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Time:
00:04 EST/05:04 GMT | News Source:
Windows Vista Blog |
Posted By: Kenneth van Surksum |
Have you been itching to enjoy your media content on Firefox? The Windows Media Player team put a lot of work into evolving media playback on Windows Vista through the new Media Foundation pipeline, and has also been actively monitoring feedback on WMP and playback in general. While commentary has been mainly positive for Web playback through IE, we've noticed that there's still work to be done to make Firefox users able to enjoy their media content on Windows.
We couldn't respond as quickly as we would have liked to (we had to get Windows Vista out the door!), but now that it's shipped, the team has moved its attention to getting Firefox users up and running. This week we are happy to say that we have a new plug-in for Firefox that makes WMP work once again -- and even better than it did before!
It's easy to get the new Firefox plug-in -- if you navigate to a Web page today that has the embedded WMP ActiveX control, Firefox will automatically grab the new plug-in for you to install and you will once again be able to enjoy your media content
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#1 By
7754 (216.160.8.41)
at
4/17/2007 10:46:16 AM
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But... wait... Microsoft... is... evil.... Can't... reconcile... <head explosion>
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#2 By
2960 (24.254.95.224)
at
4/17/2007 12:24:52 PM
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Seems to work fine!
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#3 By
15406 (216.191.227.68)
at
4/17/2007 2:39:33 PM
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#1: Let me help explain it to you. As history has repeatedly shown, MS does not do anything for the benefit of anyone save itself. Back in older days, MS would stubbornly refuse to do anything to make Windows video better in Firefox because that was a lever to push you to using IE (reinforcing the monopoly is rule #1 don't forget). However, Firefox's marketshare has gone up to the point where MS can't just ignore them. MS would like Windows media formats to be ubiquituous on the web, with MS acting as gatekeeper of all the DRM and formats, and this goal is more important than excluding major non-IE browsers. Voila, a FF plugin to better support Windows media.
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#4 By
7754 (216.160.8.41)
at
4/17/2007 3:06:09 PM
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Latch... thanks for reminding me of one of my favorite movie moments (from Team America: World Police):
Tim Robbins: “Let me explain to you how this works: you see, the corporations finance Team America, and then Team America goes out... and the corporations sit there in their... in their corporation buildings, and... and, and see, they're all corporation-y... and they make money.”
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#5 By
15406 (216.191.227.68)
at
4/17/2007 3:25:31 PM
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#4: I got through about 20 minutes of that movie before I couldn't take any more of its stupidity. And I like South Park.
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#6 By
32132 (142.32.208.234)
at
4/17/2007 3:36:53 PM
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One of the great mysteries in life for the FSF volunteers like Latch is why Microsoft would want Windows users to keep using Windows.
How dare they!!!!!
They must have ulterior motives!!!!
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#7 By
13030 (198.22.121.110)
at
4/17/2007 4:10:02 PM
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#3, Ding! Ding! We have a winner. Well said and absolutely right on target!
#6: They must have ulterior motives!!!!
Microsoft have ulterior motives???? BAHAHAHAHAHA!!!! Never!!!! That's a good one!!!!
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#8 By
32132 (142.32.208.234)
at
4/17/2007 4:33:40 PM
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#7 Increasing or keeping market share is not normally considered an "ulterior" motive by shareholders. It is usually considered the normal goal of a company.
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#9 By
23275 (24.179.4.158)
at
4/17/2007 4:55:18 PM
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#4, I love that flick.
#5, The messages in it are many, and often as subtle as they are demonstrative.
#3, Oh silly, silly, silly... what so complex - how about the fact that video over the web is rapdily evolving?
Now let's simply examine some truth. We think, in terms of dollars and sense that Google is big. How about the Sony consumer and pro-sumer electronics division? No. Not when compared to the major media houses and networks they are not. Look at the value in all of the Interent's media - then print and finally radio.... they are tiny when compared to video as we all know it best: TV and movies.
Now, WMV, VC-1, DRM, all of it is simply a reflection of the expansion of video over the web and the contest between "The allies" - Microsoft, Google, Yahoo, Mozilla, and all of us here on AWIN, against the traditional owners of not just content, but the means to reach people via video. In this contest, we are all allies - FOSS/OSS/OSX/Windows - all favoring essentially the same things: On-Demand access to any/all content, regardless of where it comes from and the ability to play it back on any device at any location.
That's all this is - a play to ensure that one day, we all get to decide what we watch - rather than have some tiny grouip of people decide for us. It is all going to change - it is not the socialization of media - it is rather, the democratization of media.
I have said it a few times here, Microsoft's future is as a media powerhouse that builds the software that makes each aspect of it possible.
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#10 By
37047 (74.101.157.125)
at
4/17/2007 6:34:44 PM
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Mark this one on the calendar! I am actually going to agree with Parker!! There is nothing ulterior going on here. Extending their monopoly, and trying to create one in a new evolving market, are parts of their business plan. That is no more ulterior than their plan to be profitable. Anyone who expects Microsoft to do things like this for benevolent and completely selfless reasons are simply delusional. It is hard to make the shareholders happy that way.
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#11 By
15406 (216.191.227.68)
at
4/18/2007 8:38:55 AM
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#9: What about the fact that video on the web is evolving? Has been for years. Don't get me wrong though. While I explained in simple terms what MS is doing, I'm not faulting them for it. Getting their media formats as much exposure as possible is in their best interests if their goal is to become (and stay) the dominant player in media formats. What makes this so funny is how MS would never have done such a thing in the past.
#10: So you're saying that Parkkker agrees with me? I'm not sure if that's good or bad.
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#12 By
15406 (216.191.227.68)
at
4/18/2007 9:08:19 AM
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Sounds like what I said yesterday:
'The plug-in itself, according to Colin Teubner, an analyst at Forrester Research, is not open source. "I think most people in the open source community will see this as a pro-WMP move, not a pro-Firefox or pro open source move by Microsoft," he told LinuxInsider.
Microsoft, Teubner speculated, has evidently decided that market dominance of WMP is not enough to drive market dominance of Internet Explorer, previously the only browser with embedded WMP. Therefore, to keep WMP as the dominant media format for the Web, where it is threatened by Adobe Flash-based video, Microsoft needs to make sure WMP is not limited to just Internet Explorer.' - LinuxInsider
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#13 By
13030 (198.22.121.110)
at
4/18/2007 10:01:41 AM
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#12: to keep WMP as the dominant media format
Yup, just as we both said. I don't understand how anyone could not see this maneuver by Microsoft for anything other than what it actually is--a market control effort.
#10: You are forcing me to agree as well then...
#9: In the future, you are going to drive your wife and grandkids crazy...
#8: Increasing or keeping market share is not normally considered an "ulterior" motive by shareholders. It is usually considered the normal goal of a company.
When the effort is an obvious attempt at subversion and control instead of being what is best for the industry, I take exception. I make every effort to buy products from and invest in companies that I believe in and trust to do the right thing. For this reason, I will never buy gasoline from nor invest in Exxon, or now Exxon-Mobil. They trashed their reputation and my trust in them when the Valdez polluted Prince William Sound and then they used the courts to delay the clean-up payments and the payments to those whose livelihoods they destroyed.
As Latch quoted in #12, the reason why Microsoft is doing this is so obvious and that is why I take exception to this.
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#14 By
15406 (216.191.227.68)
at
4/18/2007 10:07:45 AM
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#12: Some people are so used to apologizing for MS' constant bad deeds that they do so even when there's no need to. I have no problem with MS doing this, because of the way they did it. They just did it. More importantly, they didn't try their usual trick of blowing smoke up everyone's ass with their previous "MS cares deeply about choice and we do everything because we love you users sooooo much!!" nonsense. It's when MS tries to con everyone that gets me upset. This time they just did it without the PR baloney that nobody except PHBs believes anyway.
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#15 By
32132 (64.180.219.241)
at
4/18/2007 10:25:14 AM
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"When the effort is an obvious attempt at subversion and control"
Subversion? Microsoft has invested a lot of money in WM. Why shouldn't they want everyone to benefit?
Control?
You and Latch are just paranoid haters.
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#16 By
15406 (216.191.227.68)
at
4/18/2007 3:38:22 PM
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#15: Isn't it time for you to start apologizing for MS now that they've settled their latest state antitrust case? MS will pay $180 million for abusing Iowa citizens. But knowing you, you'll come up with some ass-backward, illogical, absurd justification as to why it's better for people to pay MS more money. I can hardly wait.
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#17 By
32132 (142.32.208.234)
at
4/18/2007 5:58:24 PM
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#16 Many companies settle class action lawsuits even when they aren't guilty because juries tend to end up with irrational haters like you on them.
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#18 By
15406 (74.104.251.89)
at
4/18/2007 7:08:41 PM
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#17: I see I wasn't disappointed.
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