YouTube Videos in H.264 for AppleTV (& iPod & iPhone?)

June 2, 2007 @ 4:12 pm · Filed under Adobe, Apple, Flash, Google, iPod/iTunes, Mac OS X, QuickTime

Steve Jobs’ announcement at All Things D that YouTube would be supported on AppleTV has lead to comments by Apple’s David Moody at iLounge.com:

Moody said that YouTube will soon be encoding videos in the H.264 streaming-efficient compression format preferred by Apple TV, and that all new videos submitted to YouTube as of the mid-June launch of the AppleTV update will be playable by the device. From then until fall, YouTube will be encoding its entire back-catalog in H.264 format, adding videos in chunks until everything is accessible to Apple TV users.

YouTube currently uses Flash (.flv) format for its videos, which has the advantage of a large installed base. But the older version of the Flash plug-in used by YouTube (Flash MX, aka version 7, which uses the Sorenson Spark H.263 codec) doesn’t offer very good quality.

Given Eric Schmidt‘s position on Apple’s Board of Directors, it’s not hard to view this as

  1. Google protecting itself against relying solely on Adobe’s product and diversifying to include Apple’s QuickTime (since all Mac OS X users and all iTunes users have QuickTime, it also has a very large installed base) — but not necessarily supplanting Flash with QuickTime.
  2. Google wanting to improve the YouTube brand by improving video quality
  3. Google wanting to solidify its position as market leader by gaining access to the AppleTV audience (which will not be the same audience it has now; the living room is not the desktop)
  4. Google paving the way to connect the iPhone (which will have Google Maps built-in) with YouTube?

Leave a Comment