What is WebM?

     WebM is an open source, royalty free, audio video format used for all type of video on the web such as streaming HD movies, live streaming, video calling, and any other web video. WebM was started in 2010 and was backed by Mozilla, Opera, Skype, Google, and others. It was started to provide users with a free high quality video format that is editable and able to be improved upon by the users. WebM tries to solve two major issues with current video formats. One is that it is completely royalty free and they will not charge people for using WebM. The other is that most popular video formats that exist today are not designed for use on the web but television and DVDs.

     WebM is currently still still trying to gain support so it's hard to say what we can expect to see from it in the future. As of now it is only supported by Firefox, Chrome, and Opera. To use WebM on Safari or Internet Explorer a third party software has to first be installed.  They hope in the future to get support for WebM built directly onto mobile devices.