Where did you read that it was designed to make creating an hardware decoder easier?
Ok, I don't think I'll find it. I think I'm mostly just regurgitating what I remember watching at one of the research symposiums. IDK which one it was unfortunately [1]
[1] https://www.youtube.com/@allianceforopenmedia2446/videos
Will it, though ?
Why create a SW spec and hope that the HW will support it ? Why not design together with HW ?