The goal of this activity is to make video a first class citizen
of
the Web. Video on the Web (and this includes audio, as the two are typically
used together) has seen explosive growth, improving the richness of the user
experience but leading to challenges in content discovery, searching, indexing
and accessibility. Enabling users (from individuals to large organizations) to
put video in the Web requires that we build a solid architectural foundation
that enables people to create, navigate, search, link and distribute video,
effectively making video part of the Web instead of an extension that doesn't
take full advantage of the Web architecture.
The Timed Text Working Group has been focusing on tests, issues, and test results since October 2008. The test suite made great progress, thanks to the contributions from BBC, WGBH, and Microsoft. Implementations and around 290 tests can be ran live on the W3C site, including one ECMAScript implementation based on the HTML 5 video element and media API. Around 40 issues have been closed, including the support for dynamicFlow. The Group is now gathering test results with the expectation of defining a basic presentation profile before moving to Last Call. The Group is 3 to 4 months behind schedule.
The mission of the Media Annotations Working Group is to provide an ontology and API designed to facilitate cross-community data integration of information related to media objects in the Web, such as video, audio and images. The Media Annotations Working group had two F2F meetings: one during TPAC 2008 and one meeting in Ghent (BE) in december 2008. The group has published a first document Use Cases and Requirements for Ontology and API for Media Object 1.0 on 19 January 2009, as an input for the development of "the Ontology and the API for Media Object 1.0" Specification.
The mission of the Media Fragments Working Group, is to address temporal and spatial media fragments in the Web using Uniform Resource Identifiers (URI). The Media Fragments Working group had two F2F meetings: one during TPAC 2008 and one meeting in Ghent (BE) in december 2008. The group has not yet published any public document, but preparation of a first Working Draft is well advanced and should be released very soon.
One major issue remains for a better deployment of video in the Web: the video codec to be used in HTML5. W3C investigated in 2008 the situation around video codecs. Finding a path through the patent minefield would require significant legal costs and significant support from some of the stakeholders. In addition, the situation is a moving target, since several significant patents have expired or will expire in 2008 and 2009. Sun Microsystems released in December 2008 a video codec under the Open Media Commons initiative. The Mozilla foundation has been looking at video accessibility, and seems to concentrate its efforts around the Ogg Theora video codec. H.264, in its baseline profile form at least, is still gaining traction in the meantime, becoming the video codec of choice for high quality Web video. It has found its way in softwares like Apple Safari, Adobe Flash 10, Microsoft Silverlight 2 and plenty of various high definition camcorders. W3C may restart its investigation around video codecs towards the end of 2009 depending on the situation and interest.
The activity has been launched on August 2008 and the uptake has been disappointing. While good work has been achieved in the respective groups since TPAC 2008, the participation from the industry is not sufficient to meet our goals. W3C will need to keep an eye on its commitments and resources in the Video in the Web activity. It is expected that most of the deliverables will be in or past Candidate Recommendations phases by the end of the year 2009.
| Group | Chair | Team Contact | Charter |
|---|---|---|---|
| Media Annotations Working Group (participants) | Soohong Daniel Park, Joakim Söderberg | Thierry Michel | Chartered until 30 June 2010 |
| Media Fragments Working Group (participants) | Erik Mannens, Raphaël Troncy | Thierry Michel, Yves Lafon | Chartered until 31 January 2010 |
| Timed Text Working Group (participants) | Sean Hayes, David Kirby | Philippe Le Hégaret | Chartered until 31 December 2009 |
This Activity Statement was prepared for the October 2008 W3C Advisory Committee Meeting (Members only) per section 5 of the W3C Process Document. Generated from group data.
Philippe Le Hégaret, Video in the Web Activity LeadModified: $Date: 2009/04/08 14:39:31 $