Re: Metadata in the VTT file header (bug 15851), use cases (and a need to close this) from Ralph Giles on 2012-09-14 (public-texttracks@w3.org from September 2012)

From: Ralph Giles <giles@mozilla.com>
Date: Fri, 14 Sep 2012 15:43:11 -0700
To: Ian Hickson <ian@hixie.ch>
CC: Jean-Baptiste Kempf <jb@videolan.org>, public-texttracks <public-texttracks@w3.org>
Message-ID: <5053B2FF.6080800@mozilla.com>

On 12-09-14 2:27 PM, Ian Hickson wrote:

> Wide usage was not a great concern. If it was, we'd likely have gone for 
> something used a lot more, e.g. the formats used with TV broadcasts or on 
> DVDs, which are used way more than SRT. SRT was mostly a niche format for 
> video enthusiasts online.

I...wow. I'm pretty sure the number of distinct entities creating
subtitles in SRT dwarfs those creating in DVD and broadcast TV formats.
And you know DVD-Video uses bitmaps for subtitles, right? That wouldn't
have met a lot of our use cases.

Simplicity and popular support in existing internet video tools were
what attracted me to SRT as a basis for WebVTT.

 -r

Received on Friday, 14 September 2012 22:43:42 UTC