The number of people in this thread pretending they have more expertise about this, and spreading random conspiracy theories about WebP, is impressive.
Actually, Google employs 2 of the 3 main authors of the JPEG XL spec, and the main contributors to libjxl.
Also, it wasn't a few months, and others had explicitly said no.
You can argue it was a dumb decision, but like, can we at least get facts straight instead of making up random stories?
There people in this thread arguing they have no idea what they are doing and have no expertise, while they simultaneously employ the spec authors to work on it and are one of the two primary contributors to the reference library.
A bit silly and incongruous.
Just because someone does something you don't like doesn't make them stupid or wrong. You'd be much better off if you would gather facts first, listen to the perspectives of others, and then respond.
