Fair point, we could answer that more directly on the site. Besides the comparison were there other things that make it seem oriented to people already familiar with it?
Generally, the video tag is great and has come a very long way from when Video.js was first created. If the way you think about video is basically an image with a play button, then the video tag works well. If at some point you need Video.js, it'll become obvious pretty quick. Notable differences include:
* Consistent, stylable controls across browsers (browsers each change their native controls over time)
* Advanced features like analytics, ABR, ads, DRM, 360 video (not all of those are in the new version yet)
* Configurable features (with browsers UIs you mostly get what you get)
* A common API to many streaming formats (mp4/mp3, HLS, DASH) and services (Youtube, Vimeo, Wistia)
Of course many of those things are doable with the video tag itself, because (aside from the iframe players) video.js uses the video tag under the hood. But to add those features you're going to end up building something like video.js.
Part of what makes AI useful to me is getting though the layers of "what the hell is this, exactly" that slow you down when you jump more than one level beyond your domain knowledge. I think every knowledge container (document, website, what have you) should have a "what the hell is this" link /rich tooltip /accordion section /whatever by default.
Of course, AI explanations often also fail at this unless you give them "ELI5" or other relevant prompting (I'm looking at you Perplexity).
I love a github repo's readme.md that only uses jargon and contains no intro paragraph on what the thing is or how it is to be used.
> Advanced features like [...] ads
I understand the use-case for this, but I find it working against the spirit of free software, which is bringing control back to the user.
I’m not sure which user we’re talking about, but it’s up to the video.js user to decide if and when they use ads. Just like it’s up to YouTube. Video can get expensive, so some video wouldn’t exist without some form of monetization.
The user who uses the software running in his browser.
In this case, you're talking about the browser user, and not the dev user of video.js, but I feel like you know this and are just trying to rail against ads in a manner that's just not relevant.
If someone providing video content wants to run ads as part of making the video available to you, that's up to them. It's also up to you if you want to attempt to view the video without those ads or skip watching altogether. But to the dev of video.js, you're personal choices of consuming AVOD content are irrelevant.
The user can still ad-block. Or choose to let the ad to run to fund the video producer.
Aren't most advertisements served by Linux servers these days? Free software isn't a monastery, as utopian as that ideal sounds.
the OS of an ad platform is totally not important. I fail to see how this is relevant at all.