Of the 3 software AV1 encoders, the only one that is fully dead is the Rust encoder (rav1e). If people truly wanted memory safe encoders/decoders, they would fund and develop them.
Encoding is a way, way less risky thing to be doing compared to decoding.
> If people truly wanted memory safe encoders/decoders
Really? How many codecs have your neighbors contributed money for the development of, just curious.
Fully dead in what sense? Seems like it still has active development to me.