Netflix Ditches Silverlight With Support For HTML5 Video In IE11

An anonymous reader writes: Netflix today announced that it has finally taken the first step towards ditching Silverlight for HTML5, largely thanks to Microsoft, no less. The company has been working closely with the Internet Explorer team to implement its proposed "Premium Video Extensions" in IE11 on Windows 8.1, meaning if you install the operating system preview released today, you can watch Netflix content using HTML5 right now.

Back in April, Netflix revealed its plans to use HTML5 video in any browser that implements its proposed “Premium Video Extensions.” These extensions allow playback of premium video (read: with DRM protection) directly in the browser without the need to install plugins such as Silverlight or Flash.