Silverlight is what Netflix uses to stream their videos over the internet. For anyone here who subscribes to Netflix and hasn't used their "Watch Instantly" video service, you should give it a try. It's the reason I reactivated my Netflix account, actually.
There are many others, a mainstream one that some of you may have heard of is called Netflix and small upstart news organizations like NBC. The problem is the same thing that any browser faces going up against Internet Explorer, inline skates going up against Rollerblade, MP3 players going up against the iPod, and so forth... even if you have a superior product, it is hard to make a dent in a market that is completely dominated by a long-standing powerful monopoly.
Flash sucks, and we know flash sucks, but everyone HAS flash. If I make a website, I want it to just work for my average consumer, and the average consumer has flash installed, not Silverlight.
The saving grace is that people are finally recognizing that IE and Flash suck ass, and are slowly but surely moving to better competition like Firefox and Silverlight. :)
Because people don't want to propragate another shitty proprietary plugin and keep the web open. Silverlight is just next attempt, in a number of failed attempts, to control the web. Bring on HTML5 and lick balls Silverlight.
IBM never had an OS monopoly. MS-DOS ran on IBM PCs, as did MS Windows 1, 2 and 3. OS/2 (Joint OS between MS and IBM for versions 1 and 2) never achieved that much success.
As for Silverlight, I pretty much share the same feelings as str1f3 that it can go die in a fire alongside Flash. All Silverlight does is add yet another closed off proprietary plugin to the mix that doesn't work on mobile devices. Sure, it might be in development for Windows Mobile and S60, but those two systems aren't anywhere near the top as far as mobile smartphone marketshare. Not that Microsoft will ever do this, but they need to actually work towards web standards, instead of shoving their own redundant crap down everyones throat.
Sliverlight is only good for video streaming. You cannot do much for advertising, cartoons, games or other interactive web bling, Silverlight has very limited possibilities.
Some major banks in UK are now using C# with Silverlight, but there's a resourcing issue because there are so few industrial-strength Silverlight developers.
I think websites just want to play it safe since the installed base is there for Flash even in environments (read: work/school) where users can't just install new plugins. But the performance on higher resolution videos is definitely heads and shoulders better in Silverlight.
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The only place I've seen Silverlight utilized is on Microsoft's own site. Why has it not gained wider adoption? It's clearly far superior to Flash.
Silverlight is what Netflix uses to stream their videos over the internet. For anyone here who subscribes to Netflix and hasn't used their "Watch Instantly" video service, you should give it a try. It's the reason I reactivated my Netflix account, actually.
There are many others, a mainstream one that some of you may have heard of is called Netflix and small upstart news organizations like NBC. The problem is the same thing that any browser faces going up against Internet Explorer, inline skates going up against Rollerblade, MP3 players going up against the iPod, and so forth... even if you have a superior product, it is hard to make a dent in a market that is completely dominated by a long-standing powerful monopoly.
Flash sucks, and we know flash sucks, but everyone HAS flash. If I make a website, I want it to just work for my average consumer, and the average consumer has flash installed, not Silverlight.
The saving grace is that people are finally recognizing that IE and Flash suck ass, and are slowly but surely moving to better competition like Firefox and Silverlight. :)
you obviously didnt watch the NCAA basketball tournament from your computer.
or the masters...
Austin: Great point, both of which worked great, with incredible video quality on my mid-range PCs.
Because people don't want to propragate another shitty proprietary plugin and keep the web open. Silverlight is just next attempt, in a number of failed attempts, to control the web. Bring on HTML5 and lick balls Silverlight.
IE and Flash ...
Firefox and Silverlight
I lol'd
Community Showcase has some apps and places on the web that uses it.
http://silverlight.net/Showcase/
There isn't smooth streaming or SL3 apps yet, I don't think
@OCEAN CLAK 31st Account
IBM never had an OS monopoly. MS-DOS ran on IBM PCs, as did MS Windows 1, 2 and 3. OS/2 (Joint OS between MS and IBM for versions 1 and 2) never achieved that much success.
As for Silverlight, I pretty much share the same feelings as str1f3 that it can go die in a fire alongside Flash. All Silverlight does is add yet another closed off proprietary plugin to the mix that doesn't work on mobile devices. Sure, it might be in development for Windows Mobile and S60, but those two systems aren't anywhere near the top as far as mobile smartphone marketshare. Not that Microsoft will ever do this, but they need to actually work towards web standards, instead of shoving their own redundant crap down everyones throat.
Sliverlight is only good for video streaming. You cannot do much for advertising, cartoons, games or other interactive web bling, Silverlight has very limited possibilities.
Some major banks in UK are now using C# with Silverlight, but there's a resourcing issue because there are so few industrial-strength Silverlight developers.
I think websites just want to play it safe since the installed base is there for Flash even in environments (read: work/school) where users can't just install new plugins.
But the performance on higher resolution videos is definitely heads and shoulders better in Silverlight.