Consortia and company standards
The plug-ins presented on this and the following page can be separated by one important characteristic: they are either defined by a consortium (MPEG, VRML) or by a company (Adobe Acrobat, Shockwave, Quicktime). A consortium (like the earlier mentioned W3-consortium for HTML-standards) is often formed by a group of experts who propose a vendor-free standard format. This means that a related plug-in and the software to create the plug-in file can be developed by any institute or company, and can be obtained free of charge. A company standard implies that the related plug-in can only be obtained from that company, most often also free of charge; however, the software to build the plug-in files has to be purchased from the same company. If the demos of Shockwave and/or Quicktime do not function, download the respective plug-in.

MPEG
The Moving Picture Experts Group, established in 1988, develops the standard for digital audio and video compression techniques under the auspices of the International Standards Organization (ISO). The so-called MP-3 standard is currently the preferred technique for compressing CD-quality audio files.

VRML

VRML (often pronounced as "vermal") is the abbreviation of Virtual Reality Modelling Language, which enables the construction of 3D image sequences. The user can view, move, rotate and otherwise interact with the virtual 3D scene, creating the impression of being present in a virtual reality environment. The VRML specifications are developed by the VRML-consortium.
VRML is capable of representing static and animated dynamic 3D and multimedia objects with hyperlinks to other media such as text, sounds, movies, and images. For VRML-files several plug-in applications are available, such as Silicon Graphic's CosmoPlayer, WebFX, WorldView and Fountain.
Click here for an example of Schiphol Airport in 3D with VRML.