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SanDisk MP3 Players Seized in MP3 Licence Dispute
MrSteveSD writes "According to the BBC, German officials have seized Sandisk's MP3 players at the IFA show in Berlin. The Italian company Sisvel claims that Sandisk has refused to pay license fees for the MP3 codec. Sisvel President Roberto Dini has said that Sandisk could get an edge over competitors by not paying the fees. How much are proprietary format licensing fees pushing up the cost of consumer goods?"
I'm actually really glad I purchased a SanDisk MP3 player now!
Did you ever notice that *nix doesn't even cover Linux?
IFA Show? IFA is the world's largest Consumer Electronics trade fair, the most important international exhibition for electronic entertainment, communications and ...
From the article:
SanDisk's IFA stall was left almost empty ... Giustino de Sanctis, head of Sisvel's US-based subsidiary Audio MPEG, SanDisk's refusal to purchase an MP3 licence leaves them out of step with some 600 other manufacturers and software developers. ... "We have 600 licensees and we have to protect their rights, and the rights of the patent holders,"
Protect their "right" to pay you for an audio compression algorithm by embarrassing a competitor at the show? That's some kind of protection alright.
Just use ogg.
Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.
That's OGG and while OGG has it's place, we're talking MP3 codec.
SanDisk and others in the music player market need MP3 codecs to even consider a media player release.
OGG codec is a nice to have.
So I'm not getting your point. Or were you somehow trying to say "we should all ditch MP3 for OGG because OGG is license free"?
If that's the case, then stop mumbling and just come out and say it, then we could all have a laugh at your expense and be friends.
I think you're a little confused about capitalism. Cartels (the essential problem behind proprietary format adoption) are inimical to capitalism. They are the opposite of competition. When a proprietary format becomes the de facto standard due not to its superiority, but due to its selection by the established companies, it's not a success of capitalism.
I've noticed a lot of pseudo-capitalists like to bandy out the insult of "communism" when they want to endorse anticompetitive systems. It's actually the opposite, though; these people are far closer to practical "communists" (desiring centralized control by whoever already has the money or power) than those they attack.
And a farkin licensing fee or royalty compensation is A-O-Fuggin-K in my book.
The problem is when formats that we use to communicate are encumbered by patents.
It's not enough just to make something better. We've already done that: it's called Vorbis. The inventors of MP3 are now profiting not on the merit of their technology, but the sheer inertia that you get when one format is a dominant standard.
It's just like GIF: PNG is better than GIF is nearly every way, and yet the computing world was stuck paying Unisys for years for their inferior technology, simply because GIF was entrenched.
That's why we "communist buddies" insist on unencumbered standards when it comes to the protocols and formats we use to communicate. We're not interested in writing checks indefinitely for the privilege of sending data to other people, or putting it on devices. It would be one thing if these technologies competed on merit alone, and if you could quickly drop one when a better one became available, but it doesn't work that way.
You've just explained why technology is moving so slowly nowadays.
Did you know perpendicular recording for hard disks was developed in 1976 but is only now being implemented? It's because patent law has caused hard drive makers to sit on the technology and wait for the patent to expire before researching its implementation - which, just so you know, is long before the production phase.
Many patent holders are now stuck waiting for someone to implement their ideas, while industrialists are waiting for their patents to expire. The patent holders get no money and the technology they came up with, never makes it to market for over 20 years.
The makers of the mp3 patent, thus, took advantage of something called submarine patents. They let the technology fall into the wild, where people use their technology for a while, and then they nail them with the mp3 patent when the product goes commercial and is heavily entrenched. Also see: Unisys and GIF.
Now you have companies like Intellectual Ventures which amass zillions of patents intending to ensnare anyone who blunders into their mine field.
BTW a great deal of our economy is now engulfed in patent litigation. Fear of patent litigation is slowing a lot of innovation because practically any business model based on cutting edge work is vulnerable to a lawsuit over an infringement of an obscure or broad brushing patent.
Let me put it this way for your Conservative mind:
If Frauhoff (sp?) had enforced their patent from day one, you would not be seeing mp3's in existence now, or at any time until after the patent ran out.
--- Grow a pair, liberals... stop letting the Republicans bully you!
Given the ubiquity of MP3, moving to OGG is probably not going to happen. 4 years is nowhere near as long as it would take an entire technogeneration to migrate away from MP3, and as MP3 becomes public domain in 4 years, just wait until then and MP3 will be just as or more "free" than OGG (public domain is "more free" than GPL, sort of).
MP3 quality is fine, and with flash memory prices in freefall, squeezing an extra 13.8% off the track size at a given quality level is going to be moot very soon, if it is not already.
Yours sincerely,
Mr. Reality Check.
I hate printers.
I think the reason that so many people have little respect for licence fees, royalties etc is that so few people individuals receive them.
Most folks' employment is of the form "i get a flat rate and any beneficial thing i come up with benefits only my employer, if i don't come up with beneficial things i get fired". The employer gets to make as much money as it can prise out of the marketplace for the employees ideas/labour etc. Since business is obliged to seek the lowest bidding supplier unless they are forced to do otherwise, ordinary wage slaves feel justified in seeking the lowest cost supplier, such as P2P.
They whose government reduces their essential liberties for temporary security, receive neither liberty nor security.
How much would we expect to pay for a car if we had to pay intellectual property fees to the inventors of everything back to the wheel?
Come to think of it... would technology have been able to advance as quickly as it has if we were forced to pay these taxes on the wheel for the last 10,000 years?
Does it go on forever?
Software patent bill thrown out
Way to go to ignore the will of the elected representatives of the people!
So, if I'm getting this right, a bunch of MP3 players (made in the far East where the relevant patents are in all probability null and void) are seized at a trade show in Germany (where the relevant patents are null and void: Germany is a member of the EU where mathematical operations are specifically excluded from patentability) are seized on the orders of an IP firm based in Italy (where the relevant patents are null and void: Italy is a member of the EU where maths is not patentable) on the grounds that they are in violation of patents?
The fact that the patents in question are null and void will hardly escape the attention of the courts. I don't know whether to expect some good arse-on-plate-handing action, or just a swift "Ting! Next, please!"
Je fume. Tu fumes. Nous fûmes!
Seems to me that I am paying for the same patent too many times - when I buy a mobile, an ipod, car stereo, audio system, OS......instead of all that, if I could just buy a license can I use it on all these devices. What I mean to say is that too many OEMs are buying the same license on my behalf for each of their devices. That seems like a bad deal.
As IP licensing fees are pretty much comparable to actual outright taxes on the economy, it's time to get them reported as such and accounted for, just like VAT or any other product tax.
Once the actual cost of the IP systems is accounted for in state budgets instead of hidden away, it would be far easier to get a rational discussion about the cost and benefits of the systems.
I've used Sandisk players now for several years and they are the most versatile player for the best price on the market. I just bought their new 8 gig flash memory model that plays video for myself and my daughter. They rock and I don't have to treat them like eggs when I ride my bike. I have had it with the misinterpretation of intellectual property killing innovation. It's time for more people to ignore stupid applications of IP. And NO COPYRIGHT OR PATENT AFTER THE INNOVATOR DIES. Period.
You are welcome on my lawn.
Until networks can be built up to handle that type of traffic. My first modem was 2400 BAUD (yes folks, that's a whopping 0.24 Kilobytes per second - even viewing a screen of text you had to sit there is see the data "flow" across the screen as it loaded). This was right around 1992 or 93. On my next upgrade a 14.4K modem seemed lighting fast - I would have never dreamed of having even my relatively slow broadband connection that I have today (1.5Mbps down, 256Kbps up). I'm sure that in 10 years when the max advertised speed is a 100Mbps connection a user that utilizes 3 to 4 Mbps of that connection for video and audio content won't really be saturating much of anything.
"People who think they know everything are very annoying to those of us who do."-Mark Twain
If you find any one of these things to be true, maybe take a moment to analyze your stance? If you find your first reaction to positive comments on Ogg to be one of anger, maybe do that analysis?
If there's anyone out there who dislikes Ogg and who isn't attached to MP3, it would be good to get your perspective. Please speak out.
It doesn't help that advocates of Ogg often have strong opinions about the values of using Ogg. But don't let another person's attitude deflect you from really thinking through Ogg's value for yourself. Having a chip-on-your-shoulder reaction is the essence of fanboyism.
The quality is comparable. The hardware/processing footprint is comparable. There are no technical downsides. (Don't correct me to tell me how Ogg is much better -- I'm understating the point for a reason.) Ogg detractors often get these points wrong. Unapologetically unresearched inaccuracy is another sign of fanboyism.
Adding Ogg to your hardware is easy enough -- there are over 100 models of portable player listed on just this page. So if you want to use Ogg, either as a manufacturer or a consumer, there's no problem. (If you want to keep using your old MP3s -- go ahead. Just file your new Ogg files alongside them.)
Unlike MP3, however, Ogg is public domain.
So, all things even, Ogg beats out MP3. So, even if Ogg weren't quite as good as MP3, it should be supported for the (lack of) licensing. You won't get shenanigans like what this article's about. You can implement your own software. You can build your own hardware without incrementing its cost by the royalties + insurance against litigation. (Well, likely you'll still be paying those for the other formats your player supports.) You can improve the format. You can distribute, sell, or stream Ogg files without liability.
The manufacturers support it and there are many communities using it. There is no reason to encode another MP3.
Ogg: highly recommended.
(Disclaimer: I personally don't use Ogg Vorbis much. My music's all lossless.)