Comments on: Google Snaps Up On2

By: gaetano marano

gaetano marano — Thu, 06 Aug 2009 06:35:20 +0000

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the On2 software could be useful (also) to develop a new (Wii/PS3/Xbox-KILLER) Online Gaming Platform, as predicted and explained four days ago in my GoOS blog: http://ow.ly/iScX
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By: Mark Nelson

Mark Nelson — Wed, 05 Aug 2009 18:51:23 +0000

You are automatically assuming that “advantages” means better quality compression at lower bit rates.

In this case, that’s not what I’m referring to.

Just for example, On2 was selected as the video codec for Flash 8. You can be sure the reasons were licensing, IP entanglement, and CPU cycles. None of these have anything to do with stream quality, but they are all very important in choosing a codec.

So no, it’s not like saying I have car that gets 5% higher mileage but runs on milk instead of gasoline. It’s like saying “Hey Toyota I have an engine you can put in your car that will reduce your unit costs by 3% and work pretty much as good as your last one, you have invest a few million in tooling, does that work for you?”

You can get a good idea of what their advantages are by reading the wikipedia page on On2 to see what deals they have closed in the last few years.

- Mark

By: Charles

Charles — Wed, 05 Aug 2009 16:26:25 +0000

“On2 has a really excellent video codec with some advantages over industry standards from Microsoft and the MPEG.”

Like?

Even if their newest proprietary video codec has slightly higher PSNR than AVC/H.264 as they claim, it’s meaningless.

It’s like saying you have a combustion engine that gets 5% higher mileage but — oh yeah — it runs on milk instead of gasoline.

– Charles