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Thomson: MP3 Licensing Same As It Ever Was
Thomson Multimedia is downplaying the
recently reported change
in the
licensing
of patented MP3 technology as nothing more than a trivial, semantic change.
In a NewsForge report today,
Robin ("roblimo") Miller quotes a spokesman who denies that any change in the licensing terms has taken place, "that Thomson laid down its licensing terms long ago, and that if Thomson's terms are not compatible with the GPL today, then they never were." The patent encumbrance of MP3 codecs has worried Free software enthusiasts for a long time; if the recent wording change represents no change in policy, it seems that they really have been right all along.
(NewsForge,
like Slashdot, is part of the
sinister OSDN keiretsu.)
Interesting. I wonder if they'll now ask for backpayment of all decoders issued?
Returned Peace Corps IT Volunteer
I agree, but I've got too many devices they don't play anything but MP3 too switch. If my riocar gets an update that let's it play OOG, that might push me over.
I'm intrigued that people are all about OSS not being opposed to business or profit, as long as it's done in a reasonable, open way.
At the same time, though, we see the "Red Hat = Microsoft?" articles and the subtle opposition to anything that is 'tainted' by capitalism (sinister OSDN [not that it isn't a keiretsu], etc.) I've since decided that open source people are simply disinclined toward business and there will always be a bulk of people who can't fathom that things can be both commercial and open and will make a fuss about it as a result, despite whatever benefits the continue to enjoy.
There should be a moratorium on the use of the apostrophe.
Max V.
NeXTMail/MIME Mail welcome
___ I don't respond to Anonymous Cowards, and I Never Mod them UP.
So it turns out that we don't have to pay royalties. How long before they come under new management or are bought and we are forced to pay to create and listen to mp3's? This could still turn into another compuserve .gif patent fight very easily. We should not make ourselves be at the whim of a company like that. We really should all use ogg. We know that it will always be free and open source, and the quality of ogg sound files rock.
This is a no-brainer... Ogg works great; support it, use it, and push it on the hardware player manufacturers. They have a good business case for supporting it.
Digital music is dead. Long live digital music!
People shape laws. Not the other way around.
Is anyone working on OGG in silicon? Or even mods to popular MP3 devices?
Frankly, it's our fault for making MP3 a standard - but I guess it was best technology available a few years back.
I agree with other posters - hardware manufacturers will pay the cost and raise their prices by a buck or two. But as for software decoders, only companies like MS will be able to afford the licensing fees. This spells the end of GPL MP3 decoders.
It's time to start moving to OGG, and it's time to start putting pressure on hardware manufacturers to support it. OGG is the future.
I know a bunch of people are pissed about MP3 and its licensing and so forth. I think it's a valid complaint. After all, I'm a long-time ex-Windows user, so I know what it's like to get frustrated with the people who make your software.
But when it comes right down to it, you have to choose the right tool for the right job. A lot of times, at client sites where I'd rather use Linux or BSD/OS, I have to go with Win2k, just because the required featureset (ASP, database connectivity, CGI) demands IIS. I think we need to recognize that MP3 is an established and important technology for digital music. Would it be nice if it were all public domain, or GPLed? Of course. But you can't always get what you want, and in this case we have to settle for MP3 with the knowledge that it is truly the appropriate tool for the job at hand.
Karma: Good (despite my invention of the Karma: sig)
I read that RedHat yanked all of their mp3 players off their site due to fears over the $0.75 charge that was now applicable to them. With the removal of that one line from the license policy, it appears that they might be right--at least for boxed sets. They sell the box sets of RedHat, thus selling the software inside of it.
DFossmeister
No Not Again! Its whats for dinner.
For cryin out loud, you all scream and run at the slightest hint of 'mp3's being outlawed' -type news. They are fine and they aren't going anywhere. I really doubt any else will replace anytime soon. Relax.
-Valiss
...I have to ask: does anyone know of standalone (meaning not a PDA) MP3 players that handle the OGG format as an alternative to MP3? That's the only thing holding me back from using exclusively OGG from now on. My Creative Nomad IIMG only has firmware to play WAV, MP3 and WMA. I suppose I could always use OGG and convert my files to WMA when I want to use them on the player, but that's really a pain. If anyone knows of a different firmware that can play OGG on the Nomad, that'd be even more appreciated.
"I may be quite wrong." - Socrates
Funny how sometimes trivial semantic changes to licenses allow for so much in the way of legal bullying down the road.
"I'm a leaf on the wind. Watch how I soar."
-Hoban Washburn
There's a Cirrus chip model CS7410 available that supposedly can decode OGGs.
Note: The purpose of the chip is not specifically for decoding OGGs - it just seems to have the right silicon in it to do the job.
Ummm...double shame on me? I don't know how you got modded up, but I think you were looking for "Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me." Not that that's particularly insightful, funny, informative, or any of the other positive mods.
Yes! That guy!
Just when I re-encoded my 10GB of mp3's to ogg. :(
Now I'll have to re-encode it all again!
If you can get those audio files into WAV or CD format you can get them to OGG effortlessly. Just head on over to CDex on sourceforge and download their CD ripper.
Not only does it quickly and effectively rip CDs but it can turn WAV files into the encoding format of choice just as painlessly. Good luck with your publishing by the way, would you care to describe what you're publishing?
Red Hat still was contacted by Thomson to remove mp3 players from their "product" (Red Hat Linux) since it is sold. So while the terms may not have changed, kiss mp3 players in your distros goodbye.
While everyone has lots of mp3s still, please only share out your OGGs on P2P networks to encourage use of the format.
At the same time, though, we see the "Red Hat = Microsoft?" articles and the subtle opposition to anything that is 'tainted' by capitalism (sinister OSDN [not that it isn't a keiretsu], etc.) I've since decided that open source people are simply disinclined toward business
That would be an erroneous conclusion.
A more accurate (though not necessarilly 100% correct, since it is difficult to know what 100% correct is in the context of so many diverse people) conclusion would be that
OSS (and Free Software) enthusiasts are a diverse bunch of people, and among them are included some few who dislike any 'taint' of commericalism.
I am very inclined toward business (and quite good at it, if the last few years' tax returns are to be believed), and that doesn't stop me from being accused of zealotry or anti-commercial sentiments when, in fact, my sentiments are anti-monopoly, not anti-business, as are the sentiments of anyone who understands how a free market and competition are supposed to work.
Since copyright grants a 95 year (or life+75 year) government enforced monopoly, this means I come down firmly on the side of Free Software, both philosophically and, based on a great deal of bad experience with proprietary software, practically. But this has more to do with the problems inherent in having a vendor with authority over aspects of your business, and the power to coerce one's business into taking actions not in your best interests (but theirs instead), and having that power over you backed by a government gun, that it does with any "anti-commerical" sentiment.
There are others, quite likely the majority of Open Source and Free Software enthusiasts, who are much deeper in the pro-business camp than I, so I suspect your characterization really describes only a tiny, if outspoken, minority of people who use and advocate free software and open source.
The Future of Human Evolution: Autonomy
GIF, JPEG, MP3...I guess society must decide whether the Internet is truly a public information superhighway or merely a serious of privately-owned stretches of info-road littered with tollbooths. I say it's the former, let's go with OGG in this case.
The way I see it is that it is very difficult to make a profit with open source software. Since its open and everyone can see the code, nobody is going to pay for it because they can just take it for free. You have companies like Red Hat who give away their software for nothing, but they are trying to profit! I think all these companies like red hat, mandrake, osdn even, should stop trying to profit. Just break even. Become a non-profit organization. A non profit organization still brings in money, it just doesn't bring in more than it needs to say in existance. Employees get paid, stuff gets done.
A non-profit organization gets a break on postage too!
In my eyes there is no way to make money by selling something and simultaneously giving it away. Winzip is proof. Do you know anyone who has ever paid for winzip? I don't.
Being a not for profit organization seems like such an obvious thing, if anyone knows a reason why its not a good idea, please do tell.
The GeekNights podcast is going strong. Listen!
We are using mp3 players to play illegal copies of music which we have not licensed, but we are complaining, because decoders now have a license of 75 cents? Perhaps my wording isn't so great, but I guess I will continue to illegally use my decoder to play illegal mp3 files and not give crap about any of this.
- Thomson is not going after anyone who writes/releases a free (as in beer) MP3 decoder (well, not yet anyway);
- However the patent license granted to free (as in beer) MP3 decoders does not allow redistribution for $$;
- Hence, the patent license for free (as in beer) MP3 decoders is not compatible with the GPL;
- Hence, any GPL'd MP3 decoder is in violation of the patent license.
It's hard to see Thomson as the bad guys here. Rather, the fault lies with those who slapped a GPL on top of their MP3 player-programs, without considering the legal restrictions (vis, that they were violating MP3 patents thereby).-Renard
A single point:
If it is patented, it is not available for me to do what I want with it. Free software isn't about price; it's about freedom. Try this on for size...you have free speech, but it costs you $.075 for every topic you want to speak on. How is this really different from paying $.075 for each implementation of a standard? How many RFCs are there...are you willing to pay $.075 for each of those?
"The controversy was created by the removal of this line in the old MP3 royalty licensing page from the current version: "No license fee is expected for desktop software mp3 decoders/players that are distributed free-of-charge via the Internet for personal use of end-users." Hmmm..let me remove a few more lines (removed ones in brackets[ ]).... Please [Remember to give Mr. Jones his heart pills] before feeding Mr. Jones any food. Make sure his bib is on. When opening the transmitter door [Make sure the high voltage is off]. Remember to discharge the capacitor with a clip lead. [Oncoming traffic during rush hour in] Express lane. Point made Thomson?
The Open Source community should check on this possibility. If this is found to be legal, then it may be fairly simple for a single non-profit site to have downloads of MP3 capable software taylored for each popular Linux distribution. Sure, that isn't perfect, but better than nothing.
My point, oh 733'|'ish one, is that he said he needed to publish some audio files. It usually stands to reason that if you intend to publish something, then you have the original raw version (or something of comparable quality), in your posession.
This was a copy/paste from another person's post from the article from three days ago. Not that the moderators have any way of knowing this, but it's not insightful if it's not *your* insight.
"Mod, mod, mod...and another troll bites the dust."
The licensing scheme is not the same as it always was, and there is documentation of this fact at The Internet Archive.
The recorded page from August of 2000 stated that:
"No license fee is expected for desktop software mp3 decoders/players that are distributed free-of-charge via the Internet for personal use of end-users."
The page from the same date for third-party encoders is pretty much the same as they said, though- so LAME, blade, etc., seem to have been afoul of this for a while. Which is pretty awful, since they're great software.
The record at the Archive was brought up in a previous article, so I'll give credit to that individual whose name I don't have on hand. And Flarelock, for the "1984" post above, that's a nice touch.
- (n) series; system; grouping of enterprises; order succession; (P)
keiretsugaisha- affiliate company
keiretsukalooted directly from Jeffrey's JapaneseEnglish Dictionary Server
I am not fond of software patents, but a patent on MP3 is not the same as a patent on one-click or xor cursors.
.75 drags with it a certain amount of paperwork and red tape - if you charge people 75 cents to download it off of your website, then you will need to pay for the e-commerce, and the secretary to shuffle the paper work, and then it turns out to be more like 5 or 10 bucks - which is still reasonable, but it might dampen the spirits of the typical person who, under other circumstances, may download this and use it. Especially if a free decoder is immediately available that has the same quality and size as a MP3.
But it is a patent none the less - it restricts your rights under the GPL, and it provides a very gray area as to your specific rights such as distribution, royalties, etc.. - much like the MPEG patents and other media / image patents.
The royalty is quite reasonable. If you had to pay $0.75 for your copy of WinAMP, would that really seem unfair to you? That's the price of a can of coke, for Pete's sake! It it really that unfair?
Its really not unfair, but it will put a damper on the number of people who use MP3 decoders - because that
I think that the biggest problem is that Thompson let the genie out of the bottle, and now they want to charge people to talk to him. THat to me seems to be a questionable business model, but since they managed to get the patent, more power to 'em, I guess.
3. Like it or not, this is not going to kill MP3, because most MP3 players are commercial, licensed products, and there are a ton of them out there, and they don't support Vorbis.
Its an eventual thing - instead of paying the royalties or one time fees, companies will start to move to free standards instead. MP3 didn't appear over night, and neither will Ogg. In fact, MP3 players didn't encourage the MP3 revolution, they simply took advnatage of the fact that millions of people were already listening to MP3s on their computer. It was the free decoders (XMMS and WinAMP) that introduced MP3, and now its the same decoders that are introducing Ogg. It just takes a little time to move.
So when faced with dealing with royalties and other issues, the users will start using alternatives, and eventually so will the commerical players. MP3 won't go away tommorrow, but don't be surprised if it disappears 5 years from now.
Do you have Linux and a DotPal? Click here now!
In all honesty, was it not perfectly apparent from the outset that MP3 was very much a proprietary, owned format? Did anyone with brains enough to write MP3 code ever think that MP3 = Free Software/OSS?
MP3 is a proprietary format. MP3 has always been a proprietary format. Did you think that a bunch of geeks wishing really, really hard and writing lots of really cool Free apps would somehow change this fact? Are you really just coming to this startling realization?
Obliteracy: Words with explosions
Listen, could we please refrain from making all these crazy-wack references within the article summaries from now on? I have a hard enough time remembering my own name, and have not the time or inclination to pop over to Dictionary.com, every time somebody smarter than myself decides to be clever and use anything besides monosyllabic words with less than 6 letters apiece.
I have to go now -- the doctors say it's time to take my medication again............
Since when did a 'semantic change' mean a change with no effect on the meaning?
-- Ed Avis ed@membled.com
You know that story about how aliens were going to take over the world, mass panic ensused and people died, right? But there was the darndest thing-- Not one damn person saw an alien. Then you feel insanely stupid because it was merely radio fiction the entire time. Welcome to the MP3 taxation story on Slashdot. You weren't getting charged for MP3s before even though similar (if not higher priced) charges existed in the past. You won't get now even though they changed the price. Too many alternatives to Mr. Frokenfilmhiegnmierbozel's codec exist to ever effectively tax anyone. His position is too weak to even give it a second thought. Move along, nothing to see here and try not to kill anybody in the ensuing hysteria.
You need a FREE iPod Nano
Or "fool me twice, prepare to die", but "Winnipenguin" doesn't sound like a traditional Klingon name to me.
"The Crystal Wind is the Storm, and the Storm is Data, and the Data is Life"
Yes, but "trivial" is. Thus, at least according to them, this is an "inconsequential change in meaning."
Do you really need reason for beer? Wingman Brewers
Let's apply this knowledge. For example, Red Hat doesn't necessarily sell software. It distributes the software and charges for the distribution. The software is otherwise freely available for download in source code or binary format. Customers are buying service and convenience, not software. This may be walking a thin line legally, but thin lines have been known to be found in favor of defendants more often than procecutors.
assert(expired(knowledge));
I'd switch on the spot.
Hexayurt - open source refugee shelter,
This story has obviously been overhyped, as it will not mean the end to free (as in free beer) mp3 players (and some encoders, most likely). It will, though, mean the end to mp3 encoders/decoders in GPL'd software, in other words the vast majority of open source software. It will also mean no default mp3 support in your favorite GNU/Linux distro, most likely.
This is unfortunate for the open source community, but it will help to promote newer open standards with no patent or licensing problems to worry about. It will most likely not affect the general public, who will still be able to download winamp for free.
It suprises me that nobody in the open source community noticed this discrepancy before, as it has been listed on the licensing page for quite some time. As the Thomson lawyer said, it has been incompatible with the GPL for some time now. I suppose from now on people will be more careful before building patented proprietary technology into open source software, despite the fact that this type of patent makes no sense and hurts innovation by creating a closed standard.
A computer is a valuable tool, so use it and stop whining.
1. This is an open standard. It's just patented. Patents expire. Nobody is trying to prevent you from writing decoders - they just want to get paid for (I hope) work that they did in developing the technology, which is pretty cool, and which I don't think I could have invented on my own. I am not fond of software patents, but a patent on MP3 is not the same as a patent on one-click or xor cursors.
Couple of points here: 1a. Patents expire in 20 years with an option to renew; in practical terms they don't expire especially when it comes to software. 1b. Patent on MP3 is the same as a patent on one-click in that they are both patents on software. They both claim patents on logic, algorithm, functions, whatever you want to call it.
2. The royalty is quite reasonable. If you had to pay $0.75 for your copy of WinAMP, would that really seem unfair to you? That's the price of a can of coke, for Pete's sake! It it really that unfair?
This is purely subjective. I'm sure if the patent license is enforced winamp will come up with a free version that's ad-bloated (plays an ad mp3 after each of your selected mp3s, popups, unders, etc), or paid subscription model like Real did awhile ago. Now, this may be completely reasonable to you, but others who have been playing their mp3s without having to pay for patent royalties or get annoyed by advertizers will not appreciate the change. So they will switch to Windows Media Player which will include the patent payment in the OS price (antitrust?), which will also force them to listen to and encode in WMA.
3. Like it or not, this is not going to kill MP3, because most MP3 players are commercial, licensed products, and there are a ton of them out there, and they don't support Vorbis. So you don't have to do anything to keep using your MP3s, but if you want to use Vorbis in protest, it's going to be very difficult.
I don't think it's going to be MP3 vs OGG, it's going to be MP3 vs WMA and good luck beating MS in this game. Just like I said above. Also, consider MS requiring you to use their DRM with WMAs when or as they get a hold of some market share. This will bring up so many issues it's a topic of several separate discussions.
4. I have a large library of audio files that need to get published on the net. They're free, noncommercial, non-revenue-generating. I'll publish them at least in MP3 format, and maybe Ogg if I can get a good encoder. I have a feeling that if I publish Ogg, it's not going to get downloaded very much, but it'll be interesting to see.
At least help advertize Ogg. Can't hurt. BTW what is wrong with the xiph.org's ogg encoder?
I love ogg, but now have a MacOSX system, and was wondering if anyone could recommend any players? I tried the Quicktime component only to see it do nothing and even if it did work I understand the framework will make it sound worse. Anyone have suggestions?
BTW, if anyone also happens to know some resources about bulding a vpn configuration that plays nice with Windows, Linux, and OSX, let me know. I know PPTP as a possibility, but I would prefer standard ipsec..
XML is like violence. If it doesn't solve the problem, use more.
OK, the licensing hasn't changed...that's all well and good, as far as that goes. Too bad that it's been "clarified" in such a manner, but that's life.
.wav available. You need to get mindshare and start moving product before you can generate enough traffic to make a decent profit. Still, the "clarification" that seems to no longer omit the license fee for non-commerical software created for personal use is alarming.
/adapt/modify their code...just follow the rules of the copyright, and you'll be OK. *Instant* mind-share! Any commercial firms who did NOT wish to distribute source code could talk to the patent-holders about royalties. Which, as I understand it, is pretty much what happened in mp3's case, anyway.
It doesn't surprise me that the mp3 format's patent-holders were initially supportive of allowing their decoding algorithm to be widely distributed in a royalty-unencumbered fashion...especially given that most users at the time didn't seem to believe that there was anything other than
Let's turn this around, however, and suppose that, instead of merely patenting their algorithms, they also created a reference library for those algorighms, licensed under the LGPL. Anyone building a free (as in beer) application could use
Seems like a win:win:win (patent holders get mind share, companies get a proven product with a large user base, and end-users can't ever get screwed by delayed patent enforcement).
What am I missing here?
And...isn't this sort of what Ogg is trying to do?
Please, don't support MP3 when you can support Ogg Vorbis and benefit everyone, while benefitting no single person or company.
Interesting that this covers the licensing of MP3 and the royalties to be paid for selling hardware or software containing the MP3 codec.
All MP3 players (pretty much?) can be connected to a computer of some sort to download music onto them in some way. There are exceptions to this in the form of players which can play mp3 files directly from CD etc.
Why not, next to your retail version of the product, give away a floppy disk containing the plugin to play the MP3 files.
Plug you player into the computer, insert the floppy and it gets copied to the player. No licencing costs.
The plugin (codec) does not therefore need to be GPL and can be given away instead of being sold!
Another one is "rhetoric". "Oh that's just rhetoric" some people say insultingly. But the dictionary definition is "the art of speaking or writing effectively". That's at insult I can handle.
Legal issue - Red Hat is redistributable. The license terms for MP3 do not allow that. However, since the "free" exemption is still there I would expect at least the download editions to get the decoders restored.
As for jumping on Red Hat - which Linux distro do you know of that either a) never shipped mp3 decoders or b) paid the license fee and restricted redistribution?
No - I don't use Red Hat - I just don't agree with sniping.
If their policy hasn't changed, then why did they change the wording on that Web page? Sounds fishy to me.
if Thomson's terms are not compatible with the GPL today, then they never were.
Why does it have to be compatable with the GPL? I am hereing this to often today "Its not compatable with the gpl, its not licensed under the gpl" and usually with no good reason. If people dont want to give you rights to their src code, then that is entirely up to them.
If anyone has a problem with that, they go write or help develop a alternative, in this case Ogg, instead of wasting your energy. Thats what the GPL is about, learning and helping each other! People should learn that the GPL is a single license, and other people may not feel so highly of it (I myself dislike licensing my code under the GPL, i much prefere the BSD license as i dont see why i should impose the restriction of public code for people using code i let them use freely).
Again it comes down to perceived rights, and a lot of people see a non gpl license as wrong, again with no good reason other than they cant get to use the code, they have to figure it out for themselves, or spend time coding a alternative to that point, but again this isa desicion made by the origional code or group, and i dont see why this should be a negative.
If you still don't get it read it again.
.sig.obj is child of /dev/null
hint:
patents expire after a while. does anyone know how much longer it will be until these expire?
-- john
"that Thomson laid down its licensing terms long ago, and that if Thomson's terms are not compatible with the GPL today, then they never were."
We have always been at war with Eurasia.
This sig left unintentionally blank.
Thompson is claiming that they still encourage free players. So anyone who wants to write an mp3 player can put it up for download in both source and binary format.
The only real problem is that you can't put an mp3 player on a for pay distribution of GPL'd software, even though the value of the player is a minute fraction of the value of all the other software on the disk.
This is not the ideal situation, but it isn't going to prevent anyone from playing mp3s on any computer they want to.
The old text was a loophole. If a player was in any way distributed for free via the internet then even for-pay copies would be royalty free.
AVI --> Audio Video Interleave. Two of three for the association game.
funny munging
Your subject header ("Free softare is compatible with business") and the proposition on which your argument is based (" I'm intrigued that people are all about OSS not being opposed to business or profit...") are talking about two different movements with different goals and different criteria for judging software licenses. Whichever movement you wish to talk about, please state that clearly and consistently so as to not confuse readers who understand the difference between the two movements.
If you meant to talk about the Free Software movement, you should know this movement has nothing against commercialism. It is proprietary software which is the enemy of Free Software, not commercial software. Software patents are patents which cover ideas you might use in developing any software, thus impeding the development of all software. Software patents thus serve to limit the freedom the Free Software movement champions to let every computer user share and modify software.
Digital Citizen
So "Ogg" is unintuitive for you, but you can easily make the leap from "MP3" to "Motion Picture Expert Group Layer Three" to "Music"?
Thomas Galvin
The GPL has a specific clause that deals with patents, which basically says the GPL makes no warranty with respect to patents and it is up to the user to know and adhere to any patents valid within the jurisdiction where they are using or distributing the code. If the code is in violation of a patent and cannot be distributed within the terms of the GPL, then you cannot distribute the code within the jurisdicition where the patent is granted.
In the case of a software, or mathetmatical, patent like mp3, the GPL is likely to hold, and be valid, for all of the code including the mp3 algorithm itself throughout most of the world.
Only in the United States, and perhaps some portions of Europe, will commercial use of the code that would otherwise be within the limits set by the GPL be incompatible, so most of the world is free to use the code within the constraints of the GPL.
OTOH the GPL doesn't require one to charge for the software, so I'm not certain it is incompatible even in those less fortunate parts of the world where software and business-method patents have insinuated themselves into the law, though I agree it certainly might be.
It's hard to see Thomson as the bad guys here. Rather, the fault lies with those who slapped a GPL on top of their MP3 player-programs, without considering the legal restrictions
The fault lies with Frauenhofer for changing the licensing terms, in effect, changing the rules of the game midstream. It is a sleazy thing for them to do, no matter how anyone spins it.
However, I agree with you that a large portion of the blame falls squarely on those who promote and use MP3 instead of unencumbered alternatives like OggVorbis. We knew from the history of GIF and others that this is the sort of behavior one can expect from the kind of people who would seek to patent and restrict knowledge to begin with, so it should really come as no surprise that they have remained true to their nature and done this, and anyone who was surprised, or caught flat-footed by it, has demonstrated an incredible lack of vision and foresight (not to mention understanding of recent historical events a la' the GIF LZW patent).
The Future of Human Evolution: Autonomy
This is especially bad if my program contains code written by other programmers and released under the GPL. These programmers could then sue me for incorporating their code into software that is not freely redistributable as required by the GPL.
The GNU GPL anticipates this issue, and explicitly states in section 7:
By the way, this is not a hypothetical issue for me. I'm a developer of Audacity, a GPL program that includes the MAD mp3 decoder. We are currently discussing the situation on the development mailing list. See this message for a discussion of some options we are considering.
This is all rather silly, really. Nobody (beyond the technical crowd) knows what .mpg (should be .mpeg), .jpg (should be .jpeg), .gif, .png or any other goofy file extension stands for. Users just plain don't care, and Apple and Microsoft have been working hard to ensure they don't need to. But if the extension .ogg bothers you so much, just rename them all to .mp3 and your audio player will handle them just fine.
Ita erat quando hic adveni.
Ok, I'll bite what is a keiretsu?
See my Home Theater
So, they are backing off their demand for the big cash because of the backlash, and trying to deny ever having said what they said. I guess it depends on what your definition of is is. Vizinni, Does that word mean what you think it means? I do not think it means what you think it means.
How ya like dat?
This is an open standard. It's just patented. Patents expire.
Not if Thomson Multimedia and the major pharmaceutical companies get together and lobby Congress for a Cherilyn Lapierre Patent Term Extension Act like Hollywood did back in 1998.
they just want to get paid for (I hope) work that they did in developing the technology
Then why does Thomson Multimedia require an annual minimum royalty of $15,000? That keeps the XMMS people from being able to distribute their product because they cannot charge for every copy that is passed around under the terms of the GPL.
The royalty is quite reasonable. If you had to pay $0.75 for your copy of WinAMP, would that really seem unfair to you?
AOL Time Warner, the parent company of Nullsoft, can afford to pay the minimum royalties that Thomson Multimedia asks for. If I wrote and published an MP3 player, on the other hand, and only 1,000 copies were downloaded in a given year, I would have to pay $15.00 per copy.
I have a large library of audio files that need to get published on the net. They're free, noncommercial, non-revenue-generating.
If your site's space and bandwidth are paid for with advertisements, then it is not non-revenue-generating. If they are demos for potential employers to look at when evaluating your fitness for employment, then they are not non-revenue-generating. You may want to argue differently, but Thomson Multimedia most likely has more money to spend on legal representation than you have.
I'll publish them at least in MP3 format, and maybe Ogg if I can get a good encoder
I have a feeling that the parent comment is a repost from the previous article about MP3 patent licensing. In response, I recommended OggDropXPd and noted that users of Winamp 2.80 and later could play Ogg files.
Will I retire or break 10K?
Can Thomson actually show me the patent which covers the MP3 decoding process? As far as I can tell, their patents only claim a method of encoding, but I'm not a patent lawyer, and I haven't read every patent they own. Anyone?
RedHat doesn't include MP3 support by default in the distribution.
But at install, asks, "Would you like to download free MP3 support for XMMS?"
They've sold the distribution with a media player - But the MP3 capability is then distributed seperately, still by RedHat, but for free. (i.e. it is NEVER placed in their boxed distros)
retrorocket.o not found, launch anyway?
This would be a good place for MS to now enable their DRM system to stop unlicensed MP3 DEcoders from running..
Will they take this "opportunity" to try out their new EUL? It would be a very 'Microsoft' thing to do. IMHO.
LoB
"Anyone who stands out in the middle of a road looks like roadkill to me." --Linus
You are rejecting Ogg Vorbis purely and only because of the name. That's just stupid.
.ogg as extensions. Why would he care about the extension, even if it's a weird one? It works, and is good, THAT is what matters.
Face it: Ogg Vorbis is technologically superior to MP3, in every way. So the name isn't so great. But really... so what? It's the technology that matters. Streaming can be done easier, files can be smaller and sound better, you can sort your collection in any way because of the flexible tagging system. Ogg Vorbis is the future!
To reject superior technology and freedom, only because of the name, is stupid and totally rediculous. You don't get sleepless nights because of it, the world won't explode, your CD collection won't be sucked into a black hole. If name is the most important thing, then we wouldn't have all these machines today. It's all in your mind! The technological benefits far outweight this little thingy called "name".
MP3 is old and inferior and should die. Death to old technology!
And you know what? A lot of people don't care about the name, because all they want is the best product available. Vorbis *is* one of the best, and gives more freedom, and is totally free. And all Joe Average sees is
You mentioned gif. You know what gif means in Dutch? Poison! But that didn't stop people from using it.
Their insistence that nothing has changed when there is ample fact that something HAS changed is very 1984-ish. We know where Winston Smith works now.
I thought that windows Media Player supported mp3s.
If I'm wrong, sorry. If I'm right... that's a lot of licenses to pay.
This isn't new information. We've known the MP3 codec was proprietary and yet most of us continued to use it. If you want a real alternative, then I suggest looking at Ogg Vorbis. It's free as in beer and speech. It's also better!
-Tom
Not to be a stickler, but the freely usable (and W3C-recommended) replacement for GIF is PNG. Like GIF, PNG is non-lossy compression. JPEG is lossy.
I'll be quiet now.
Don't you mean OGG? I think OOG is the format the cavemen used. No, wait, that's UGH. Sorry.
Hey kids, there's only 5 days left 'til Yak Shaving Day!
Thompson's license is stronger on freedom than the GPL. The software that uses it has to stay free; it can't be imprisoned in a box with a pricetag.
Yes, this impacts Red Hat's "revenue model" of taking the work of others and reselling it. Tough.
Company "A" has patented technology "a". Company "B" makes a free player using technology "a" and gives it away. Company "C" sells its distribution "c" that includes pruduct "b".
The question is, whether company "C" should pay company "A" for the use of the patented technology "a". Inclusion of "b" into "c" may make the later more valuable, even though everybody can take "b" for free.
The question is not nearly as simple as your comment implies. Next time please take time to understand the issue instead of posting template-based comments.
Jedi: This is not a new licensing agreement. (waves hand)
Linux geek: This is not a new agreeement.
Jedi: These are the same terms you've always had. (does a back flip)
Linux geek: These terms are the same as before.
Jedi: You just never read them carefully enough before. (stands on the geeks head)
Linux geek: I guess I never read the old terms. I need to go home and rethink my distro.
WWJD? JWRTFA!
The GPL gives you permission to copy the software, provided certain conditions are met, namely the redistribution of source.
The patent imposes separate restrictions on the algorithms used. Specifically you may not charge for the software if you want to redistribute royalty free.
You are able to fufil the terms of both agreements simultaneously.
If the patent licence prevents you from releasing source code, or from allowing others to redistribute it there might be a conflict, but there is no such clause it is a non issue.
Of course you could just move to a country in which Thomson does not own the patent.
The only real problem is that you can't put an mp3 player on a for pay distribution of GPL'd software, even though the value of the player is a minute fraction of the value of all the other software on the disk.
Super-simple, perfectly legal workaround: RedHat could leave the mp3 players in the downloadable distribution (it's freely available, so isn't violating the patent), and the boxed set could have a feature in the installer which would ask "would you like to install the FREE mp3 software blah blah". The user clicks the "YES" box, and the system downloads and installs the decoders.
Actually, the user likely wouldn't be connected to the 'net while installing, so maybe it should happen the first time they connect to RedHat to get updates. Or does RedHat offer to download updates during the install now (I know Mandrake does in the latest betas)? That would be the perfect time to do it.
Hey kids, there's only 5 days left 'til Yak Shaving Day!
This would relegate mpg321, XMMS mp3 input plugin, etc to the non-free section of Debian; as the author (and maintainer within Debian) of mpg321, I'd rather it be removed altogether than relegated to non-free.
I understand that Thompson wants to make money, but their licensing practices wrt free software leave much to be desired. I'm now faced with the possibility of discontinuing development on mpg321 because of their licensing practices; it may be possible to change it to work with Ogg Vorbis, and use mp3 as a seperate input plug-in, but this is dependent upon Rob Leslie's work on an integer-only Ogg Vorbis decoder.
Someone please tell me I'm not the only one here with that '70s song 'Water Flowing Underground' stuck in his head after reading this article title.
Same as it ever was...
Same as it ever was...
Same as it ever was...
Same as it ever was!
And no, I don't have an MP3 of it!
Good judgment comes from experience.
Experience comes from bad judgment.
Does this mean that if someone distributes a previously-existing decoder that fell under the free-of-charge clause, they can continue distributing it under the license they originally licensed it with?
Did the original license have a clause where they could change the license terms?
It seems to me that without a clause allowing them to change the license at a later date you could claim that any existing player that fell and continues to fall under the previous exemption doesn't need to pay the fee, since it was licensed under the original terms.
Argue the licensing fees per person (use, etc) down to very little:
... then for $0.75 anyone could use a thread on this global distributed computer to decode mp3s. But there would only be "one" multi threaded globaly distributed decoder and thus only one $0.75 charge (presumably to whoever decides to set up this distributed decoder) ... ever... ? right ?
...
Okay, so if i have one decoder, i'll have to pay $0.75, correct?
What if i have a multi processor machine? Still only $0.75?
What if the decoder it is multi-threaded to run faster on multi-processor machines?
What if it can decode multiple streams at one (for internet radio applications for instance) (which may involve decoding two or more streams and them mixing between them) ?
What if the machine is a distributed computer?
The distributed decoder need only be in name (and description) different from any other software mp3 decoder.
Each time anyone wants to decode an mp3, it asks the distributed network (or in this case the portion of it running on their computer) to decode the mp3
Perl 6 will give you the big knob. -- Larry Wall
Thompson's license is stronger on freedom than the GPL.
I beg your pardon? What freedom is that?
Freedom to write code under a different license that either A: I can't profit from (freeware); B: I can't sell without paying them a royalty (commercial); C: Release under a license that another company can sell my code without paying me anything (BSD-style).
I don't know about decoding, but it's been well-known that all mp3 encoding has involved a mandatory payment to Thomson/Franhofer for years. People who have encoded mp3s over the last five years on their PCs, have been in full knowledge that this is a proprietary technology, and fortunately many have moved to ogg vorbis.
The thing that boggles the mind is that some people (many of them freedom/GPL advocates) still use this mp3 technology even today.
What can I say? Fools!
"Nine times out of ten, starting a fire is not the best way to solve the problem." - my wife
First off, have you tried using Virtualdub? I'm Certain that you can in fact produce an AVI with ogg streams for audio. Although vp3 isn't quite ready to replace mpeg-4 yet, you can at least reduce the amount of closed source software used to produce an avi.
Oh, and Winamp 2.81 with the DivX movie plugin will play DivX'ed movies, even ones with ogg soundtracks.
https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/free-sw.html
If you GPL a MP3-player program, which includes the patented MP3 technology, and offer the program free of charge, there is no issue for you. You are not in violation of the patent.
It is also not your concern, regarding the royalties on any copies sold. That is the concern of the person who decides to alter your GPL'ed program and sell it for money under the GPL.
Also, remember that this patent is not applicable in every nation. So offer the program from a nation where this patent is not granted, or which does not recognize the patent. Then the conflict is a non-issue.
Furthermore, lets remember that this will be a non-issue in a few years anyways (remember, patents exist for some 20 years). I believe that the patent on MP3-technology is due to run out soon.
Another solution for people who want to release code under the GPL -- keep the patented technology "at an arms length" from the GPL'ed code. Offer it as one package, but your MP3 program "call" the patented MP3-software. Create a separate licence for the patent software, identical to the GPL, except having terms requiring that redistribution be free of charge. Simple.
That is not to absolve Thompson of any responsibility. He and Fraunhofer allowed the public to be deceived, and waited until the format was popular to speak publicly about its patents and enforce them. This was a clearly designed plan -- once they saw MP3 becoming popular -- to trap people. They realized it was getting popular, but decided to refrain from enforcing or mentioning its patent terms; this way, it would become more and more popular without any inhibitions. Then when it was popular and ubiquitous, many MP3-players depending on it, they decided to close the trap. Had they enforced and publicized the patent issue from the beginning, MP3 never would have become popular, and a format like OGG-VORBIS would have been developed a long time ago as a replacement.
There should be some requirement by the government that if companies don't enforce their patents, they lose them, similarly to trademarks. Otherwise, companies just wait for many people to be in violation of their IP, then sue.
social sciences can never use experience to verify their statemen
We know where Winston Smith works now.
I'm sorry, but you're mistaken. No one by that name has ever worked here.
We have always been at war with Eurasia
I would expect at least the download editions to get the decoders restored.
Why would RedHat make their free-to-download version more full-featured than the version that they are trying to sell for money? Seems to be weighting the wrong side, from their point of view.
If you're a zombie and you know it, bite your friend!
The statement made by Thomson relating to Slashdot's post can be read here as well. Replying directly to the Slashdot post, Thomson makes it clear that "Thomson has never charged a per unit royalty for freely distributed software decoders."
If you check out the list of licensees at mp3licensing.com, you'll find Microsoft right there. And if you look at the royalty rates, you'll find out how much they paid for a one-time paid-up software decoder license.
You may think folks will overlook a name for technology reasons but go out and read a good contemporary marketing paper.. Most people are lethargic, lemmings who don't waste any more synaptic connections in their brains if they don't have to. There have been countless studies of soft drinks (for example) where without the label they couldn't pick out there own supposed 'favorite' drink.... Basic marketing is the root of all subconscious. If your average user thinks Ogg is some IT-goober's format, it will never take off.
For the original release. If somebody then sells it as part of another product they have to pay the royalty. It's consistant from an original release point of view (which mp3 encoders/decoders released under GPL aren't) and whoever sells it has to pay for selling it. Unfortunately this doesn't help Red Hat.
Nerd: Derogatory term typically directed at anybody with a lower Slashdot ID than you.
You aren't restricting anyones rights, the owner of the patent that may or may not exist in your location is.
I believe that France does not permit crypto, you can not legally distribute it there. Does this mean that you can not GPL crypto as the government of France restricts who you can distribute it to.
I don't think this invalidates the GPL.
You can still re distribute the source
you are licensed under the GPL
The government and others may take other means to try to restrict you, but that should be irrelevant
Thanks to the thousands that understand, are mistaken or simple intuitive:
h am e+on+me%22&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&hl=en&met a=
http://www.google.ca/search?q=%22fool+me+once+s
Any of the desktop player software written for Linux and licensed under the GPL or other free license were never intented for sale, they were given away. Just because Red Hat shoveled them onto a CD and charges for that CD doesn't mean that they are selling the software. Redhat is selling their support of the software on the CD, more specificly they are selling support for the system they have created using GPL'ed software. Since the software is distributed under the GPL it is still free, Thompson can consider that Redhat isn't selling the free player, they are selling the CD, the buyer is paying Redhat for the distribution of the software, the service of downloading and copying to the CD and the support of installation and use of the software.
So Redhat isn't under the gun. But anyone who wants to sell a hardware device containing the software (car mp3 players) probably IS running afowl of the patent.
IANAL, but the above is my common sense opinion.
Since Thompson hasn't "said boo" in so many years they may have even lost the right to do so.
You are misdiagnosing the problem and that's bad because it won't let us avoid this problem in the future.
MP3 is an aging and mediocre music compression standard. There is nothing essential or noteworthy about it. It caught on because people incorrectly believed it was free. Had people thought through the patent issues from the start, online music could have evolved some other, open standard.
The implication therefore is not to accept patented standards like GIF or MP3 as necessary evils, but for people working on cutting edge technologies (and those are usually people in the academic and open source world) to build their systems around unencumbered standards from the start.
And the same things apply to users. Don't use MP3 or ASP or MS Word or whatever just because you think it's cool. Think about the consequences of what happens if everybody does what you do. If you help a company unnecessarily establish a proprietary standard, you will pay for that many times over in the long run. So, think about the consequences of your actions, even if in the short term something may seem expedient.
In any case, Thompson isn't even giving you a license to use the MP3 patents, they merely state their intentions. And their patents are valid in only a few countries anyway so that even if there were a conflict in the US and the GPL self-terminated in that case, there can still be lots of GPL'ed MP3 players (just like there are MP3 encoders available over the Internet from countries where the MP3 patents aren't valid). So, I really don't see what possible connection there could be between a software author putting a GPL on a piece of code and some statement of intent by Thompson on their web site.
IANAL, but this should not be too hard, and I guess there aren't too many developers who hold copyright on the plugin.
But Joe Average doesn't care about what Ogg is. The ones who encode music and distribute them on P2P networks are not Joe Averages, and are smarter. Those people don't judge things on names as much as Joe Average does. Have you read the forums about movie/music encoding like Doom9.org or PowerDivX.com? The encoders *love* Ogg. If the encoders use Ogg, Joe Average will be forced to use Ogg too. But since all Joe Average wants is free music, he will not care that his music file is called Ogg.
Actually, I considered that as I was writing my message - but no, I really think the younger adults and teens *are* influential.
True, they may not directly have the responsibility in a corporation to "call the shots" ordering a change in OS or software.
That's not really the problem, though. The people who do call those shots are typically pretty far away from the technologies themselves. They don't really know more than just a basic overview of what "software package A" does for their company, and why it's supposed to be better than "package B".
They end up relying on "their people" to keep them informed, or at least to "use their best judgement" in selecting the right products for their businesses. That's where all these young adults and teens come in. They're usually the ones setting up the computers and software, implementing the changes, and getting their voices heard when they constantly chatter about the way they think things should be.