New MPEG-4 Licensing Scheme

morcheeba writes: "EETimes is reporting that the licensing of MPEG-4 patents will be substantially different than the existing MPEG-2 licenses. The per-player fee will be substantially cheaper ($0.25 instead of $2.50), but a new "use fee" component of $0.02/hour will be charged to service providers. More on MPEG-4 in general at MacWeek; The MPEG-4 Industry Forum and MPEG LA are handling the licenses."

Comments

emulating MS

[Alien54]

It sounds like another group is trying to take the MS software rental idea and do something creative with it. It is not entirely from the articles how this will be handled. (the business news wire seems to be bucklling under the strain)

If it is a usage fee for each individual use, then this is a bad thing.

Re:Confused

[Lars T.]

It doesn't affect DivX, because that doen't actually use MPEG4, but a hacked-up version of a pre-released version by MS.