Digital Home Thoughts: Microsoft Debuts Windows Media Photo, a JPEG Replacement

"If it is up to Microsoft, the omnipresent JPEG image format will be replaced by Windows Media Photo. The software maker detailed the new image format Wednesday at the Windows Hardware Engineering Conference here. Windows Media Photo will be supported in Windows Vista and also be made available for Windows XP, Bill Crow, program manager for Windows Media Photo said in a presentation. "One of the biggest reasons people upgrade their PCs is digital photos," Crow said, noting that Microsoft has been in contact with printer makers, digital camera companies and other unnamed industry partners while working on Windows Media Photo. Microsoft touts managing "digital memories" as one of the key attributes of XP successor Vista. In his presentation, Crow showed an image with 24:1 compression that visibly contained more detail in the Windows Media Photo format than the JPEG and JPEG 2000 formats compressed at the same level."

I don't often bet against Microsoft when they make moves into new markets, because they have such staying power, but this move strikes me as foolhardy. Didn't they see what happened to JPEG2000? Utter failure. I'd like to learn more about WMP (uh-oh, that acronym is already being used), but based on this C|NET article, there's just not enough measurable improvement over JPEG to really catch on. Microsoft wants to see this format succeed because it will mean billions in licensing revenue, but if you're Canon or Nikon, you won't want to give Microsoft a single cent for a new format unless your customers are begging for a JPEG replacement - which I don't think they are. Microsoft's Windows Media Photo gambit will fail - by this time next year it will be a distant memory.