I actually see lack of H.264 support as more of a blow for those desktop browsers than anything else. With both Firefox and Chrome on the desktop refusing to support the video codec preferred by most (non-PC) device vendors, and both mobile browsing and video usage on the web dramatically increasing, I can't see this having any long-term effect other than marginalizing these browsers for the majority of users. Users who just want to visit a video site and have it work equally well on any device they happen to be using.
H.264 is royalty-free for at least the next 5 years, has widespread hardware encoding and decoding support and its patents will eventually expire. Removal of this codec from Chrome just doesn't make any sense to me. I'm sure all those people who have recently switched to Chrome won't find it too hard to switch away if the "more open" video support starting burning through their laptop battery three times as fast.
H.264 is royalty-free for at least the next 5 years, has widespread hardware encoding and decoding support and its patents will eventually expire. Removal of this codec from Chrome just doesn't make any sense to me. I'm sure all those people who have recently switched to Chrome won't find it too hard to switch away if the "more open" video support starting burning through their laptop battery three times as fast.