Because it's pointlessly incompatible. You can do the exact same thing purely in the application, leaving the file format the same. Why do you hate interoperability?
The same could be said of a word document, vs a text file with markdown.
The same could also be said of an .mkv file, vs a directory with an .avi, subtitle files for each language, and suggested fonts.
Or a macOS application bundle, vs an installer program that decompresses a binary and numerous resources across the file system and sets values in a system registry describing their locations.
It's not wrong, but it misses the value that can be found in a container format. Sure, I could make a digital mixtape by dropping audio files in a folder with a .m3u playlist etc. But being able to package audio with album art and metadata in a single open file format actually strikes me as incredibly useful.
What am I missing?
Edit: https://www.otape.org/spec/#73-codecs sorry, it's an mp4 audio file with extra steps...
The same could also be said of an .mkv file, vs a directory with an .avi, subtitle files for each language, and suggested fonts.
Or a macOS application bundle, vs an installer program that decompresses a binary and numerous resources across the file system and sets values in a system registry describing their locations.
It's not wrong, but it misses the value that can be found in a container format. Sure, I could make a digital mixtape by dropping audio files in a folder with a .m3u playlist etc. But being able to package audio with album art and metadata in a single open file format actually strikes me as incredibly useful.
I'd love to see this take off.