trying to ensure that I get the ‘best experience’ but are in fact denying me any experience at all.

It’s not so much that it is a WMV file, but for some reason AP are requiring IE6 to even get to the file. That is, you click the link to watch the video but get a popup window with a message stating that “This product requires Microsoft© Internet Explorer 6, Microsoft© Media Player 10, and Macromedia Flash 7″. And there is no way to get to the video file itself.
So this is actually more of a ‘bad design’ problem. They are trying to ensure that I get the ‘best experience’ but are in fact denying me any experience at all.

I’ve got a Powerbook G4, and I can watch WMVs, but it’s a pain in the ass. I have to save them to my hard disk, open Windows Media Player, and then open the saved files from Windows Media Player. None of my browsers (Safari, Firefox, IE) are able to open a WMV and play it (or launch WMP to play a WMV).

When given the choice, I watch MPG or QT on the Mac, and WMV on my PCs.

I’ve got a Powerbook G4, and I can watch WMVs, but it’s a pain in the ass. I have to save them to my hard disk, open Windows Media Player, and then open the saved files from Windows Media Player. None of my browsers (Safari, Firefox, IE) are able to open a WMV and play it (or launch WMP to play a WMV).

When given the choice, I watch MPG or QT on the Mac, and WMV on my PCs.

Larry: good point. WMVs stream better and have better infrastructure for doing that. But streaming is quickly going away now that more people have good bandwidth.

Even on our new video projects we’ll be using MPG. I’m still trying to figure out how to get off of the format on Channel 9, but there’s a streaming infrastructure issue (I have a bank of streaming servers to use for free, whereas other formats would require new infrastructure). It’s not an easy one to solve, that’s for sure.

Larry: good point. WMVs stream better and have better infrastructure for doing that. But streaming is quickly going away now that more people have good bandwidth.

Even on our new video projects we’ll be using MPG. I’m still trying to figure out how to get off of the format on Channel 9, but there’s a streaming infrastructure issue (I have a bank of streaming servers to use for free, whereas other formats would require new infrastructure). It’s not an easy one to solve, that’s for sure.

Do you know if Flip4Mac is ever going to have the ability to play DRMed WMV content?

Do you know if Flip4Mac is ever going to have the ability to play DRMed WMV content?

Beat me to it, Robert, I was going to say ‘streaming is over’ again. Actually, streaming is worse when you have bad bandwidth too - that’s when you get coughs and splutters and ‘buffering’ and so on. When you have good bandwidth, streaming only uses a bit of it, so it can still start spluttering after a file would have downloaded.
If you have bandwidth and server capacity, put up the files for download as straight http. Streaming will only save you bandwidth if people abandon watching partway through.
The only time streaming makes sense is for a live event with a backchannel (like when you and I were speaking at Northern Voice, and I had Steph and others joining in via irc).

Beat me to it, Robert, I was going to say ‘streaming is over’ again. Actually, streaming is worse when you have bad bandwidth too - that’s when you get coughs and splutters and ‘buffering’ and so on. When you have good bandwidth, streaming only uses a bit of it, so it can still start spluttering after a file would have downloaded.
If you have bandwidth and server capacity, put up the files for download as straight http. Streaming will only save you bandwidth if people abandon watching partway through.
The only time streaming makes sense is for a live event with a backchannel (like when you and I were speaking at Northern Voice, and I had Steph and others joining in via irc).

Scoble -

I am actually happy about this decision. When it comes to digital media, Mac users are very important.

If Microsoft doesn’t want its format to play on the Mac, so be it. h.264 will continue to grow in popularity at the expense of single-platform codecs.

Scoble -

I am actually happy about this decision. When it comes to digital media, Mac users are very important.

If Microsoft doesn’t want its format to play on the Mac, so be it. h.264 will continue to grow in popularity at the expense of single-platform codecs.

WMP9 for the Mac and Flip4Mac are utter embarrassments. Like, stunningly awful. Quicktime Player and iTunes for Windows aren’t perfect, but they’re like fucking prize-winning thoroughbreds compared to the garbage you’re heaping on Mac users.

I had a wide myriad of problems getting files to play. Glaser is absolutely right to point this out. WMV is the problem child of the online video formats, and I can’t wait to see it fall to superior codecs.

WMP9 for the Mac and Flip4Mac are utter embarrassments. Like, stunningly awful. Quicktime Player and iTunes for Windows aren’t perfect, but they’re like fucking prize-winning thoroughbreds compared to the garbage you’re heaping on Mac users.

I had a wide myriad of problems getting files to play. Glaser is absolutely right to point this out. WMV is the problem child of the online video formats, and I can’t wait to see it fall to superior codecs.

“This product requires Microsoft© Internet Explorer 6, Microsoft© Media Player 10, and Macromedia Flash 7″

How can a multimillion dollar company not be able to spare, like, the five minutes it takes to implement rather simple cross-compatibility?

“This product requires Microsoft© Internet Explorer 6, Microsoft© Media Player 10, and Macromedia Flash 7″

How can a multimillion dollar company not be able to spare, like, the five minutes it takes to implement rather simple cross-compatibility?

This seems more like poor coding rather than exclusion, I can easily watch WMV on my mac, I have Flash 8 [not 7 as requested by the AP], but I am using firefox not explorer and fail to get past the gatekeeper at video.ap.org

Maybe it’s not a conspiracy between Microsoft and the AP against Apple but just plain bad coding?

This seems more like poor coding rather than exclusion, I can easily watch WMV on my mac, I have Flash 8 [not 7 as requested by the AP], but I am using firefox not explorer and fail to get past the gatekeeper at video.ap.org

Maybe it’s not a conspiracy between Microsoft and the AP against Apple but just plain bad coding?

“WMVs stream better and have better infrastructure for doing that.”

Baloney, Scoble. You don’t know about mpeg or H.264 streaming. You’ve said this over and over. What you should say is: what I am aware of I know better, or if you are forced to use MS server products than it’s easy. But to claim that WM is better as an infrastructure or at streaming is absurd.

And to claim technological superiority in the same breath as mentioning that you are abandoning it? Pathetic!

Other than that, this post is absurd. You know there is a real and significant issue. Your company hasn’t upgraded WMP for Mac to support anything beyond WMV9. It never supported DRM. WMV10 has been around for, what, 2 years? It cannot be played except by a thrid party hack that is buggy at best and dangerous at worst. It is a hack that is not available for newer Macs.

And then pretending that it’s this person’s issue because some people can figure out how to get some files to play? Can’t we apply the same argument to you? We’ve asked for mpeg for over a year and your best defense has been you don’t know how.

“WMVs stream better and have better infrastructure for doing that.”

Baloney, Scoble. You don’t know about mpeg or H.264 streaming. You’ve said this over and over. What you should say is: what I am aware of I know better, or if you are forced to use MS server products than it’s easy. But to claim that WM is better as an infrastructure or at streaming is absurd.

And to claim technological superiority in the same breath as mentioning that you are abandoning it? Pathetic!

Other than that, this post is absurd. You know there is a real and significant issue. Your company hasn’t upgraded WMP for Mac to support anything beyond WMV9. It never supported DRM. WMV10 has been around for, what, 2 years? It cannot be played except by a thrid party hack that is buggy at best and dangerous at worst. It is a hack that is not available for newer Macs.

And then pretending that it’s this person’s issue because some people can figure out how to get some files to play? Can’t we apply the same argument to you? We’ve asked for mpeg for over a year and your best defense has been you don’t know how.

“And then pretending that it’s this person’s issue because some people can figure out how to get some files to play? Can’t we apply the same argument to you? We’ve asked for mpeg for over a year and your best defense has been you don’t know how.”

Not to mention several promises to get this resolved for Channel 9 RSN (Real Soon Now).

I bet the average Linux user could figure out how to hack something together to play these files before the wizards (ooops that’s a loaded term) at MS can figure out how to make an mpeg file.

Keep it up, it may be moot sooner than you think. Apple is moving into the living room while MS continues to struggle with media even in at the computer desk.

*sits back and listens to Roku (Linux based) music player grab tunes (mp3) off my Linksys NSLU2 (Linux based file server) box.* (Total system cost: $200)

“And then pretending that it’s this person’s issue because some people can figure out how to get some files to play? Can’t we apply the same argument to you? We’ve asked for mpeg for over a year and your best defense has been you don’t know how.”

Not to mention several promises to get this resolved for Channel 9 RSN (Real Soon Now).

I bet the average Linux user could figure out how to hack something together to play these files before the wizards (ooops that’s a loaded term) at MS can figure out how to make an mpeg file.

Keep it up, it may be moot sooner than you think. Apple is moving into the living room while MS continues to struggle with media even in at the computer desk.

*sits back and listens to Roku (Linux based) music player grab tunes (mp3) off my Linksys NSLU2 (Linux based file server) box.* (Total system cost: $200)

This isn’t about WMV — AP and MSN are partnering on this - it’s an “MSN Video Player” http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/press/2005/nov05/11-09APVidNetPR.mspx

This isn’t about WMV — AP and MSN are partnering on this - it’s an “MSN Video Player” http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/press/2005/nov05/11-09APVidNetPR.mspx

Ryan, you miss the point: even if we are being pointed to the specific issue of the AP created problem, there is a real, general problem with WMV. Scoble can’t bring the issue up, and then claim: well, well, I know all that is real, but I’m only tlaking about this one specific issue that involves the AP. We’ve raised this issue many times, Scoble has feigned concern, he is fully aware of it, his post points this out in a number of ways — none of us who are concerned about the larger issue really care that much about a silly IE-only glitch.

Ryan, you miss the point: even if we are being pointed to the specific issue of the AP created problem, there is a real, general problem with WMV. Scoble can’t bring the issue up, and then claim: well, well, I know all that is real, but I’m only tlaking about this one specific issue that involves the AP. We’ve raised this issue many times, Scoble has feigned concern, he is fully aware of it, his post points this out in a number of ways — none of us who are concerned about the larger issue really care that much about a silly IE-only glitch.

Scoble in the past has said Microsoft’s resources are better spent elsewhere. I say, fair enough — it will be interesting to see how WMV will do given that it barely works on the content creator’s platform of choice.

Not to mention how freaking annoying it is for the millions of Mac and Linux users out there. Microsoft is once again going to fight a battle against open, cross-platform competitors and they are going to lose.

Scoble in the past has said Microsoft’s resources are better spent elsewhere. I say, fair enough — it will be interesting to see how WMV will do given that it barely works on the content creator’s platform of choice.

Not to mention how freaking annoying it is for the millions of Mac and Linux users out there. Microsoft is once again going to fight a battle against open, cross-platform competitors and they are going to lose.

Scoble has alzheimer. He doesn’t remember we had that discussion in the past with WMV files on Channel9 and the fact that he was justifying the codecs that are used to encode the files, saying WMV9 and other codecs incompatible with old WINDOWS WMP versions (such as Windows 2000) was a good thing.

Yeah. Whatever forces you to upgrade.

Scoble has alzheimer. He doesn’t remember we had that discussion in the past with WMV files on Channel9 and the fact that he was justifying the codecs that are used to encode the files, saying WMV9 and other codecs incompatible with old WINDOWS WMP versions (such as Windows 2000) was a good thing.

Yeah. Whatever forces you to upgrade.

Mike,

Scoble’s not suffering any lapse of memory. He’s a corporate shill: It’s his JOB to pretend that flaws in Microsoft’s products are imaginary.

Railing against Scoble is pointless. Better to send messages to the owners of sites who put up Internet Exploder pages instead of web pages. If their sites don’t work with a standards-compliant browser like Safari or Firefox, it’s THEIR fault. If their video only works on the Evil Empire’s very latest media player, it’s still THEIR fault.

Mike,

Scoble’s not suffering any lapse of memory. He’s a corporate shill: It’s his JOB to pretend that flaws in Microsoft’s products are imaginary.

Railing against Scoble is pointless. Better to send messages to the owners of sites who put up Internet Exploder pages instead of web pages. If their sites don’t work with a standards-compliant browser like Safari or Firefox, it’s THEIR fault. If their video only works on the Evil Empire’s very latest media player, it’s still THEIR fault.

Mike: can you point to that discussion. I think that’s a misrepresentation of what I said.

I do say that the newer codecs are better than the older ones. That’s pretty easy to demonstrate.

J. Random: you obviously aren’t a very careful reader of this blog. I admit when we have flaws in our products. Even in this post I say it’s bad to design a site that doesn’t serve Macs. Pretty much agreeing with what you say here.

Mike: can you point to that discussion. I think that’s a misrepresentation of what I said.

I do say that the newer codecs are better than the older ones. That’s pretty easy to demonstrate.

J. Random: you obviously aren’t a very careful reader of this blog. I admit when we have flaws in our products. Even in this post I say it’s bad to design a site that doesn’t serve Macs. Pretty much agreeing with what you say here.

Hmm… I still didn’t Understood on this article, Keep reading mode on

Hmm… I still didn’t Understood on this article, Keep reading mode on

Tried the FLIP4Mac thing - it still crashes a lot. Way too much. If the content is wmv, I’ll bail on it.

Quicktime, mpg, swf, that’s it.

Tried the FLIP4Mac thing - it still crashes a lot. Way too much. If the content is wmv, I’ll bail on it.

Quicktime, mpg, swf, that’s it.

Hmm, I do have to add this in. Microsoft wants to have WMV as a standard - standard means support on all products, not just Microsoft only products. This is Mac, Linux, etc. It includes handhelds and other devices. DRM only perhaps on Windows, but for sure, the codecs SHOULD be available for other platforms, even if on a limited basis only.

Guess what codecs I can play fine on my Linux/Mac boxes? H.264, MPG, RealPlayer formats, etc. This should be fixed, and SOON, if MS wants to demonstrate that they’re actually supporting people, instead of forcing people to their will.

Hmm, I do have to add this in. Microsoft wants to have WMV as a standard - standard means support on all products, not just Microsoft only products. This is Mac, Linux, etc. It includes handhelds and other devices. DRM only perhaps on Windows, but for sure, the codecs SHOULD be available for other platforms, even if on a limited basis only.

Guess what codecs I can play fine on my Linux/Mac boxes? H.264, MPG, RealPlayer formats, etc. This should be fixed, and SOON, if MS wants to demonstrate that they’re actually supporting people, instead of forcing people to their will.

Nailing this once and for all - you look at what the pr0n sites use to serve their content. They have the biggest cash flow based on streaming and it is overwhelmingly NOT wmv.

Its mpg files.

ER uh, so I’ve heard.

Nailing this once and for all - you look at what the pr0n sites use to serve their content. They have the biggest cash flow based on streaming and it is overwhelmingly NOT wmv.

Its mpg files.

ER uh, so I’ve heard.

Robert,
I’m not running a Mac, but my wife does. Thanks for linking to my post and engaging in the debate. There was a bit of confusion up front, but the deal is that the AP launched a new video network with Microsoft doing the back end. If someone visits one of the news sites in the network, they MUST have IE and WMV, etc., in order to see the videos.

However, AP does still license video to other sites such as Yahoo that have their own open standards video player. So the choices for news sites are simple: License the video for money, or join a free network with advertising rev share but force your users to view with IE.

I’m not making this a Mac v. PC issue (or codec issue), but more of an issue with the AP and its many news org members for foisting an IE-only video plan onto much of the public. But as one commenter said on my blog, people will just hit the IE-only wall and watch the video somewhere else. Like with Reuters, which has a Flash implementation.

Robert,
I’m not running a Mac, but my wife does. Thanks for linking to my post and engaging in the debate. There was a bit of confusion up front, but the deal is that the AP launched a new video network with Microsoft doing the back end. If someone visits one of the news sites in the network, they MUST have IE and WMV, etc., in order to see the videos.

However, AP does still license video to other sites such as Yahoo that have their own open standards video player. So the choices for news sites are simple: License the video for money, or join a free network with advertising rev share but force your users to view with IE.

I’m not making this a Mac v. PC issue (or codec issue), but more of an issue with the AP and its many news org members for foisting an IE-only video plan onto much of the public. But as one commenter said on my blog, people will just hit the IE-only wall and watch the video somewhere else. Like with Reuters, which has a Flash implementation.

Scoble-

That would be MSN Video that’s the problem (you get the same page if you try to use MSN Video). Read the comments in that post Mark made, as well, especially ones by the AP rep.

John, you’ve got to be kidding me on hard ship dates. The MacBU doesn’t do that. Hell, APPLE doesn’t do that. Anybody who does that is insane and asking for lawsuits when the hard ship date slips for whatever reason. Yes, the way MS has treated Windows Media on the Mac is a joke…but truth be told, Real isn’t a lot better- they’ve been keeping Mac users in a ghetto, as well.

I’d settle for “we’re licensing our technology to Flip4Mac and letting them produce our Windows Media solutions for the Mac- with the proviso that the goal is full feature compatibility, we aren’t going to keep them from implementing particular features the Windows side has.” There are units at Microsoft that do this- let 3rd parties do the Mac side if MS isn’t interested in creating a Mac development side of things for a particular product (like they’ve done for Office and the MacBU),, so I actually think it’s a good precedent.

Scoble-

That would be MSN Video that’s the problem (you get the same page if you try to use MSN Video). Read the comments in that post Mark made, as well, especially ones by the AP rep.

John, you’ve got to be kidding me on hard ship dates. The MacBU doesn’t do that. Hell, APPLE doesn’t do that. Anybody who does that is insane and asking for lawsuits when the hard ship date slips for whatever reason. Yes, the way MS has treated Windows Media on the Mac is a joke…but truth be told, Real isn’t a lot better- they’ve been keeping Mac users in a ghetto, as well.

I’d settle for “we’re licensing our technology to Flip4Mac and letting them produce our Windows Media solutions for the Mac- with the proviso that the goal is full feature compatibility, we aren’t going to keep them from implementing particular features the Windows side has.” There are units at Microsoft that do this- let 3rd parties do the Mac side if MS isn’t interested in creating a Mac development side of things for a particular product (like they’ve done for Office and the MacBU),, so I actually think it’s a good precedent.

Oh, btw… Scoble, please ask MSN Video to implement cross-platform compatibility. Better yet, ask them what they are doing to help the AP reach that goal.

Yes, I know, you can’t let us see ENTIRELY behind the curtain. But giving someone faith that their concerns aren’t being blown off (or, at least, an honest response as to why- “You have 5% market share, buzz off”) doesn’t mean you have to commit to a public ship date- but it does mean opening lines of communication.

Oh, btw… Scoble, please ask MSN Video to implement cross-platform compatibility. Better yet, ask them what they are doing to help the AP reach that goal.

Yes, I know, you can’t let us see ENTIRELY behind the curtain. But giving someone faith that their concerns aren’t being blown off (or, at least, an honest response as to why- “You have 5% market share, buzz off”) doesn’t mean you have to commit to a public ship date- but it does mean opening lines of communication.

Actually, please Microsoft don’t change anything.

h.264 is really picking up steam right now. Lets rid ourselves of WMV once and for all.

Actually, please Microsoft don’t change anything.

h.264 is really picking up steam right now. Lets rid ourselves of WMV once and for all.

For what it’s worth, I haven’t managed to view any Channel 9 videos on my iBook. I have a couple of video player thingies installed (I kinda suck at understanding the whole codec stuff), but the one it opens when I try and view a Channel 9 video just crashes or doesn’t work.

I’m not a super-user when it comes to viewing videos online.

I’d love to be able to download them in *.avi or *.mpeg format. I also looked to see if I could subscribe to the stream in iTunes, and there doesn’t seem to be an easy button to do that. I could probably subscribe to it in BlogLines but I don’t know how it would handle the videos.

Again, I’m not really up to par when it comes to getting audio/video from the web — the easiest way for me (and which works) is if I can subscribe to it in iTunes.

These were the views of a lambda user

For what it’s worth, I haven’t managed to view any Channel 9 videos on my iBook. I have a couple of video player thingies installed (I kinda suck at understanding the whole codec stuff), but the one it opens when I try and view a Channel 9 video just crashes or doesn’t work.

I’m not a super-user when it comes to viewing videos online.

I’d love to be able to download them in *.avi or *.mpeg format. I also looked to see if I could subscribe to the stream in iTunes, and there doesn’t seem to be an easy button to do that. I could probably subscribe to it in BlogLines but I don’t know how it would handle the videos.

Again, I’m not really up to par when it comes to getting audio/video from the web — the easiest way for me (and which works) is if I can subscribe to it in iTunes.

These were the views of a lambda user

Ahoy people!

I am using flip4mac to make .wmv files of vacation clips for a personal website.
i want to use it because the file sizes are so much smaller than anything i can seem to get when saving as an mpeg or mov or avi.

I figure most of my family & friends will view on a pc, so no problems.
Bums me out though, to think that my mac friends will not just be able to click & view them… they’ll have to download either the flip4mac player, or the wmp for mac….

WHY CAN”T THEY ALL JUST GET ALONG?????

my 2 cents, a bit late.
cheers!

Ahoy people!

I am using flip4mac to make .wmv files of vacation clips for a personal website.
i want to use it because the file sizes are so much smaller than anything i can seem to get when saving as an mpeg or mov or avi.

I figure most of my family & friends will view on a pc, so no problems.
Bums me out though, to think that my mac friends will not just be able to click & view them… they’ll have to download either the flip4mac player, or the wmp for mac….

WHY CAN”T THEY ALL JUST GET ALONG?????

my 2 cents, a bit late.
cheers!