do you use modern media formats?

[splashy]

over the past 14 or so years, there's been some new image, audio and video formats on the block. for images, the best formats we currently have are AVIF and JPEG-XL (of which the latter needs more love) for audio, by far the best format to use is opus. it can sound really good at bitrates as low as 64-96kbps and basically perfect at 128kbps. for video, we've got av1. which performs really well even at stupendously low bitrates. here's a video by 2kliksphilip about jxl and avif. it's what introduced me to those formats: video

if you'd like to stick to jpeg, then try jpegli it's up to 30% more efficient than pretty much any other jpeg encoder.

so do you use these more modern formats? or have you stuck with the old reliable jpeg, png, h264 and mp3 formats?
ps: this attatched opus file was encoded at just 20kbps!!! and it's fullband!!! (20hz-20khz)

[nuclearblues]

I greatly respect and value the existence of modern formats, but I'm stubborn and don't like change much :P

in all seriousness, a lot of these formats (jpegli being a great example) emphasize optimization, which just isn't much of a priority for me personally. my site and other projects aren't nearly intensively enough to necessitate change. there's also a reliability issue; the majority of people aren't immediately switching to these formats, so their longevity is a bit of a crapshoot. I'd much rather stick with a clunkier format that I know will likely be supported until the sudden heat-death of the universe or at least the end of my days as a webmaster, whichever comes first. especially when newer formats are in the hands of companies like google, who are fairly notorious for ditching any project that doesn't see immediate benefits. absolutely not an insult to those who choose to switch over, but it's just not for me.

edit: they also aren't supported across all browsers and operating systems. AVIF in particular is incredibly touchy with transferability and legibility across systems. I can barely get them to work sometimes on a super standard windows 10/firefox setup, not to mention trying to save them or edit them. I want my site to be fairly technologically accessible.

[villain]

yeah I agree with nuclearblues - I mostly use older/more established formats in fear of compatibility issues.
though, I have been considering using more optimised formats for my visual novel - ren'py supports webp, and while they're a bit of an inconvenient scourge online I do understand why they exist as an alternative to the much weightier png, and I think in a context where they are being read and displayed by a game its much more useful to keep things light for smaller download sizes! I know its relatively easy to decomplile ren'py games so that might also provide an extra layer of inconvenience for anyone who wants to fuck around with my game's art - though if they've worked out decompiling, finding a webp > png converter probably wouldn't be an issue I suppose

[candycanearter07]

No. I personally try to download everything in png, mp3, m4a, or mp4 formats. Those are the most compatible imo, and just feel like the "default" to me. Using a newer format risks not being able to use it in some programs, or it eventually becoming deprecated. However, the new format stuff is nice and if more things supported it I'd try it.

[PurpleHello98]

For me, it's definitely a question of backward compatibility. My favourite tech is all retro, and so I want at the very least to ensure that my own computers can access my own Web site. And then, I know there are a good few other Neocitizens out there who also love retro tech---basically, I just want to make sure it's accessible on older systems, whether someone's using an older machine out of choice, like me, or even necessity. Plus, for me to not support older OSes/browsers/etc. would be kind of hypocritical and nonsensical, Pale Moon devotee that I am 

[sen.fish]

AV1 is still a bit too new for me--Safari only adopted it in Sep. 2023 (making it the last major browser to do so)--so it's VP9 for me. Opus is great though. I always try to stick to royalty-free/open formats when I can.

No. I personally try to download everything in png, mp3, m4a, or mp4 formats. Those are the most compatible imo, and just feel like the "default" to me. Using a newer format risks not being able to use it in some programs, or it eventually becoming deprecated. However, the new format stuff is nice and if more things supported it I'd try it.

MP4 is a container format (like the superior webm format), it doesn't do the coding itself. Meaning that an MP4 file can have AV1 video coding and Opus audio coding.

[Skykristal]

Uh honestly I would have to read into all of this and unless it is or becomes a necessity, I likely won't. I stick to png, jpg, mp3, mp4, gif, occationally SVG etc. and I'm perfectly fine using those for my everyday life.