Wetlook World Forum

I've noticed quite a proliferation of codecs over the past couple of years, and it seems that as new contributors arrive on the scene to share their material, as often as not, they render it using a codec nobody's heard of before. I look forward to seeing all the material being offered up, but I'm not that comfortable with downloading a seemingly endless array of new codecs to do it.

By my understanding of information theory, there is only so much one can achieve re: image compression without sacrificing quality. I believe that the array of popularly available codecs for the past year represent more-or-less the limit of what can be done; any further improvements would only be incremental - not of any real practical value. Also, they perform well enough on most platforms that again, any further improvements are unlikely to yield any appreciable benefit.

So... with no real benefits coming from this "latest and greatest" stream of codecs, can't we standardize on one or two or three of the myriad of codecs most of us already have on our computers, instead of adding yet another one to the mix?

It seems to me almost like an arms race... just when consumers have settled in to the latest emerging "standard", providers moving forward to something new, which consumers can't use (until they find a way to move forward). I know this isn't the intent, but I think it does tend to be the effect.

Why am I making a big deal out of it? What's so difficult about going to www.supernewcodec.com to download it? Well, two things: (1) I need this computer to earn a living; I can't risk installing software which might make my computer unstable, and (2) It seems to me that codecs are a great opportunity to introduce a virus into a computer; I'm not saying it's been done, but I think it may only be a matter of time.

Any thoughts on this? I'd especially welcome perspectives from people who are producing/providing video clips.