SleepyEgg

Microsoft has put its stake in the ground and committed to supporting H.264 in Internet Explorer 9. That the next browser version would support H.264 HTML5 video was no surprise (though the current Platform Preview doesn't include it, it was shown off at MIX10), but this is the first time that Microsoft has provided a rationale for its decision. More significantly, this is the first time the company has confirmed that H.264 will be the only video codec supported.

H.264 certainly has some advantages. It's standardized, resulting in wide support in both software and hardware. This also provies a migration path of sorts from Adobe Flash; the same H.264 video file can be played both in Flash and via the native browser support, which allows site owners to target both HTML5 and Flash users with a single codec. But the biggest advantage cited by Microsoft was intellectual property: the IP behind H.264 can be licensed through a program managed by MPEG LA. Other codecs—the blog post named no names, but Theora is obviously the most widespread alternative for HTML5 video—may have source availability, but they can't offer the same clear IP rights situation.