(The web / HTML / audio part.)

• Flash-based player UI, SWF object/embed
• Java Applets, Quicktime etc.
• External applications launched from browser

• 100% Flash-based audio (SWF <object> / <embed>)
• HTML5 Audio() / <audio> with Flash fallback
• HTML5-only audio, MP3 and/or OGG

• Only one sound at a time.
• No auto-play allowed (pop-up blocker-style security model.) Applies to play() also.
• Limited or no caching?

• No HTML5 audio/video support in Safari/Windows without QuickTime.
• Windows Server may have IE 9; no "desktop experience", no Audio()
• No panning (not in spec?)

• new Audio() .canPlayType('audio/mp3') Mixed browser support for MP3, MP4, OGG, WAV
• Audio() object ceilings (32?)
• HTTP: Partials (range requests) and chunked transfers de-emphasize traditional "load progress"

• Broken HTML5 audio on Safari, Snow Leopard (OS X 10.6.3 - 10.6.7.) #32159. Fixed w/10.6.8+.
• Global audio "crash", playback failure in Chrome <18. #107933.
• Related: areweplayingyet.org (HTML5 audio test suite)

• new Audio(null) may load "null" in Webkit, vs. new Audio() (WRONG_ARGUMENTS_ERR in Opera 9.64)
• audio.src = null vs. '' (Firefox likes '', most others don't and may fail to cancel request, may not release RAM etc.)

• SoundManager 2: JavaScript API for MP3, MP4 + HTML5 audio. Hidden Flash fallback. 10 KB (gzip)

• soundManager.createSound({
    id: 'mySound',
    url: '/path/to/an.mp3'
  }).play();

• Browser implementation bugs mean soundManager.preferFlash = true by default.
• Thus, MP3 + MP4 playback is flash-based (by default) if available.
• Case study: Cut The Rope (MSFT-sponsored game, 100% HTML5 audio only in IE 9 due to the above.)

• Performance, sync, timing critical for games
• Latency between JS/browser, and browser/hardware
  (per-browser, per-OS?)
• Looping (ideally, seamless. Tricky.)

• Base64-encoded audio data can be loaded by Audio().
• Limited (realistically) to generating static sounds from code vs. loading over HTTP.

• Binary-level read/write. Similar to what <canvas> does for graphics.
• Data = remix = visualization = shiny.
• Independent APIs in development by Mozilla and Webkit teams.
• W3C now discussing an "Audio Processing API."

• Mozilla Audio Data API
  Demo: Flight Of The Navigator
• Webkit Web Audio API
  Demo: Loop Waveform Vis
• ofmlabs codecs (JSMad / ALAC.js)