H.264 isn't free, Cisco is footing the licensing bill for support in most software (including Firefox): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/H.264/MPEG-4_AVC#Implementatio...

This is why Mozilla is pushing AV1 and VP8/VP9 so hard, being stuck with H.264 as the whole industry migrates to H.265 due to bandwidth savings is a major impediment, and the licensing body could easily extract usurious rent for H.265 if it becomes the only reasonable option: https://hacks.mozilla.org/2018/08/the-video-wars-of-2027/

Sorry I got mixed up, but it should be free for anyone which has H.264 hardware decode. Which is like 95%+ of All PC / Tablet / Smartphone sold in the last 5+ years.

And that article from Mozilla, I remember it, worst article from Mozilla for as long as I remember ( That is since Netscape Era ).

Rejecting VP8/VP9 due to Google's involvement is silly and pointless, they're free to use codecs that are much more efficient than H.264. Apple has made its choice to push H.264 & H.265 due to their vested interest in the licensing revenue they stand to gain via the MPEG LA.

Apple has made its choice to push H.264 & H.265 due to their vested interest in the licensing revenue they stand to gain via the MPEG LA.

If that’s true, why are they a member of the AOM, which promotes the royalty free av1?

How long can Apple push against all of the major content providers? Google, Netflix, Mozilla, AT&T & the plethora of other streaming providers will not fully support H.265, and Apple doesn't want to not have a seat at the table as they build a codec to supplant it.

I think this is a repeat of the USB C engineering participation by Apple, they may roll it out to their tiny MacOS install base, but it could be years before AV1 is supported on iOS. Safari on iOS is where Apple likes to draw its line in the sand, it also happens to be where they have nearly 1 billion users, versus 70 million on MacOS: https://ngcodec.com/news/2018/10/9/whats-in-a-codec-hevc-ver...