The One Laptop Per Child (OLPC) Foundation, the group working to create computers that can be sold for $100 and given to children in developing countries, has partnered with popular French video company Daily Motion to advance the Open Source video format Ogg, an alternative to Adobe’s Flash.
The OLPC computers don’t support Flash, they are Open Source throughout and avoid proprietary software. Daily Motion publishes its video in Flash but will now make video available in Ogg format for OLPC users.
OLPC is a long shot, hasn’t achieved its $100 price goal yet and the Foundation’s fortunes go up and down with various partnerships. The computer that’s been produced so far totally rocks, though, according to reports we hear from people who’ve bought one.
We love Adobe for the incredible ecosystem of innovation the company has fostered and the impact of Flash video on the internet is undeniable. That said, we are skeptical of proprietary media formats with effective monopolies and we are excited to see this partnership moving to advance Open Source video. If the OLPC project succeeds in putting low cost computers into the hands of children all around the world, that could be a real change to the balance of power in video codecs. It would be fantastic, in fact.
Above, a video, in Flash, from YouTube. That’s just how it goes.
