Buying some webspace. . .need the nitty gritty

John Britt · April 15th, 2004, 02:12 PM

Dan

No flaming intended. And again, I respect your experience and your volume of hits.

You say that my quotes are "totally unsubstantiated by any statistics," yet the only numbers you can show are empirical evidence from your own website. I would like to give two of the top-selling PC magazines a benefit of a doubt when it comes to their journalistic credibility. I see no reason why PC Magazine would simply make up false information in order to call Quicktime "the de facto format for delivering video content." I trust that they can substantiate their views so that the average reader doesn't have to.

Actually, though, I think that using PC Mag and PC World quotes shows more of a basic user's POV than an internet-specific source would. Both of these magazines are geared toward mid-level PC users -- you won't find many grandmothers reading it, but it's not necessarily geared towards IT specialists either. Those magazines, in my opinion, reflect the general landscape of Windows users, i.e. the average person who will be visiting your or my site. If they are talking about QT6, then (at least close to) a majority of their readers are probably using it.

As for the "3%" -- your implication seemed to be that so few Windows users had Quicktime that the number of QT users online was at least very close to 3%. Sorry if I misinterpreted that.

Regardless, a quick Google search will find statistics showing up to 8% or more of people online are using Macs -- not a huge number, but far greater than 3%. A 2002 article at http://www.internetnews.com/stats/article.php/1403581 quotes a Neilsen/NetRatings survey that said that Mac users made up "8.2 percent of the online population" -- it may be 2 years later, but I highly doubt that that figure has dropped by more than 5%. I don't have the time to search out the figures, but if you have a more recent survey, I will defer.

Nevertheless, the question is not how many Macs are out on the Net, but how many computers total have QT installed on them. 100 days after the release of QT 6, Apple stated that the app had been downloaded 25 million times. In 2003, the company announced that 1 million copies of iTunes for Windows had been downloaded in 3-and-a-half days after its launch. Every Windows user who installs iTunes gets Quicktime as well.

These may be Apple's figures, but they are probably close to the truth -- and much probably much higher now, 6 months down the line.

The question becomes: You may see 20,000 unique URLs a month, but how many other users do you lose (or simply just alienate) by not offering Quicktime as an option?

And unless your personal experience somehows trumps anyone else's, I can personally say, as a Windows user, that I try hard *not* to use Windows Media Player, and in fact, until very very recently, refused to even download the codec to allow WM9 video to play on my system. And as I mentioned before, *my* empirical evidence shows that most people have no trouble viewing the QT files on my site (and seem to prefer them to RealPlayer, although that seems to be no surprise). My clients usually do not become my clients until they have seen my demo -- if they can't see the video, then I don't get hired. And I've only had to send out a small handful of VHS tapes or DVDs to those who could not access either of the available formats on my site.

My main beef comes with suggesting that someone *not* offer users the option of Quicktime; that they should only be handed WM9 and deal with it. Vistors should be given options, not forced to take one format or nothing. People like options -- give them options and they'll like you even more. And given that many creative professional are Mac users, that's not necessarily a demographic that Josh wants to alienate. As I stated previously, now that I have expanded my disk space, I will probably once again offer Windows Media files just to be fair to everyone -- to give my visitors 3 options to choose from.

Dan Euritt · April 15th, 2004, 10:45 PM

<<<-- Originally posted by Josh Bass : Dark? I DID gamma correct all those clips. . .or most of them, anyway-->>>

i went back and looked at your main demo reel on a couple of other pc's... it looked a lot better on other monitors... most people run their monitors too bright anyway, so you ought to be golden with what you got.

i usually light talking heads with less contrast than what you have in some of your shots, maybe i'm watching too many sitcoms, lol.

it's a great demo reel... the opening with the finger reaching for the play button is a neat idea!

Josh Bass · April 15th, 2004, 11:02 PM

Talking heads. . .you mean the stuff at the end? That was all run and gun event coverage. On-camera light, right into the face.

If not those talking heads. . .which ones are you referring to?

Dan Euritt · April 15th, 2004, 11:40 PM

"The Mac platform has made a small step forward in Google's February 2004 Zeitgeist. Mac browsers accounted for 4% of Google's traffic for February 2004.

The Mac platform was last at 4% in March 2003, but has been hovering at 3% since that time in Google's stats. The peak was at 5% in September 2002." -http://forums.macrumors.com/printthread.php?t=64657

i suppose that this will all sound sort of pissy to some people, lol, but if you don't look at all the angles you'll never know anything.

i've been looking at web codecs for quite awhile, btw, here is something i did years ago:
http://www.oceanstreetvideo.com/vidcomp1.html

nielson stats are suspect... look at this, circa the same time period as your quoted study... nielson suddenly starting counting downloads of still images in the mix right along with video downloads... wm and real don't play still images in their media players: -http://news.com.com/2102-1023-937302.html

Dan Euritt · April 15th, 2004, 11:45 PM

<<<-- Originally posted by Josh Bass : Talking heads. . .-->>>

not the bar per se, but when that guy was talking to the girl at the bar(?), there were some cutaways to a bedroom(?) that had some kinda soft but drastic film-like contrast... looked good on a brighter monitor, hard to pull that sorta thing off with video.

Josh Bass · April 15th, 2004, 11:58 PM

oh yes. . .that was the early days of the bass lighting experience. If I knew then what I know now. I'm trying to satisfy you quicktime people, but these files are taking forever to upload.

Is there some reason a file that's longer than another file would be significantly smaller?

when rendered to QT, The ninjews is about 10 megs smaller than my demo reel, and it's also about a minute longer! I used the exact same settings for each. . .

Dan Euritt · April 16th, 2004, 12:24 AM

<<<-- Originally posted by Josh Bass :
Is there some reason a file that's longer than another file would be significantly smaller?
-->>>

are the frame size settings the same?

as an aside, i think that you went with the full 720x480 frame size in the demo reel(?)

usually you want to go with square pixels when it's displayed on a pc, so your frame size should have been 640x480... also try encoding it at 320x240, with a smaller bitrate than the 523kb/s you've been using, especially if bandwidth costs are an issue... see what the playback looks like.

the playback times should be the same regardless of what format it is.

Josh Bass · April 16th, 2004, 12:53 AM

Yeah, I did all that. . .that's why it's weird.

Christopher Lefchik · April 20th, 2004, 07:55 PM

There's an interesting comparison between DivX 5.1.1, Windows Media 9, QuickTime 6.5/Sorenson 3, and QuickTime 6.5/MPEG-4 codecs at http://www.extremetech.com/article2/...1546486,00.asp. (ExtremeTech is associated with PC Magazine).

Dan Euritt · April 21st, 2004, 04:30 PM

thanks for the link christopher... no surprises there, the quality of qt video codecs is poor, that's why i don't use it or recommend it anymore... what the test didn't show was how really lousy the qt audio codecs are, and how difficult it is to tweak the qt encoder to get acceptable results.

much as i hate the borg, it's the only way to go these days for 'net video... there are so many complaints about the realmedia player taking over your computer that i had to recently abandon that also.

April 15th, 2004, 11:02 PM	#33
Josh Bass Slash Rules! Join Date: Apr 2002 Location: Houston, Texas Posts: 5,472	Talking heads. . .you mean the stuff at the end? That was all run and gun event coverage. On-camera light, right into the face. If not those talking heads. . .which ones are you referring to? __________________ The Bass' camerawork The Bass on IMDB

April 15th, 2004, 11:58 PM	#36
Josh Bass Slash Rules! Join Date: Apr 2002 Location: Houston, Texas Posts: 5,472	oh yes. . .that was the early days of the bass lighting experience. If I knew then what I know now. I'm trying to satisfy you quicktime people, but these files are taking forever to upload. Is there some reason a file that's longer than another file would be significantly smaller? when rendered to QT, The ninjews is about 10 megs smaller than my demo reel, and it's also about a minute longer! I used the exact same settings for each. . . __________________ The Bass' camerawork The Bass on IMDB

April 16th, 2004, 12:53 AM	#38
Josh Bass Slash Rules! Join Date: Apr 2002 Location: Houston, Texas Posts: 5,472	Yeah, I did all that. . .that's why it's weird. __________________ The Bass' camerawork The Bass on IMDB

April 15th, 2004, 02:12 PM	#31
John Britt Major Player Join Date: Sep 2003 Location: Atlanta, GA Posts: 621	Dan No flaming intended. And again, I respect your experience and your volume of hits. You say that my quotes are "totally unsubstantiated by any statistics," yet the only numbers you can show are empirical evidence from your own website. I would like to give two of the top-selling PC magazines a benefit of a doubt when it comes to their journalistic credibility. I see no reason why PC Magazine would simply make up false information in order to call Quicktime "the de facto format for delivering video content." I trust that they can substantiate their views so that the average reader doesn't have to. Actually, though, I think that using PC Mag and PC World quotes shows more of a basic user's POV than an internet-specific source would. Both of these magazines are geared toward mid-level PC users -- you won't find many grandmothers reading it, but it's not necessarily geared towards IT specialists either. Those magazines, in my opinion, reflect the general landscape of Windows users, i.e. the average person who will be visiting your or my site. If they are talking about QT6, then (at least close to) a majority of their readers are probably using it. As for the "3%" -- your implication seemed to be that so few Windows users had Quicktime that the number of QT users online was at least very close to 3%. Sorry if I misinterpreted that. Regardless, a quick Google search will find statistics showing up to 8% or more of people online are using Macs -- not a huge number, but far greater than 3%. A 2002 article at http://www.internetnews.com/stats/article.php/1403581 quotes a Neilsen/NetRatings survey that said that Mac users made up "8.2 percent of the online population" -- it may be 2 years later, but I highly doubt that that figure has dropped by more than 5%. I don't have the time to search out the figures, but if you have a more recent survey, I will defer. Nevertheless, the question is not how many Macs are out on the Net, but how many computers total have QT installed on them. 100 days after the release of QT 6, Apple stated that the app had been downloaded 25 million times. In 2003, the company announced that 1 million copies of iTunes for Windows had been downloaded in 3-and-a-half days after its launch. Every Windows user who installs iTunes gets Quicktime as well. These may be Apple's figures, but they are probably close to the truth -- and much probably much higher now, 6 months down the line. The question becomes: You may see 20,000 unique URLs a month, but how many other users do you lose (or simply just alienate) by not offering Quicktime as an option? And unless your personal experience somehows trumps anyone else's, I can personally say, as a Windows user, that I try hard not to use Windows Media Player, and in fact, until very very recently, refused to even download the codec to allow WM9 video to play on my system. And as I mentioned before, my empirical evidence shows that most people have no trouble viewing the QT files on my site (and seem to prefer them to RealPlayer, although that seems to be no surprise). My clients usually do not become my clients until they have seen my demo -- if they can't see the video, then I don't get hired. And I've only had to send out a small handful of VHS tapes or DVDs to those who could not access either of the available formats on my site. My main beef comes with suggesting that someone not offer users the option of Quicktime; that they should only be handed WM9 and deal with it. Vistors should be given options, not forced to take one format or nothing. People like options -- give them options and they'll like you even more. And given that many creative professional are Mac users, that's not necessarily a demographic that Josh wants to alienate. As I stated previously, now that I have expanded my disk space, I will probably once again offer Windows Media files just to be fair to everyone -- to give my visitors 3 options to choose from.

April 15th, 2004, 10:45 PM	#32
Dan Euritt Trustee Join Date: Mar 2004 Location: Carlsbad CA Posts: 1,132	<<<-- Originally posted by Josh Bass : Dark? I DID gamma correct all those clips. . .or most of them, anyway-->>> i went back and looked at your main demo reel on a couple of other pc's... it looked a lot better on other monitors... most people run their monitors too bright anyway, so you ought to be golden with what you got. i usually light talking heads with less contrast than what you have in some of your shots, maybe i'm watching too many sitcoms, lol. it's a great demo reel... the opening with the finger reaching for the play button is a neat idea!

April 15th, 2004, 11:40 PM	#34
Dan Euritt Trustee Join Date: Mar 2004 Location: Carlsbad CA Posts: 1,132	"The Mac platform has made a small step forward in Google's February 2004 Zeitgeist. Mac browsers accounted for 4% of Google's traffic for February 2004. The Mac platform was last at 4% in March 2003, but has been hovering at 3% since that time in Google's stats. The peak was at 5% in September 2002." -http://forums.macrumors.com/printthread.php?t=64657 i suppose that this will all sound sort of pissy to some people, lol, but if you don't look at all the angles you'll never know anything. i've been looking at web codecs for quite awhile, btw, here is something i did years ago: http://www.oceanstreetvideo.com/vidcomp1.html nielson stats are suspect... look at this, circa the same time period as your quoted study... nielson suddenly starting counting downloads of still images in the mix right along with video downloads... wm and real don't play still images in their media players: -http://news.com.com/2102-1023-937302.html

April 15th, 2004, 11:45 PM	#35
Dan Euritt Trustee Join Date: Mar 2004 Location: Carlsbad CA Posts: 1,132	<<<-- Originally posted by Josh Bass : Talking heads. . .-->>> not the bar per se, but when that guy was talking to the girl at the bar(?), there were some cutaways to a bedroom(?) that had some kinda soft but drastic film-like contrast... looked good on a brighter monitor, hard to pull that sorta thing off with video.

April 16th, 2004, 12:24 AM	#37
Dan Euritt Trustee Join Date: Mar 2004 Location: Carlsbad CA Posts: 1,132	<<<-- Originally posted by Josh Bass : Is there some reason a file that's longer than another file would be significantly smaller? -->>> are the frame size settings the same? as an aside, i think that you went with the full 720x480 frame size in the demo reel(?) usually you want to go with square pixels when it's displayed on a pc, so your frame size should have been 640x480... also try encoding it at 320x240, with a smaller bitrate than the 523kb/s you've been using, especially if bandwidth costs are an issue... see what the playback looks like. the playback times should be the same regardless of what format it is.

April 20th, 2004, 07:55 PM	#39
Christopher Lefchik Trustee Join Date: Jul 2003 Location: US Posts: 1,152	There's an interesting comparison between DivX 5.1.1, Windows Media 9, QuickTime 6.5/Sorenson 3, and QuickTime 6.5/MPEG-4 codecs at http://www.extremetech.com/article2/...1546486,00.asp. (ExtremeTech is associated with PC Magazine).

April 21st, 2004, 04:30 PM	#40
Dan Euritt Trustee Join Date: Mar 2004 Location: Carlsbad CA Posts: 1,132	thanks for the link christopher... no surprises there, the quality of qt video codecs is poor, that's why i don't use it or recommend it anymore... what the test didn't show was how really lousy the qt audio codecs are, and how difficult it is to tweak the qt encoder to get acceptable results. much as i hate the borg, it's the only way to go these days for 'net video... there are so many complaints about the realmedia player taking over your computer that i had to recently abandon that also.