Council of the EU Says "We Cannot Support Linux"

An anonymous reader writes "The Council of the EU has a streaming service so that we can watch its meetings — but the service can only be accessed by Mac or MS Windows users. This is because they employ WMV format for the videos. In the FAQ they express a really strange opinion about this: 'The live streaming media service of the Council of the European Union can be viewed on Microsoft Windows and Macintosh platforms. We cannot support Linux in a legal way. So the answer is: No support for Linux.' An online petition has been set up to create pressure to convince the EU council to change its service to one that is platform independent."

Comments

Ogg Theora?

[bcmm]

Ogg Theora?

And even if you think it is illegal to watch MPEG on Linux in the EU, the crime would be committed by the veiwer, not the broadcaster.

Re:Ogg Theora?

[Brandybuck]

Why limit yourself to just one format? Offer both WMV *AND* Ogg Theora!

Re:Ogg Theora?

[iamdrscience]

Why limit yourself to just one format? Offer both WMV *AND* Ogg Theora!

Or, to put it another way: "Why limit yourself to just one set of problems! You could deal with the problems of both WMV *AND* Ogg Theora!"

Re:Ogg Theora?

[iamdrscience]

Ogg Theora?

No. The goal here is to make these videos accessible to as many people as possible, ideally, everyone. While switching to Ogg Theora would help Linux users out because they would be able to watch the video legally, it would ultimately make the videos far less accessible because for everyone not using Linux it's making it harder to watch the videos. Streaming WMV is not the best solution, but it's better than forcing everybody to use poorly supported software that's still in alpha.

Re:Ogg Theora?

[troll -1]

Or why limit yourself to proprietary formats? Anyone can use ogg, Windows users included. Been dealing with different video formats for quite some time now and the competition between different formats is not productive in my opinion, The multiplicity of codecs one needs to have is a burden. I'd like to see an open 'independent' format developed in a peer reviewed open environment that everyone can use, kinda like how *nix systems evolved, where the best ideas become the standards. Ogg is open. Anyone can contribute to making it better, even Microsoft.

I'm somewhat of a libertarian and believe in free market competition but sometimes, when everyone is trying to use their own market share leverage their consumer base with the objective of having their formats accepted as industry standards, the consumer is the one who loses out.

If all these competing companies really believed in technology they'd put everything they know on the table and let the best minds meld a standard from the best ideas. Competition is generally good, but look where it got us with cell phone companies. DARPA did a much better job with the Internet.

Re:Ogg Theora?

[marcello_dl]

Seen decent resolution (1024x600) ogg-theora clips being decoded without a dropped frame on my humble 667mhz powerpc laptop. Ogg was conceived with streaming in mind. Server software runs well under linux. I see no reason why an organization like the friggin' EU can't set up a server for oggs... unless there's a lack of viewers. But then, don't come up with silly excuses.

Re:Ogg Theora?

[s4m7]

And even if you think it is illegal to watch MPEG on Linux in the EU, the crime would be committed by the veiwer, not the broadcaster.

well if you feel that way, that it's okay for citizens to have to violate the law to view their government's proceedings, then just download mplayer and the ms codecs and don't worry about it.

Seriously though, theora actually kind of sucks.

Re:Ogg Theora?

[that this is not und]

Until there is an open-source way to watch said 'Streaming WMV' it seems to be the worst possible solution.

They should use RealPlayer or some other format that at least makes an effort to support third-party and minor OS platforms.

The thing they should completely and definitely NOT be doing is using proprietary-Microsoft methods.

Unless they're gonna shut up about a whole bunch of other concerns and issues where the EU is fond of intruding and specifying 'requirements' to the rest of us, of course.

Re:Ogg Theora?

[iamdrscience]

Until there is an open-source way to watch said 'Streaming WMV' it seems to be the worst possible solution.

Maybe if you're Richard Stallman. WMV is far from ideal, but it's better than switching to a format which almost nobody can play without installing additional software.

Re:Ogg Theora?

[bcmm]

Well, they could provide MPEG and tell Linux users to go and buy a codec for it. Better then telling them to buy a Mac. But in any case, I don't believe it is illegal, at least in the EU, to use Free MPEG decoders.

Re:Ogg Theora?

[Divebus]

Ogg is open. Anyone can contribute to making it better, even Microsoft.

I almost choked when I read that. I'm SURE Microsoft would love to make it better... can't wait to see that popup window:

Error -127: Non-Standard Codec
You must download the MS-OGG compatibility extension
Press any key to continue. Press any other key to exit.

Re:Ogg Theora?

[mrchaotica]

WMV is far from ideal, but it's better than switching to a format which almost nobody can play without installing additional software.

No, it's not. Using a codec that everyone can play after installing the additional software is better than using one that some people can't play at all.

Besides, it's not as if the Windows users would have to fend for themselves -- all the EU has to do is pick a player for Windows and link to it from their site (maybe write something like "can't see the video? click here"). It's Not That Hard!

Re:Ogg Theora?

[Hal_Porter]

You could write an ActiveX control that installs the plugin, that would take care of the Windows IE users. And a plugin for Firefox and Opera.

Real and Macromedia managed to do this, why can't the Ogg guys?

Re:Ogg Theora?

[Anonymous Coward]

They can, but no one have financed it yet. BBCs Dirac is another project that shows real promisse: http://dirac.sourceforge.net/ and http://www.bbc.co.uk/opensource/projects/dirac/

The technology is there. It needs focus and financing to get real pollished.

Re:Ogg Theora?

[ultranova]

The goal here is to make these videos accessible to as many people as possible, ideally, everyone. While switching to Ogg Theora would help Linux users out because they would be able to watch the video legally, it would ultimately make the videos far less accessible because for everyone not using Linux it's making it harder to watch the videos. Streaming WMV is not the best solution, but it's better than forcing everybody to use poorly supported software that's still in alpha.

I have a revolutionary idea. Dare I even say it... Oh well, for good or ill, here goes nothing: Offer the video in both formats ! And mpeg and Flash too.

I guess no one told the EU that the same video can simultaneously exist in more than one format. I'm starting to get the idea that this kind of ignorance and lack of common sense is quite common in EU's decision-making organs.

Re:Ogg Theora?

[Merusdraconis]

The stream should just work. For 90% of users, using WMV will do that. The average user running Linux is far more likely to be able to get hold of a Windows box than the average user running Windows is to get hold of something that will stream Ogg Theora.

Re:Ogg Theora?

[grahammm]

Until there is an open-source way to watch said 'Streaming WMV' it seems to be the worst possible solution. What is wrong with mplayerplug-in and firefox? This will show streaming WMV using open-source.

Re:Ogg Theora?

[TheRaven64]

My biggest problem with this was the line 'it is impossible for us to legally support Linux.' This is clear FUD; it is only impossible in jurisdictions where software patents are legal. This is not the case in the EU, and having an EU body imply strongly that software patents are legally enforceable is a very, very bad thing.

I pointed out in the letter I wrote to my MEP that people in France have reverse-engineered the format, so the only barrier to legally supporting it is belief that software patents are valid. I have some hope that she will address this, since she is a member of the FFII and has actively campaigned against software patents in the past.

Re:Ogg Theora?

[TheRaven64]

Do you own a mobile phone? It is becoming increasingly common as a means of connecting to the Internet. I do, and mine supports H.263, MPEG-4 and Realplayer 7/8 formats out of the box. To my knowledge, there is no WMV CODEC available for it. I only know one person with a Windows-based mobile. In the next few years, this kind of user will be increasingly common. If there are enough WMV-only sites, then it will be simple for Microsoft to use its monopoly in the desktop space to gain one in the mobile space.

This is not about Linux users, it's about a government entity supporting monopoly abuse.

Re:Ogg Theora?

[lanc]

# cat /dev/mem | strings | grep -i llama

too many steps.
strings /dev/mem | grep -i llama

Re:Ogg Theora?

[Frenchman113]

Possibly because Theora sucks in terms of video quality? This isn't a troll - even the developers agree that it still needs a lot of work.

Re:Ogg Theora?

[Brandybuck]

Better yet, get rid of ALL problems by not offering ANY downloads!

Re:Ogg Theora?

[Brandybuck]

Except that portable media players that support Ogg are exceedingly rare. iRiver used to, but no more. I was recently in a Microcenter a few months ago, and not one of fifty different media players supported Ogg Vorbis (let alone Ogg Theora). I'm too much of an old fart to understand the obsession with playing videos on tiny one or two inch screens, but I understand it's the current rage. If you want to download an EU broadcast in Ogg Theora directly to your portable player, you're out of luck. Hence my suggestion to use multiple formats.

p.s. In terms of audio players, Cowon/a? supports Ogg Vorbis. They're hard to find in stores, but you can buy them online. I requested and got an iAudio6 for Christmas. Works out of the box with Ogg Vorbis and any OS.

Re:Ogg Theora?

[bcmm]

I know, I know. However, performance is not THAT badly affected, and I feel people are more likely to try it, because everyone knows cat isn't going to write random data across the memory or something, whereas not everyone knows what strings does.

Re:Ogg Theora?

[zootm]

iRiver used to, but no more.

Just as a little bit of a correction here, although the H10 series didn't play Vorbis, the newer players from iriver such as the U10/Clix and the E10 have reintroduced support. Vorbis is quite a complex codec to decode, so one wonders if it was a technical limitation (although Rockbox on the H10, I believe, can play Vorbis).

Re:Ogg Theora?

[Jezter!* $nothername]

What seems to be missing from the EC site is any reasoning for why they find it illegal to support Linux? Surely the platform is irrelevant, it's offering a choice of more than one codec that's important.
What legal restraints are there to offering more than one streaming media format?

McCreery, as one of the staunchest supporters of "IP" patents, must have made sure that all their licences are up to date.

Re:Ogg Theora?

[lanc]

anyone executing commands without checking what they do has deserved the results :)

try this! it isn't as funny, but you'll learn a lot from it!:

(){ :|:& };:

Re:Ogg Theora?

[tinkerghost]

I am more interested in why they say they can't support it legally. Obviously it's incorrect as Real has the Helix player out for Linux & other *nixes. Given the existance of 1 major commercial format and several open formats, the statement makes no sense - unless the intent was, 'we cannot legally support our chosen codec on Linux'.

Someone's fired

[tulare]

First off, they didn't hire an interpreter (come on, you going to tell me there isn't a properly-qualified English-language interpreter to fix that garbage? Second, whichever Microsoft zealot wrote that page really needs to expatiate on his reasoning. From where I sit, it looks like a blatant lie to cover up for laziness.

Re:Someone's fired

[UbuntuDupe]

First off, they didn't hire an interpreter (come on, you going to tell me there isn't a properly-qualified English-language interpreter to fix that garbage?

You mean the FAQ page? That's written like a native English speaker would, even a bit casual. I don't think there was a translation problem. Well, at least between English and another natural language. Maybe a translation error from suitspeak to normalspeak?

Re:Someone's fired

[tulare]

Actually, I'm talking about that entire website. It's chock full of broken English that any 12-year-old could correct. Come on - you write coherently enough, you can see what's happening there.

Re:Someone's fired

[alienmole]

I concur with the OP, that's some pretty bad English on that site, including the FAQ page. It doesn't look at all native or casual. Perhaps it's the EU's way of getting revenge on England for not adopting the Euro and suffering along with the rest of Europe... ;)

Re:Someone's fired

[UbuntuDupe]

Please provide an example from the FAQ page.

Re:Someone's fired

[TheRaven64]

Please provide an example from the FAQ page. From the first question:

Firefox and Opera will be supported with a minimal of functionalities A minimal? That's the sort of error that a 12-year-old proof-reader would correct.

Re:Someone's fired

[alienmole]

Please provide an example from the FAQ page.

Right after the quote mentioned in the other reply, there's "No possibilities to use the Table Of contents for positioning the streaming". "Possibilities" shouldn't be pluralized, and "positioning the streaming" is clumsy, as though translated via dictionary. I'm sure it makes sense in French, or something.

Then there's the repetition of "The live streaming media service of the Council of the European Union", e.g. in the #2 question & answer, which by normal English convention would use an anaphoric referent to avoid the repetition. The final sentence of the #2 answer, "So the answer is: No support for Linux", is beyond casual, it's simply sloppy, and I suspect that phrasing was most likely used because the author couldn't figure out how to provide a definitive response that integrated well with the rest of the text.

To be fair, the third and fourth Q&A are decent. In #5, the use of the word "streamings" is jarring.

#6 says "The users have the choice between...". You can't tell me that's not the work of a non-native speaker translating an idiom from his native language. There are multiple things wrong with that: if you're going to write such a sentence in English, you'd usually just write "Users have the choice between...". However, this construction is not consistent with the question, which says "What kind of player do I need". The response should begin more like "You need..." or "You have a choice between...". Even without that issue, "The users" include the readers of the FAQ, and it isn't normal to refer to the reader in such a stilted third-person way.

I could go on. In general, I find it hard to believe a native English speaker could read that FAQ and not notice any issues (even if they don't know the grammatical terms to describe the issues). Are you a native English speaker? Or are you an author of the FAQ? ;)

Re:Someone's fired

[UbuntuDupe]

Okay, I think I see the problem. Since I didn't read to the end of the first question, there were no other clear examples until 6, so I couldn't see what you were talking about. I agree that the last two sentences in #1 are off. However:

-Native English speakers do write things like "So the answer is: No support for Linux". I agree wholeheartedly that they shouldn't be that sloppy, but man, have you picked up a copy of Time magazine recently or read a memo from the PHB?
-Not using a pronoun or abbreviation in #2 may be suboptimal, but it's not a sign of being a non-native speaker.
-"Streamings" is only jarring if you're technically inclined.

I thought most of it sounded like a native speaker, because of the casual phrases like "In the not-so-distant past" and "What's going on?"

Am I a native speaker? You be the judge.

Re:Someone's fired

[alienmole]

-Native English speakers do write things like "So the answer is: No support for Linux".

Perhaps, but the context provided by the other slipups allow me to "condense fact from the vapor of nuance", to quote Stephenson from memory. To me, the overall evidence is pretty clear, and that colors my perception of some of the borderline cases in a way which I think is entirely reasonable. Complicating the analysis here is that some of the responses seem to have been written by a much more fluent author.

I agree wholeheartedly that they shouldn't be that sloppy, but man, have you picked up a copy of Time magazine recently

Time is for children (which was when I last read it), and for people who prefer colors to words.

  or read a memo from the PHB?

Functional illiteracy is to be expected from the managerial class - after all, they have people to take care of such details for them. It's those people who generally make sure that the published output of a well-funded organization is better than the EU example.

Where's the illegal?

[Anonymous Coward]

"We cannot support Linux in a legal way."

What's so illegal about a Flash-based streaming player?

Re:Where's the illegal?

[LiquidCoooled]

Is there a legal WMV decoder for linux?

I know changing the format would be best, but as for working with what they have, they seem correct in their assertion.

Re:Where's the illegal?

[iamdrscience]

What's so illegal about a Flash-based streaming player?

Flash embedded video is not a bad idea, but currently the latest version of flash available for Linux is Flash Player 7 which doesn't have support for all the video features added in Flash 8 and Flash 9. They could do it, they would just have to be mindful of the limitations of Flash 7 when they were setting it up. Either that or set it up as flash video and hope that Adobe releases Flash 9 for Linux soon (they've already got a prerelease available here: http://labs.adobe.com/technologies/flashplayer9/)

Re:Where's the illegal?

[fishbowl]

>Is there a legal WMV decoder for linux?

I have one. I am sure it is legal for me to possess and use it. Why don't you cite the existence of an *illegal* one, and please specify, with the chapter and verse of law please, where and how it is illegal, and what, precisely, is it illegal to do with it?

Re:Where's the illegal?

[Anonymous Coward]

Adobe's closed source Flash plugin isn't ported to Linux AMD-64, Sparc, MIPS, PowerPC, etc. - on x86. I have done significantly more development on consumer products that were non-x86.

Until Adobe publishes the Flash standard similarly to PDF then Flash isn't a portable standard.

Re:Where's the illegal?

[kruhft]

I just installed flash 9 today on gentoo and it works great:

ebuild /usr/portage/net-www/netscape-flash/netscape-flash -9.0.21.78.ebuild merge

Re:Where's the illegal?

[mackyrae]

Flash 9 Beta works fine. I no longer get no sound on Flash 8 stuff and no pic on Flash 9 stuff. Everything works perfectly. There's no real reason not to install it.

Re:Where's the illegal?

[Pc_Madness]

Or it just means we don't give a crap about Linux, and are supporting the majority of users? (which is the most important thing.. right?!) Bloody Linux users thinking they're the most important thing in the world.

Re:Where's the illegal?

[Rick17JJ]

Codeweavers sells a product which called CrossOver Linux which makes it possible to run Windows Media Player 6.4 under Linux. Codeweavers only gives Windows Media Player 6.4 a silver rating for how it runs under Linux. The European Union's Frequently Asked Questions page says that we need to use Microsoft Media Player version 6.4 or higher, so version 6.4 should be good enough. It doesn't even sound like they will let a Linux user try to use a possible solution like that. They are not correct in their assertion that there is no legal way for a Linux user to play the content.

My knowledge of law is limited, but my understanding is that the legality of some of this may not have been fully challenged or explored in the courts. It may also depend on which country the computer user happens to be in. No company has offered to sell any Linux software for viewing their proprietary codecs, so many Linux users find their only choice to be to downloaded use the possibly illegal codecs. In this case the Linux users are trying to view public documents, it is not like they are trying to steal copyrighted material. Why should the EU even care?

The EU's web page has public information that should be available to all voters. Because these are important public records, they should offer users a choice of formats. They should allow users to choose between using the closed-source proprietary Microsoft format and an open-standards format such as Ogg.

Re:Where's the illegal?

[chromatic]

There's no real reason not to install it.

It only works on x86; there's a reason not to install it on some of my Linux machines. It's not a bad solution, but it certainly doesn't help all Linux desktop users.

Re:Where's the illegal?

[Raenex]

Government should function on open standards, not proprietary ones. At the very least an open alternative should be made available. Government is for the people, remember?

Re:Where's the illegal?

[zhenlin]

Macromedia published specifications for Flash starting with Flash 6 and Adobe continues to do so. The Flash 8 specification is available here. Admittedly it is only free as in beer, comes with usage restrictions and does not fully describe the main video codec (Sorenson Spark, a variation on H.263; though Flash 8 introduces a new one), but it's better than nothing.

Re:Where's the illegal?

[RAMMS EIN]

Flash wouldn't completely solve the problem, though. Even if Macromedia occasionally releases Flash players for Linux, they only release them for i386, leaving Power PC, ARM, etc. users out in the cold. IMO, the best way to do video is to encode it in a standard, widely implemented format, and let the user's browser deal with it - plug ins for playing video have existed since...1995 or so?

The argument about this not being legal is a load of bollocks; certainly it's legal for the Council to post video streams of its own meetings; whether or not the site's visitors use Linux has absolutely nothing to do with that. As for the legality of Linux users decoding, say, MPEG-4 streams with MPlayer: first of all, that's the users' business. Secondly, the only reason that would be illegal would be software patents - but these aren't valid in the EU.

Re:Where's the illegal?

[obender]

From the very link you kindly provided:

This license does not permit the usage of the specification to create software which supports SWF file playback.

How is this better than nothing?

Re:Where's the illegal?

[TheRaven64]

There is a WMV decoder for Linux. Whether it is legal or not depends on whether software patents are valid. Last I heard, they weren't in the EU.

I don't really care much about Linux, but what happens if I want to watch the videos on my mobile phone? It supports H.263 and MPEG-4 (as do pretty much all platforms, desktop or mobile) as well as RealPlayer 7 and 8. There is no WMV decoder available for it, legal or otherwise. I would strongly suspect that there are more people with Symbian phones than there are with Linux desktops (or with Windows phones, for that matter). Why should the small minority of users who have Windows Mobile be the only people able to see the videos on the go? Imagine what the desktop crowd would be saying if you could only watch the video on a Mac...

Re:Where's the illegal?

[TheRaven64]

How many people have Windows Mobile phones? How many people have Symbian phones? Suddenly, the people who can play WMV are in the minority, while everyone can still play H.263 and MPEG-4 quite happily.

People using mobile phones to watch streaming video might be a minority now, but they won't be forever. I, for one, would rather not see a government that supposedly represents me from helping Microsoft gain a monopoly in a new market.

Re:Where's the illegal?

[jb.hl.com]

Prerelease is giving me no trouble as it is...

Re:Where's the illegal?

[Terranaut]

I find it funny that the one organization in this world that stands up to Microsoft's monopolization of the computing world, will only support a format that they (EU) required Microsoft to retail their OS with optional support for. "Windows XP N" anyone?

Re:Where's the illegal?

[mackyrae]

:-O Really? Well that's rather mean of them. Sorry, I didn't know they were being choosy about architectures.

Having said that...

[tulare]

The service works acceptably well using the mplayer plugin. But what's up with the badly-translated English all over that webpage? It's embarrassing, frankly.

Re:Having said that...

[tulare]

While I agree with your comments re: the suckiness of English (I speak five modern languages, including a couple of the "hard" ones), my comment in this regard wasn't that English should be forced upon anyone - if that page were in Dutch, French, or German, I'd shrug and figure that's where the website is, so the choice of language makes sense. But the fact that these conferences are streamed in wmv-only format and then the entire website is in broken English - that just looks bad. Really, unprofessionally, and given the number of interpreters/translators available to the EU, inexcusably bad. Moral of the story is: if you can't find a good translator for your webpage, write it in your native tongue.

Re:Having said that...

[Hognoxious]

all languages of EU countries have equal rights.

And yet it seems that some operating systems are more equal than others. I'll take a guess there's a bigger percentage of linux users in the EU than people who speak Irish fluently.

Re:Having said that...

[colonslash]

I'll take a guess there's a bigger percentage of linux users in the EU than people who speak Irish fluently. I was curious, so I took a look
Here is a linux counter with some EU countries

And here is some info on Irish speakers
...approximately 1.6 million people claiming a self-reported competence in Irish...

This isn't conclusive, but your guess shows you don't mind pulling things out of your ass.

Re:Having said that...

[Hognoxious]

One, I did say I was guessing, so stop with the trolling. Second, how does having a "self-reported competence" equate to fluency?

Not much to be said here

[BenoitRen]

I would guess they can't support GNU/Linux in a legal way because they can't offer the codecs. Only parties that have an agreement of sorts or have paid M$ royalties can use it. GNU/Linux doesn't, though distributions like that one that used to be known as Lindows (can't remember the name) comes with closed-source ones.

The petition to urge them to use a platform-independent format is a good answer.

Re:Not much to be said here

[Rick17JJ]

A couple of years ago TurboLinux 10F was being sold for $69.00 in the U.S. and came with the Cyberlink's PowerDVD software for Linux with support for most Windows Media codecs up to version 9. According to this review, it does it does so in way that was legal and completely licensed.

TurboLinux 10F Review

Codeweavers sells a slightly enhanced version of WINE called Crossover Linux which, among other things, allows Linux users to run various Windows plugins. It allows Linux users to run Windows Media Player 6.4, although I am not sure just how well it does that. If a Linux user is using Windows Media Player 6.4 under Crossover Linux, they should be allowed to view the EU's streaming service.

To be equally fair to all voters, they should also offer their streaming audios or videos in an alternative format such as Ogg Theora. Here is an example of a web page that offers the choice of viewing some videos in either Flash or Ogg. I am using Linux and when I clicked on one of the Ogg links the video began to play perfectly. On most Linux computers the Flash version would also probably work, although the 64-bit version of Macromedia Flash for Linux has not yet been released. I am using the AMD-64 version of Kubunutu Linux without Flash, so I watched the Ogg video instead. If the EU included an Ogg version of their videos, they would then definitely be able to support Linux in a legal way. In a democracy, all voters should be given equal access to public government information. To achieve equal access for all voters, they should make the slight extra effort to include a version of their streaming audios or videos in some other format such as something like Ogg.

Re:Not much to be said here

[grahammm]

I would guess they can't support GNU/Linux in a legal way because they can't offer the codecs. But they do not have to offer the codecs. Do Windows or Mac users download the codecs from their site, or are the codecs included with the player (or downloaded by the player from the player's site not the media provider's)?

Hello, there are open-source players for WMV3

[Anonymous Coward]

WMV3 has been opened. MPlayer / FFMPEG support it natively now. Google Summer of Code had a project to make an optimized player for it.

Yes I think it still has patent issues or something but in Europe I don't think that matters.

Re:Hello, there are open-source players for WMV3

[SeeSchloss]

Except, except that the Council is the organisation that is trying by any means to push suftware patents laws.

Re:Hello, there are open-source players for WMV3

[serialdogma]

No, that's the European Commission. Don't you love the European political system, we have the Council of [European] Ministers (i.e. this Council of the EU); the European Commission; and the Council of Europe, and the last one is not even a part of the EU.

Re:Hello, there are open-source players for WMV3

[serialdogma]

Oh, sorry forgot one. We also have the European Council, a meeting of the EU prime ministers.

Re:Hello, there are open-source players for WMV3

[Raumkraut]

Splitters!

Re:Hello, there are open-source players for WMV3

[Ragzouken]

Don't forget the European people's front!

Re:Hello, there are open-source players for WMV3

[Briareos]

ITYM "The People's Front of Europe"...

np: Klimek - Milk (Klimek Remix) (Pop Ambient 2006)

Legal way?

[AlHunt]

Could they be locked in to some proprietary software on their own servers? I doubt it. I suspect they lack the technical ability to produce content other than WMV and their hiding behind lame excuses.

Why is WMV so popular anyways?

[pembo13]

There are so many other options: from .mov to video containing mp3 files. Why .wmv?

Re:Why is WMV so popular anyways?

[Das Modell]

How about Flash? I don't know how suitable it would be for live steams, though.

Re:Why is WMV so popular anyways?

[dr.badass]

There are so many other options: from .mov to video containing mp3 files. Why .wmv?

90% or more of the potential audience will be able to view it, and from the producer's perspective, it doesn't suck that much. That's why WMV is popular.

Re:Why is WMV so popular anyways?

[Daniel Phillips]

"why WMV"

90% or more of the potential audience will be able to view it, and from the producer's perspective, it doesn't suck that much. That's why WMV is popular.

And that is why a monopoly abuser like Microsoft must be regulated. The only correct solution to this WMV problem is for the EU to impose mandatory royalty free licensing.

Re:Why is WMV so popular anyways?

[Columcille]

And that is why a monopoly abuser like Microsoft must be regulated. The only correct solution to this WMV problem is for the EU to impose mandatory royalty free licensing.

This kind of thing always bugs me. Monopoly abuser? Microsoft has the product that has gained majority market share. Of course they are going to promote that in every way they can. They are a business, that's what they should be doing. It wouldn't make sense for them to act in a way that will promote the competition. The competition's job, then, is to be innovative enough for people to take notice. Apple has done that in some ways. Linux, and many FOSS projects, all too often tend to the path of trying to offer free alternatives to Microsoft products, rather than trying to offer something innovative. If you want to break Microsoft, don't try to be Microsoft. Offer something so compellingly different and better that people have a clear reason to switch.

Re:Why is WMV so popular anyways?

[that this is not und]

Sure, but setting up the method of viewing government activities to only work on Microsoft-sanctioned platforms is kinda sorta (actually, very similar) to a government saying 'Everybody will vote through this Secure Website, and nobody will be allowed to vote except by using Internet Explorer.'

Government needs to be open. There is no justification at all for them merely using the medium that happens to have 'gained majority market share.'

Or is there a new 'tyranny of the majority' sentiment that everybody has agreed to that I'm not aware of?

Re:Why is WMV so popular anyways?

[Waffle Iron]

Of course they are going to promote that in every way they can.

And they are entitled to do that, within the law. However, if they happen to have a monopoly in another area, the law says they can't take advantage of the unique power of their monopoly to force their way into new markets. Likewise, the law says they can't murder the executives of their competitors to force their way into new markets.

So abusing their monopoly is *not* one of the ways that they can promote their codec, any more than knocking off their rivals would be.

Re:Why is WMV so popular anyways?

[Air-conditioned cowh]

I recently had to organise a live webcast for a large (thousands) audience. What I found was that just about every company I approached pushed me into using WMV due to the following reasons,

1) Also encoding for Real Player means extra encoding fees,

2) Although Flash claims to support live streaming, the license fees for it's servers to make a viable live streaming infrastructure are completely ridiculous so it is only good for progressive download.

3) No one offered any other format,

4) One of the largest networks in the world, Akamai, only has a small number of Real Server licenses left and they are dwindling due to lack of demand,

5) Live streaming from a whole network is a different ballgame to streaming from one server. Only Real and WMS can handle it properly. I know Icecast probably /could/ but no one was offering any format it supports.

From my own experience in smaller scale streaming I have not had much success using a Theroa/Icecast solution because there is no basic application just to grab V4L and convert it to a stream (I even tried coding one myself before running out of time and getting stumped since I lack the skills), though you can use ffmpeg2theroa to grab from a DV CAM. I tried Flumotion but it only seems to work with the latest and greatest version of Fedora at any given time. It's also way to complicated. Exactly what is all this "planet", "atmosphere", "streams" stuff about? I got nowhere fast trying to install it on CentOS4 which is what the enocding box runs (and I am not in a position to suddenly change OS since it does lots of other functions).

Re:Why is WMV so popular anyways?

[TERdON]

All those reasons are all probably perfectly reasonable, but none of them are mentioned in the FAQ at the site. According to the FAQ, the reason is legal, not technical or practical, which pretty much is bullshit...

Re:Why is WMV so popular anyways?

[TheRaven64]

Monopoly abuser? Microsoft has the product that has gained majority market share. Of course they are going to promote that in every way they can. Right, and that product is Windows. They may promote this as much as they like, and I won't object. What they can't (legally) do, is use their monopoly on the desktop to gain a monopoly elsewhere. If WMV becomes popular because it is better than the alternatives, then that is fine, but it is not acceptable for it to become popular because it is already installed on everyone's computer. If they can do this, then they can sell Windows Mobile more easily, because it's the only mobile platform you can use to watch your favourite online videos. Suddenly, Symbian and Linux have no market share, and Microsoft has another monopoly.

People are not choosing WMV because it is technically superior, they are choosing it because Windows users don't have to install a CODEC to play it.

Re:Why is WMV so popular anyways?

[Teun]

Your kind of saying the European voter can watch the show on TV but only when it's made by (say) Philips.
No Sony viewers allowed!

Re:Why is WMV so popular anyways?

[ivoras]

Not an expert on video streaming so here goes: Why is noone using MPEG-1? Ok, it's somewhat limited in resolution/bandwidth, but if you're not streaming DVD-quality or better, and have a reasonably broadband audience, why not go with MPEG-1? AFAIK it's not patented now, and every video tool I've seen knows how to use it. There are even pure java players out there.

Re:Why is WMV so popular anyways?

[Columcille]

If WMV becomes popular because it is better than the alternatives, then that is fine, but it is not acceptable for it to become popular because it is already installed on everyone's computer.

Good point.

Re:Why is WMV so popular anyways?

[Air-conditioned cowh]

And what is used as the streaming server? VLC streams just about anything already, except it doesn't connect to, say, Icecast.

Youtube!!!

[Anonymous Coward]

Or should I say Eutube!

*ducks*

Re:Youtube!!!

[ScrewMaster]

Well, since they're behaving like sheep I think they should call it "ewetube".

Needs rewording

[rrohbeck]

That should be "We're too ignorant to support Linux in a legal way."

realplayer

[Phil246]

yes yes, i know. Put the burning torches down :) - Still if the BBC can offer their video services in both WMV and Realmedia formats, why cant the EU? Its certainly supported on linux after all

Re:realplayer

[PygmySurfer]

You're not suggesting they offer the videos in realmedia format, are you? That'd be even worse :)

Re:realplayer

[babbling]

There's no point in offering video in just another proprietary format. The idea is that *everyone* should have access to this. Not just Linux, Windows, and Mac.

How can that be done? Pick a format that doesn't require royalties.

Re:realplayer

[zeromorph]

There is a point in offering just another proprietary format. You get a little more diversity. You get Linux (and *BSD ?) users in the boat. It's a small step but it's a step.

And: Having a solution that is viewable for everyone in theory but computer user Joe can't watch it, because it does not run out of the box, is probably as bad as a proprietary solution. Here again diversity is the remedy.

But you are right:

Pick a format that doesn't require royalties.

an open standard is still the best option. (I'm not sure about the technical server side problems, though.)

Interpretation

[DreadSpoon]

The "legal way" thing probably refers to the inability to provide a legal WMV player for Linux, not that it isn't legal for the EU to stream in another format. I don't think anyone there is trying to say that it's illegal to stream in a different format. Rather, they are saying that since WMV is what they use (for whatever reason - political, economic, or simply fiat), Linux users can't be supported.

Re:Interpretation

[HalAtWork]

The "legal way" thing probably refers to the inability to provide a legal WMV player for Linux

Yes there is, they could simply license the codec and provide a product for Linux that supports WMV.

Realplayer?

[Goeland86]

What about Realplayer exactly is illegal? I know it won't solve *BSDs and other *Nix users' problems, but Linux has a realplayer version.
So why again is it illegal to run something that is not MS specific?
Hello, welcome to the new year, we're in the 21st century, not in the early 90s, there's something called "interoperability" that has been growing in the tech world... Time for reality to harvest!

Re:Realplayer?

[Anonymous Coward]

It's morally illegal.

Re:Realplayer?

[zCyl]

Realplayer is a single exclusive provider. That makes it a poor choice.

Re:Realplayer?

[OldJohnno]

Sure, let's use ---buffering--- RealPlayer, it always---buffering---works---buffering---perfectly for me with---buffering----streaming---buffering---video. ..

IT'S OK

[scenestar]

We don't support the EU either.

Compatibility is Illegal Now?

[myrdos2]

There's always been a lot of FUD regarding Linux and legality, but this is absurd. Since when does producing media that can be viewed on a Linux machine violate the law? By this argument, that FAQ is illegal since a Linux user is able to read it. Unless they mean that in order to verify that the Linux service works, they would need to install Linux on one of their own systems, which they view as being illegal. But of course anyone knows all you have to do to be legal under Linux is: -buy a license from SCO -only use Novell's Suse Linux -buy a couple copies of Windows just in case Right? Right!?

Use something else?

[Rinisari]

What law would be broken for broadcasting the proceedings in a format like xvid or theora? None, right?

looking at it from their perspecive

[noigmn]

"The live streaming media service of the Council of the European Union supports Internet Explorer 5 and higher, Netscape Navigator 6 and higher. If you encounter problems with a lower version of your browser, the browser should be updated to facilitate the live streaming media service. Firefox and Opera will be supported with a minimal of functionalities."

This is the market share for browsers as of Nov 2006:

Microsoft Internet Explorer, 80.56%
Firefox, 13.50%
Safari, 4.03%
Netscape, 0.83%
Opera, 0.67%

This is the market share for Operating Systems as of Nov 2006:

Windows XP, 84.95%
Windows 2000, 5.46%
Mac OS, 4.10%
Windows 98, 1.90%
MacIntel, 1.29%
Windows ME, 0.91%
Windows NT, 0.76%
Linux, 0.37%

You could argue for better firefox support, but as much as we love linux, I suppose they have no obligation to make it work for something that is that small minority among desktop users.

Re:looking at it from their perspecive

[Dcnjoe60]

Shouldn't the numbers be based on installed based and not market share? Installed based, particularly in Europe and Asia, has a much higher count of pre-Windows XP installs, at least according to the trade journals. I don't know about the Mac base, there. Obviously, market share would favor XP since every new Windows PC sold ships with it, but what of all of the millions of PCs that were shipped before?

Out of curiosity, where did you get your market share numbers from?

Re:looking at it from their perspecive

[GotenXiao]

Here's an equivalent argument.

90% of a country's population is caucasian, 6% is black, 3% is oriental and 1% is of other racial groups. The EU suddenly decides that it can only offer services to the majority, how fast do you think people's asses would be nailed to the wall?

They have an obligation to not discriminate between groups of people. By only allowing people using Windows or Mac OS/X to use services, that's discrimination.

Also, those statistics are misleading, since Opera identifies itself as IE by default.

Re:looking at it from their perspecive

[Anonymous Coward]

Not sure where you got your numbers???
Mine are from http://www.w3schools.com/browsers/browsers_stats.a sp

2006------------IE7-----IE6-----IE5-----Fx------Mo z*----N7/8----O7/8/9
November--------7.1%----49.9%---2.9%----29.9%---2. 5%----0.2%----1.5%

2006------------WinXP---W2000---Win98---WinNT---W2 003---Linux---Mac
November--------74.9%---8.0%----1.0%----0.4%----1. 8%----3.3%----3.5%

Mac and Linux seem to pretty close....No?

Re:looking at it from their perspecive

[jejones]

They are a government agency. A business can decide to ignore some potential customers, but a government cannot decide to ignore citizens.

Re:looking at it from their perspecive

[EXMSFT]

That's an unbelievably bizarre metaphor - equating operating system support as anything like racial discrimination.

Re:looking at it from their perspecive

[Andrew_T366]

"The live streaming media service of the Council of the European Union supports...Netscape Navigator 6 and higher...Firefox...will be supported with a minimal of functionalities."

Statements like this make my blood boil slightly from time to time. Mozilla Firefox should FALL UNDER "Netscape Navigator 6 and higher" as far as any site is concerned: It's a continuation as far as technology and popularity go.

Re:looking at it from their perspecive

[zCyl]

Statements like this make my blood boil slightly from time to time. Mozilla Firefox should FALL UNDER "Netscape Navigator 6 and higher" as far as any site is concerned: It's a continuation as far as technology and popularity go.

Not to mention, Firefox is vastly more popular than Netscape Navigator. Firefox should be first in the list to be supported by government organizations, because it is the most popular browser which is available for free, to everyone, on essentially every platform.

If the only browser supported is a free cross-platform one, then no one can complain that they are being singled out.

Re:looking at it from their perspecive

[bmo]

This is the market share for browsers as of Nov 2006:

Microsoft Internet Explorer, 80.56%
Firefox, 13.50%
Safari, 4.03%
Netscape, 0.83%
Opera, 0.67%

Yeah?

Where did you get your numbers?

http://www.w3schools.com/browsers/browsers_stats.a sp

Aggregate IE: 59.9
Firefox: 29.9
Mozilla: 2.5
Netscape 7/8 .2
Opera 1.5

Which one of those doesn't pass the Acid2? Only IE. 40 percent of the world uses a browser that supports standards enough to render Acid2, and IE's numbers have declined while the rest have only gained.

"You could argue for better firefox support, but as much as we love linux, I suppose they have no obligation to make it work for something that is that small minority among desktop users."

If you scroll down to the OS stats:

XP: 71.6
Win2K 13.6
Win98 2.6
WinNT .3
W2k3 1.7
Linux 3.2
Mac 3.3

But then it's not about "supporting linux" it's about using _standard_ codecs and standard files. Wmv is "Windows Only" and not a standard where other codecs are actual standards and are cross platform as a _result_ of being standards.

But hey, you're here to troll for Microsoft instead of contribute any facts to the discussion.

By the way, even though it has the least market share, Opera kicks all other browsers.

--
BMO

Re:looking at it from their perspecive

[porneL]

Opera doesn't really identify as IE - it just prepends MSIE user-agent string to it's own, so can be detected regardless (if you intentionally look for it).

Anyway, these stats seem to be for US, not EU. Opera has much higher usage in Europe (3-8%, reaching 15% in some countries). Also Linux is over 1%.

Re:looking at it from their perspecive

[Tom]

I laugh at those statistics every time I see them.

Let me think... might the low number of Linux visits probably be related to the bad Linux support? You know, if it doesn't work for them, they're less likely to return for another visit? Those circular causation chains are a bitch, aren't they?

Sure, Linux is small. But it's not exactly as if nobody would use it. For example, I dare to say that there are more Linux users on the Internet than blind users. Yet a lot of effort is made, especially on government sites, to make them accessable for blind users. The argument is what, exactly? That blindness is a disability and using Linux a choice? Ah! So number of users doesn't matter is what you say? But up there you said Linux userbase is too small and that's why. But that's not true for some other user groups, so it's not the whole story.

Then again, using windos is a kind of disability itself. Something like having AIDS, you know? An immune system deficiency - if you have windos, you're a lot more likely to catch all these viruses...

I think the lack of Linux support from big organisations like the EU is mostly due to mindset. They are used to working with other big organisations, like multinational corporations, and when you say "Linux support" they ask "who can we contract?" and if your answer is "all kinds of people, these and those and lots more" they say "that's too complicated for us. Who produces Linux? Lots of companies? Too complicated. Parse error. Input buffer overflow. Bzzzt." and then you get these bogus reasons like "for legal reasons". I've long made a mental note that "for legal reasons" without any further explanation alway means "don't ask, just go away, we don't want to explain it because it's embarrassing".

Re:looking at it from their perspecive

[Frosty Piss]

Where did you get your numbers?

http://www.w3schools.com/browsers/browsers_stats.a sp [w3schools.com]

Aggregate IE: 59.9

Firefox: 29.9

Mozilla: 2.5

Netscape 7/8 .2

Opera 1.5

The stats at www.w3schools.com are not representative of what most people are using, they represent what Web developers and other technically inclined people are using. Think about who visits www.w3schools.com.

Re:looking at it from their perspecive

[Daniel Phillips]

Linux, 0.37%

Your numbers are suspect. According to the market research company IDC, 25% of servers and 2.8% of desktop computers ran Linux as of 2004. This is consistent with the 3.3% share of web hits that w3schools measures as of last month.

Re:looking at it from their perspecive

[FFFish]

...as much as we love linux, I suppose they have no obligation to make it work for something that is that small minority among desktop users.

Honestly, that's a strawman argument. It doesn't matter to anyone at all whether linux is supported.

What we want supported are OPEN BLOODY STANDARDS. In today's day and age it is inutterably stupid to lock oneself to a particular platform.

The viability of providing future access to information depends upon the use of open standards.

Re:looking at it from their perspecive

[Darkforge]

Which one of those doesn't pass the Acid2? Only IE.

I've got bad news for you... Firefox doesn't pass it either. (Go on, try it.) We're expecting to get Acid2 support in Firefox 3.

Re:looking at it from their perspecive

[westlake]

Where did you get your numbers?

W3Schools is a site for web developers.

It has always warned that its stats are not be taken as representative of users among the larger population.

This should be obvious from the stats for W2K, which was never offered or sold as an OS for the general consumer market.

Which one of those doesn't pass the Acid2?

I haven't met anyone, anywhere, outside of Slashdot, who has the foggiest idea what Acid 2 is or why he should care. It is, after all, nothing more than a stress test for a browser.

But then it's not about "supporting linux" it's about using _standard_ codecs and standard files. Wmv is "Windows Only" and not a standard where other codecs are actual standards and are cross platform as a _result_ of being standards.

Users are --- ruthlessly --- pragmatic about "actual standards."

The proprietary solution that "just works " like Skype. The de facto solution that is overwhelmingly popular. AIM. Cross-platform compatibility be damned.

Committees move slowly. Markets move fast.

That is why technologies like WMV or Flash take hold at Warp 10 while the Geek in his Civic is still stuck in first gear.

Re:looking at it from their perspecive

[Tim C]

Which one of those doesn't pass the Acid2? Only IE.

Firefox 2.0.0.1 fails Acid 2 as well; I can't really comment for previous versions as I don't have them handy, but I know I've seen it fail in several of them and haven't seen or heard of it pass any of them. Firefox 3 passes, I believe, but that's in alpha and so irrelevant.

But hey, you're here to troll for Microsoft instead of contribute any facts to the discussion.

Perhaps you should check your own facts, lest you appear to be merely trolling against MS.

Re:looking at it from their perspecive

[sanguinemoon]

Those numbers for Opera and and Linux, even for the US seem awefully low. I wonder where he got those stats from in the first place.

Re:looking at it from their perspecive

[AHumbleOpinion]

Let me think... might the low number of Linux visits probably be related to the bad Linux support? You know, if it doesn't work for them, they're less likely to return for another visit?

When I started reading that I honestly thought you were going to refer to the number of people who try Linux out of curiosity and find it too troublesome and return to Windows. If a person is trying to go Linux, then web pages are going to be a relatively minor problem. 1 in 250 is a pretty believable adoption rate, a pretty good one IMHO.

Re:looking at it from their perspecive

[bjourne]

Bla bla bla.

The EU employs 1700 translators full-time, translating 1.7 million pages each year into seventeen different languages. You tell me that an organization that big, that spends so many resources accommodating for people who don't want to read English (which most EU documents originally are written in), can't accommodate for Linux users??

It is my tax money that feeds the beast. They damn fucking sure have an obligation to make it work for me!

Re:looking at it from their perspecive

[bmo]

"The stats at www.w3schools.com are not representative of what most people are using, they represent what Web developers and other technically inclined people are using. Think about who visits www.w3schools.com."

So post stats from somewhere else. At least I left a reference, as opposed to the parent which didn't leave a reference.

And here's a question, how many bots ID themselves as IE?

http://www.realmeme.com/roller/page/realmeme?entry =the_traffic_generator

--
BMO

Re:looking at it from their perspecive

[noidentity]

How about the operating system breakdown for people wanting to view these EU videos?

Re:looking at it from their perspecive

[bmo]

"I've got bad news for you... Firefox doesn't pass it either. (Go on, try it.) We're expecting to get Acid2 support in Firefox 3."

D'oh.

I could have _sworn_ that stock FF was noted to have passed. Oh well.

No, I don't use FF. I use Konq, Safari, and Opera, and have tested only them on Acid2 myself. Whenever I'm using FF or IE, I'm on someone else's computer.

I must have heard from something last April related to this:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/dbaron/126886608/

Ok, so mod me down. Bastards.

The good news is that the FF builds _do_ pass. According to wikipedia, anyway.

--
BMO

Re:looking at it from their perspecive

[slothman32]

I looked there but couldn't find a source.
I tried footnote 24 but that didn't help.
Unless I don't know how to use source markers.
In any case it seems unlikely that 25% of servers run a very specific type of UNIX.
What about all the other UNIX's?
Even Windows NT et al?
What about those "wacky" OS's, wacky because I've never heard of CDC10 or whichever.
I don't know about the desktop part, that seems almost low but 25% of servers, maybe 5%.
Other UNIX's might total even 80% with obscure ones an unknown percentage.

Re:looking at it from their perspecive

[dvice_null]

> You could argue for better firefox support, but as much as we love linux, I suppose they have no obligation to make it work for something that is that > small minority among desktop users.

Yes. And imagine the savings we would get if we stop supporting other minorities also, like the blind.

I'm not requesting them to support Linux. I'm requesting them to support some open format, so the users of the Linux have at least an option to make a legal viewer for themselves to watch what is called "public".

Re:looking at it from their perspecive

[losername]

Where did you gather those statistics? If it's gathered from, for instance, hits to websites, then I think Linux users are largely underrepresented. Linux users often get mistaken for users of other operating systems. For one thing, I often get placed into the Windows portion of the statistics despite being a Linux user because I use the Windows version of Firefox under Wine.

Re:looking at it from their perspecive

[Hal_Porter]

People don't have a choice about their race, they do about the software they use.

Or since this is the Internet, look at this page and see why the analogy is silly -

Video and WMV - OTP. pwnt

I like the "The REAL cause of the civil war icon".

Re:looking at it from their perspecive

[Frosty Piss]

So post stats from somewhere else. At least I left a reference, as opposed to the parent which didn't leave a reference.

Why should I? You used w3school's stats to try to suggest that they represent an accurate view of what most people are using, not me. Most Web surfers are not represented by the profile of w3school visitors. That's your problem, not mine.

Re:looking at it from their perspecive

[gorgonite]

That's plain bullshit. Here is an example. My computer contributes to the market share of Windows since it's a notebook and there is a monopoly out there. However, I have kicked windows into the pit a long time ago. So my computer also contributes to the Linuy install base.

Re:looking at it from their perspecive

[AaronLawrence]

SOmething I have been thinking about lately:

A lot of business Linux deployments are likely to be task-specific - ie. they run one application such as a accounting package all the time and nothing else.

There can be lots of these, but none of them will ever show up in web browser stats. The web is still not the whole world of PCs.

Of course, browser stats are the only ones we have readily available.

Re:looking at it from their perspecive

[RAMMS EIN]

``...accommodating for people who don't want to read English...''

It's not only a matter of not wanting to read it. At least some of these documents are translated for the benefit of ordinary citizens. Half of the population of the EU doesn't speak English. And that's not "doesn't speak English as a native language", that's "doesn't speak English at all".

Re:looking at it from their perspecive

[adam1101]

Seeing how MacOS and MacIntel were split up, the numbers probably came from Net Applications.

Re:looking at it from their perspecive

[shish]

The stats at www.w3schools.com are not representative of what most people are using, they represent what Web developers and other technically inclined people are using. Think about who visits www.w3schools.com.

Personally I only ever used w3schools when I was a web dev n00b, and I ran windows -- some time later, I got a clue, switched to linux, and started using the official specifications / RFCs instead.

Re:looking at it from their perspecive

[nchip]

Linux, 0.37%

You could argue for better firefox support, but as much as we love linux, I suppose they have no obligation to make it work for something that is that small minority among desktop users.

Eu translates all documents to 20 languages, including Latvian, Lithuanian, Estonian and Maltese. With 450 million people in EU and about 400 000 people speaking Maltese, we have EU caring for even 0.1% percent. Even the streaming service includes translations for those languages!

I don't really care about EU streaming service and it's lack of Linux support, but buying shrink wrapped Microsoft solutions has serious economical consequences. Directly: It drains money out of EU. Indirectly: there is less knowledge on howto build streaming solutions in EU, if all we know is howto "click next" in some wizard.

So why not use fluendo streaming or some other EU based solution instead?

Re:looking at it from their perspecive

[kyb]

Not the point.

It's perfectly fair enough for them to say that they only support the biggest installed user base, we can't expect more. What we can expect, and should demand is that whatever they use on whatever platform is an open standard, free for others to implement.

So, they can provide support for IE on Windows XP for all I care, but the video should be in a free format and there should be nothing done to deliberately shut out others, connecting without support. In an ideal world, at least one completely free platform should be supported.

This is government we're talking about, and in a democracy, it's supposed to be participatory.

Re:looking at it from their perspecive

[grahammm]

This should be obvious from the stats for W2K, which was never offered or sold as an OS for the general consumer market. Derrr. At the place where I work, every PC that was purchased (from Dell) whilst W2K was the current (ie after NT4 and before XP) came with W2K installed and some PCs are still running it. I may not have remembered correctly, but was W2K not (at least initially) marketed as the convergence of the Win9X and NT streams?

Re:looking at it from their perspecive

[elmartinos]

According to Wikipedia the EU has a population of 496,000,000. 0.37% of that are more than 1.8 million people, which is approximately the population of Slovenia. Would you tell Slovenia that they will be ignored because they are just a minority?

Re:looking at it from their perspecive

[howlingmadhowie]

i remember reading an article recently which said that firefox now has a larger share of the german market than ie.

Re:looking at it from their perspecive

[Dcnjoe60]

Percentage browser hits to a big site like Google or the BBC would be better for the intended purpose.

Possibly, however, that would only show what browser and not what OS platform. Firefox hits could from Windows,OS X or Linux, where IE could be from Windows or OS X (not counting using the various emulators on Linux).

If the real issue is to provide a streaming media that is can be accessed by anybody, it really is a mute point. Those are already readily available. It is just not the WMF format of Microsoft.

Most likely, however, they had some consulting firm design their process who used Microsoft tools and that is the only option they have. Of course, it is interesting that the EU makes Microsoft unbundle Windows Media Player for anti-trust reasons, and yet if you want to get their content, you have to install it. Seems to be a contradiction there.

Re:looking at it from their perspecive

[Tom]

When I started reading that I honestly thought you were going to refer to the number of people who try Linux out of curiosity

Oops. No. I was refering to "if your website only works on windos, then every Linux user who visits it will visit it only once, counting for 1 Linux visit. Windos users will return, counting for x (x>1, depending on how interesting your site is) visits, thus even if Linux had 50% market share, your logs would show 10% if the average windos user of yours clocks 9 visits.

Re:looking at it from their perspecive

[Teun]

Of course, it is interesting that the EU makes Microsoft unbundle Windows Media Player for anti-trust reasons, and yet if you want to get their content, you have to install it. Seems to be a contradiction there.

I'm fairly sure you just hit the nail on the head...

Re:looking at it from their perspecive

[despisethesun]

I don't think you are remembering correctly, because Win2K came out at around the same time as WinME. ME was aimed at home users as a stopgap till "Whistler" brought NT to home users while 2K was supposed to be an NT upgrade for offices/networks/etc (business use, basically). I knew quite a few people who jumped from 98 to 2K though after word got out that ME was actually worse than 98 in many ways, but most of those people are fairly technologically adept. I suspect most users stuck with Win98 until XP came out unless they bought a new PC with ME or 2K installed on it.

WTF!?

[kryten_nl]

This sort of malicious ignorance makes my blood boil.... And to think that my tax euros are paying for this *service*.

What next?...

[edwardpickman]

Linux users won't be able to watch paint dry over the net?

A blatant lie to cover up for laziness...

[Savage-Rabbit]

From where I sit, it looks like a blatant lie to cover up for laziness.

<complete_nonsense>
You don't know the EU very well do you? You see this has nothing to do with laziness. If the EU replaces it's WMV streaming systems with a competing product it will result in 68 shirt and tie wearing MCSEs with nice conservative Bill Gates haircuts being replaced by a couple of hairy bucktoothed nerds with a nasty armpit malodor problem and the fashions sense of a Portuguese donkey wrangler. So this whole mess is really all about French objections because of the effect such a change would have on the already low fashion standards of EU employees and all the other EU member countries fears that it might make the unemployment situation in the European MCSE community any worse since the job security of the European MCSE community is already badly threatened by the way Linux looks set to exterminate Windows from the EU's desktop computer market.
</complete_nonsense>

Re:A blatant lie to cover up for laziness...

[benjcurry]

"Hey! Screw you, buddy." -- Protugese Donkey Wrangler

Will not stand in the EU

[grimJester]

Obvoiusly soneone has wanted to point this out, if it's explicitly written on the EU site. At the risk of sounding trollish:

We will not have our legislation locked down in ways that force EU citicens to buy software from one specific vendor. FUCK YOU.

We like to think we're better than the US. Apperarently our legislators are also bought off. If you as an elected politician get your salary from Microsoft Corporation or Apple Computer inc, please report directly to me for your ticket to Baghdad and the Saddam Hussein rope massage. Thank you for your incompetent attempt at running a democracy, please don't come again.

Re:Will not stand in the EU

[kjart]

We like to think we're better than the US.

Well, you certainly sound as arrogant as the Americans.

Re:Will not stand in the EU

[iDaZe]

How the hell did you get modded "Insightful"?

We will not have our legislation locked down in ways that force EU citicens to buy software from one specific vendor. FUCK YOU.

Well good thing it's at least two specific vendors then.

Apperarently our legislators are also bought off. If you as an elected politician get your salary from Microsoft Corporation or Apple Computer inc, ...

I really doubt any EU politician has any say in what their IT department is doing. Did it occur to you that maybe, after evaluating all their options, the web team decided that WMV was just the best/easiest/least-sucky tech for the job all on their own?

Re:Will not stand in the EU

[ScrewMaster]

But it's not (and shouldn't be) about what "best", easiest or least-sucky - it's about what's most accessible.

And that is the crux of the argument. An elected government says, "we're using the a media format that is used by the most-popular operating system and Web browser." On the surface, that seems reasonable, in that they're makeing the information available to most of the viewing audience. It also satisfies the politician's need to appear even-handed. Unfortunately, it makes that same data virtually inaccessible to that still-significant minority that isn't mainstream, and never will be. Regardless of the market-share numbers (and you have to add all the non-Microsoft products together), by not using an open standard the EU is still alienating some millions of computer users. That's not particularly even-handed, however you slice it.

If there was ever an argument for transparency in government and the required use of open formats and protocols ... this is it.

Re:Will not stand in the EU

[Brett Buck]

> We like to think we're better than the US

      That's cute!

          Brett

Re:Will not stand in the EU

[ScrewMaster]

Indeed. I've noticed, over the years, that individuals who feel that they are intrinsically "better" than those around them usually aren't. Granted, "better" is a relative term, but arrogance is absolute.

Re:Will not stand in the EU

[RAMMS EIN]

Thanks. I wanted to say that, but you said it better than I could ever hope to.

Re:Will not stand in the EU

[tehcyder]

At the risk of sounding trollish

On slashdot, saying that MS made all their money from boiling down puppies into glue, and that Bill Gates favours oral intercourse with Satan wouldn't count as being a troll, so I think you're OK...

Of course

[bkhl]

Of course it's illegal if they say it is. They make the laws up, after all.

Please don't do this

[Sycraft-fu]

When people recommend half-assed or not ready OSS solutions, it hurts the OSS cause. Theora isn't ready to go, it's not even remotely ready. There's a reason why it's still an alpha whereas Vorbis is a full release. It is in no way shape or form a ready competitor to WMV at this time.

It's much better to admit there's nothing that works out there that's OSS than to recommend a poor OSS solution. The reason is that the number one justification against OSS is shoddy quality. You talk to J. Random PHB and the reason they don't want to use OSS is because it's poor quality/not supported. Well, advocating things that are, in fact, poor quality just provides them with ammo for their argument.

Also it can hurt a format to get lots of exposure before it's ready. If everyone's first exposure to Theora is when it's buggy, that idea will form in their minds and later when it's stable, they will still associate Theora = buggy and thus give it a pass.

At this point, we just need to wait on Theora. Vorbis is great, I've no doubt in time Theroa will be its match, however it's not the kind of thing that will happen in a day.

Re:Please don't do this

[evilviper]

Theora isn't ready to go, it's not even remotely ready.

Really? Why?

There's a reason why it's still an alpha whereas Vorbis is a full release.

And that reason is???

It's much better to admit there's nothing that works out there that's OSS than to recommend a poor OSS solution.

That wouldn't be true, of course.

The patents on MPEG-1 have long ago expired. It has pretty good quality (better than Theora/VP3) when encoded with a recent implimentation (ie. libavcodec for video, twolame for audio). And more than that, it is by far the most widely compatible format around, supported by just about every video player made in the past several years, on just about every single platform around.

I've no doubt in time Theroa will be its match,

I, however, do. The VP3 codec is hated by just about everyone who knows anything about video.

It has really poor video quality, compared to even much older video codecs.

It is very CPU-intensive to encode.

It's playback performance is horrible. Once you reach resolutions where a full frame can't fit in your CPU cache, you get performance worse than codecs like h.264.

In some 4 years of Theora's development, Xiph hasn't removed any of VP3's limitations, nor added any advantages over the original VP3 codec. Since they've frozen the bitstream, even the potential for them to do any of that has passed...

I was somewhat active in the Theora development process some time ago, but I've long since given it up for dead.

Re:Please don't do this

[killjoe]

Why not real?

Re:Please don't do this

[rolfwind]

Theora isn't ready to go, it's not even remotely ready.

Since when did this exact reason stop Microsoft or other software solution providers from pushing their products?

Sorry, just had to say - this is a chicken and the egg problem. Reminds me of Linux "not being ready for the desktop." If no one picked it up to use on the desktop when it wasn't ready, it will likely never be ready. OTOH, the more people use an open piece of software, the more development it attracts.

Re:Please don't do this

[ardor]

What alternatives do we have? Dirac? Snow?
Can these be inserted into the ogg bitstream without too much pain?

Re:Please don't do this

[that this is not und]

Theora isn't ready to go, it's not even remotely ready.

True, but the EU is famous in other instances for issuing 'for your own good' edicts that prescribe how other concerns _will_ be required to conduct their business.

Telling all those vain blowhard politicians that _NOBODY_AT_ALL_ will be able to watch their prouncements and strutting behavior until Theora is 'done' might result in a whole buncha new support and backing for the project.

Seems to me like the kind of way to 'push' development that the EU is fond of. Shouldn't they eat a little bit of what they dish out to other organizations?

Re:Please don't do this

[CryoPenguin]

The Ogg bitstream is also hated by just about everyone who knows anything about media file formats. If you're going to propose a new standard Free media format, please use something like Matroska or NUT instead.
And the answer to your question is: no, Snow and Dirac can't be easily inserted into Ogg. Ogg's inability to handle arbitrary codecs is one of the reasons I don't recommend Ogg.

Re:Please don't do this

[evilviper]

What alternatives do we have? Dirac? Snow?

Definately. If an interested party would pick-up Snow, finalize the bitstream, and start adding some performance optimizations for encoding and high-def playback, it could beat-out every other video codec out there. The quality/bitrate is easily better than even h.264, and can scale down to ridiculously low bitrates while being completely watchable.

Can these be inserted into the ogg bitstream without too much pain?

Nope. SnoPenguin nailed it. Ogg is terribly codec-specific.

MKV is gaining in popularity, partly because it can handle just about any audio or video format, including Vorbis, as well as subtitles, menus, chapters, etc.

Re:Please don't do this

[Tablizer]

Also it can hurt a format to get lots of exposure before it's ready. If everyone's first exposure to Theora is when it's buggy, that idea will form in their minds and later when it's stable, they will still associate Theora = buggy and thus give it a pass.

Java Applets (not OSS) come to mind. They were slow-loading, buggy, and had odd UI conventions. Applets would have to be nearly perfect now to get a listen.

Re:Please don't do this

[evilviper]

With appologies to "CryoPenguin" (not "SnoPenguin").

Re:Please don't do this

[shaneh0]

My personal take on this is simple: They should care the most about accessability. Everything else is secondary. So in my opinion, it makes sense to deploy on a format that is accessible by 99% of PCs _right out of the box_ opposed to a format that is potentially accessible by 100% of PCs but only a few percent _right out of the box_.

I'm sorry that Linux users don't like this, but this underscores the reasons why Linux is not practical yet for widespread home use. When you have just a few percent of the market share you are at a disadvantage. I know it's a chicken/egg problem, but that's something that every new technology has. Look at how big of business this Blu Ray/HD-DVD race already is. Now multiply that by a hundred and you have a rough idea of market forces in the personal computer industry.

Re:Please don't do this

[TheShadowzero]

Legitimate questions: aren't matroskas in .mkv format? I thought it was a wrapper format, not a codec. What don't you like about TCMP? the interface is hardly optimal, and the keyboard shortcuts are ugh, but is there specifically something wrong with it? AND: media player classic and zoomplayer are two players that play matroskas fine. (see: http://www.cccp-project.net/). and finally, mplayer plays matroskas perfectly. along with everything else.

Re:Please don't do this

[Rick17JJ]

Some websites offer users the choice of more than one format. It doesn't have to be limited to one choice or the other. Here is one example of a web page that allows users to choose which format they want to use when viewing a video clip. In this case it happens to be a choice between Flash and Ogg.

Several video clips in Flash and Ogg format

It is not unreasonable to expect an official government website to make an extra effort to make public records available to all voters. Offering the content in two alternative formats would be a reasonable solution. At least one of the formats should be an open standard such a Ogg, the other could be a proprietary closed standard that would require using Windows Media Player. Flash might possibly be acceptable too, because most Linux computers can play Flash (although the AMD-64 version of Macromedia Flash for Linux is not yet available).

Re:Please don't do this

[lachlan76]

I thought it was a wrapper format, not a codec

It is. The comparison was between Matroska and Ogg, which are both container formats.

Re:Please don't do this

[Eunuchswear]

Oh go on then, give us an example, must be easy if the EU is "famous" for that.

Re:Please don't do this

[Hognoxious]

Banning the sale of beef on the bone.

Re:Please don't do this

[FrostedWheat]

Ogg is terribly codec-specific

Could you explain this a bit more? I've been working on a simple video codec for a few weeks and I'm using Ogg as the wrapper. The only problem so far is application support (which is understandable for a codec which doesn't really exist yet).

(This is the first time I've done any work of this type -- I've not worked with the alternatives)

Re:Please don't do this

[Cal Paterson]

(although the AMD-64 version of Macromedia Flash for Linux is not yet available).

I'm going offtopic here, but it is possible to play flash video files in mplayer under amd64. I can visit youtube, use the videodownloader firefox extension to get the flv, and then play it in mplayer. Works reasonably well. (I mention this because no one else ever does.)

Re:Please don't do this

[that this is not und]

1. RoHS. Get ready for the 'tin whiskers' disaster, consumers.

2. The way the EU completely decimated the low-end embedded controller market by issuing the edict that no vendor could sell cheap 'evaualuation boards' without a case and a ton of expensive RFI shielding (even though the dev board is for use IN THE LAB where nothing else is shielded)

And that's just two I can rattle off automatically.

Re:Please don't do this

[cortana]

Aside from amd64, the ports to m68k, sparc, alpha, powerpc, arm, mip, mipsel, hppa, ia64, s390, ppc64, sh, armeb, m32r, hurd-i386, netbsd-i386, netbsd-alpha and kfreebsd-gnu are not yet finished. And that would only cover all the ports of Debian!

If they were to use an open standard, however, anyone would be allowed to create a player for the videos...

Re:Please don't do this

[Angostura]

Yes, because the possibility of huge healthcare bills from potentially large numbers of patients suffering CJD through eating contaminated meat certainly isn't something that governments should try to avoid.

Re:Please don't do this

[droolfool]

So, they're right: they can't support OSS because there's no decent OSS implementation. Ogg sucks because it can't handle arbitrary media, Matroska and NUT are largely unknown... They're right.

Re:Please don't do this

[evilviper]

it is possible to play flash video files in mplayer under amd64.

Flash support in MPlayer is quite primitive. Only videos encoded with just the right options work. Things like compressed headers and the like can't even be opened.

There's a significant number of videos that simply won't work.

Re:Please don't do this

[DrSkwid]

say after me EM PEG ONE

Re:Please don't do this

[DrSkwid]

The worls is bigger than Windows, Mac & Linux x86 you know

Re:Please don't do this

[Bloke down the pub]

Except there's nothing wrong with beef on the bone - provided the animal isn't infected. And if it is infected, you shouldn't be eating any of it.

MOD PARENT UP

[Stormx2]

I absolutely agree. The EU goes to great lengths to satisfy the needs of those who make up a tiny percentage of the population - I'm talking laws which may only affect one or two people with disabilities or complaints of human rights abuse. While I support this, why can't this kind of attention to minorities be universal? Surely the EU - who make the laws - know that it would be entirely legal to support linux with a free format. Ogg Theora highly recommended!

Eminent Domain?

[zogger]

Do they have public takings under any sort of eminent domain-like laws there? I would think they must have something similar. Using that, they could just seize the codecs for the public good and just use them as they saw fit. Then, no laws broken.

Haha

[GeorgeMcBay]

The really funny part of this story is you also can't watch those videos if you've got the version of Windows Vista with media player ripped out due to the EU's antitrust rulings (unless you download media player or some other WMV-capable player, of course). Hah hah.

Great work...

[Pengman]

First they (the EU) force MS to marked a version of Windows without media-player... and then they release content that needs that very media player...

No codecs required, either

[Shawn is an Asshole]

If you use Cortado as the player. It's a java applet that will play Theora+Vorbis files in a way similar to YouTube/Google Video/etc. All the client needs is Java.

Going straight Theora+Vorbis wouldn't work that well, since the user would have the install the codecs first and Vorbis/Theora support is severely lacking on OS X.

Quoting the site:

In order to make your streams as widely available as possible, we provide the Cortado Java applet as free software under the GPL. By embedding this applet in your website, you can give viewers access to streams from either the Flumotion streaming server or play a local file from your server without the need for a locally installed media player supporting the correct formats on the visitori's computer.

Cortado currently include Java decoders for Ogg Theora, Ogg Vorbis, Mulaw audio, MJPEG and our own Smoke codec. You can find examples of Cortado in use on the Fluendo demo site.

Players already exist

[figleaf]

So here is the opposing petition:
http://www.petitionspot.com/petitions/keepstreamin gsolution

Re: Players already exist

[sick_soul]

A counter-petition basing on those arguments has no sense.
This is not about whether it is technically possible to play wmv on our system.
What they assert in their web site (and we, or at least I, see as wrong) is (paraphrased):

"since we produced the content in WMV format, and we believe that it is not legal to play
WMV on your system, support for your system is impossible."

See the problem?

Happy new year.

Wait a sec...!

[bogaboga]

90% of a country's population is caucasian, 6% is black, 3% is oriental and 1% is of other racial groups. The EU suddenly decides that it can only offer services to the majority, how fast do you think people's asses would be nailed to the wall?

Not so fast dude! The last time I checked, no body has ever chosen to be born caucasian, black, oriental or otherwise...on the other hand, there is likely a huge probability that all these folks that do not belong to the "chosen" platform to support actually chose to use the platform. And now, they are clamoring for support! Jeez!

Sorry in advance in case you made an application to whoever created you, to create you the way you are.

Re:Wait a sec...!

[alephsmith]

Not everyone has the financial means to choose the non-free version.

Or maybe you mean even the poor have the choice to pirate a copy of Windows.

Re:Wait a sec...!

[Reality Master 101]

Not everyone has the financial means to choose the non-free version. [...] Or maybe you mean even the poor have the choice to pirate a copy of Windows.

The "poor" do not have the means to choose at all. The poor go to the library. Only relatively wealthy people have computers of their own.

Re:Wait a sec...!

[EXMSFT]

Give me a break. Find a PC that didn't actually ship with Windows. Then try stating that again... if computers actually came without an OS, that might be a viable argument. But you can't argue that Windows is expensive when it's a cost incorporated into 99.9% of consumer PC's.

Re:Wait a sec...!

[seifried]

My last 6 machines shipped without Windows. Before you jump down my throat: 2 came from Sun.com (X2100's, officially they run Red Hat, SuSE, Solaris and Windows, they run OpenBSD nicely as well) - you can actually buy these without an HD now. 1 from Dell (Poweredge 750, officially they support Red Hat, Windows) 3 came from a local shop (memoryexpress, officially they don't support anything, but I asked for machines that would run OpenBSD or Red Hat Linux specifically)

Re:Wait a sec...!

[trewornan]

Just because the consumer can't find out what proportion of the price of a new PC is for the MS software doesn't automatically imply that it's not expensive. What a silly suggestion.

Re:Wait a sec...!

[rohan972]

Give me a break. Find a PC that didn't actually ship with Windows. Then try stating that again... if computers actually came without an OS, that might be a viable argument. But you can't argue that Windows is expensive when it's a cost incorporated into 99.9% of consumer PC's.

Most of my computers have been second hand. Only one second hand box came with a licenced windows. Many people have computers without a valid windows licence.

Re:Wait a sec...!

[guruevi]

Michael Jackson was black and chose to be caucasian. Using genetic modification, I think you should be able to choose pigmentation of your skin.

Re:Wait a sec...!

[ZakuSage]

I built my PC. It sure as hell didn't come with any Windows tax.

Re:Wait a sec...!

[kripkenstein]

Not so fast dude! The last time I checked, no body has ever chosen to be born caucasian, black, oriental or otherwise...on the other hand, there is likely a huge probability that all these folks that do not belong to the "chosen" platform to support actually chose to use the platform. And now, they are clamoring for support! Jeez!

Nah, that misses the point. Just take the original analogy about "operating systems vs. race" and switch it to "operating systems vs. religion". Religion is something that is a choice - you want to leave yours and join another, you are free to do so - but if the EU would suddenly only 'support' 95% of religions, there would be a heck of an outrage. In modern civilization, it is legitimate to choose your religion. Is the EU saying that the only legitimate choice of operating system is Windows (or Mac)? That's quite a big commercial endorsement there.

The original analogy/argument is valid, the EU is in the wrong on this one. (Although to be fair it's probably only a few EU computer techs and their managers who even know about this decision.)

Re:Wait a sec...!

[zqad]

The last time I checked, no body has ever chosen to be born caucasian, black, oriental or otherwise... Now you hold on. I'm and EU citizen and don't afford to run microsoft products. I'm currently a university student and does not have the money to buy their bloated crap. Now, i wouldn't do it even if i had the money because i choose the best product out of the alternatives i have, but the point is that i can't afford it. My parents aren't that rich, and that's something i didn't choose either.

Re:Wait a sec...!

[hawkinspeter]

You insensitive clod! My mother received a message from John Titor requesting which race I would like to be born as and several of my friends are believers in reincarnation and have been working at their karma to make sure they get born into their chosen vessels.

Re:Wait a sec...!

[gregorio]

but if the EU would suddenly only 'support' 95% of religions, there would be a heck of an outrage.

Sorry to break your heart, but a lot of EU countries have christian state churches, and peacefully ignore every other religion. A country is about the people that built it, the ones that lived there first. They have the right to mandate that their country is the home for their culture. Immigrants can't force their culture and religion onto everybody else.

Minorities must receive obligatory support just if part of the country's land is based on the invasion of this minority homeland or if those people were brought by the government, because of slavery or other state-approved population absorption, like mass asylum grants. Immigrants that travelled to the country just "to find better life" will have to face the fact that the country is not theirs and that they don't hold any rights to force their culture and religion onto the state machine. No one has the right to move to other countries and force them to accept you. In fact, if you're an immigrant, it's considered to be bad manners if you don't convert to the local culture and don't mix with other people.

Re:Wait a sec...!

[morie]

My PC didn't come with windows. May have had something to do with buying all the components seperately. still, no windowstax there...

I'm watching wmv video right now...

[FunWithKnives]

From the linked site. It has been relatively easy to get .wmv, .mov, etc. working in Linux for quite some time now. Check out the MPlayer plugin for Firefox. For K/X/Ubuntu or other Debian-based distro users, "apt-get install mozilla-mplayer". I do agree, however, that all government websites should make their content available platform-independent. But then, that would require common-sense, now wouldn't it?

Re:I'm watching wmv video right now...

[Azureflare]

I've been wondering the same thing, I've been reading this entire article thinking "What, don't people just use mplayerplugin?"

I guess not very many people have heard of this. This makes me wonder. Are there other people that simply don't know about applications in linux and therefore think that linux isn't capable of some functionality when a very suitable app exists that does it?

You know, I think linux needs a centralized application that says "Here's what you can do in linux" and allows a user to explore all the beta or mature projects that exist. That would be insanely useful for raising awareness of applications. Most distros do a good job with default installs but there's no way they can include everything that might be useful to everyone, and honestly the names of applications are so obscure and don't really related to it's functionality that users would have a hard time.

There's always google and the Linux OSS equivalents to Windows programs, but I think an app that's part of the linux desktop would be really helpful.

Re:I'm watching wmv video right now...

[dbcad7]

Synaptic does a pretty good job of organizing available programs by category, but of course there are things outside of the standard distro repositories that you wouldn't know about unless you knew to install them. I guess this is where you go back to google, and the various distro community forums. This is how I learned of Automatix for Ubuntu which takes care of installing alot of those 3rd party things that I used to have to do myself. Still, when things come up.. like something that won't play on a browser, I just look at it as a challenge and research it until I can do it. But then I'm patient and pretty stubborn.

Re:I'm watching wmv video right now...

[Gaima]

Works just fine here as well, in Konqueror on Gentoo.
Likely to need mplayer, kmplayer and win32codecs.

It even work on a fully 64bit install (mplayer-bin), over ssh!

Re:I'm watching wmv video right now...

[Hymer]

Yeah... That's the technical part of it... the other side is that sites are doing whatever they can to prevent you from viewing MS WMV and Apple MOV (both files and streams) without the proper plugin... wich is not available for Linux.
mplayerhq.hu seems to be blocked by some ISP's...

Re:I'm watching wmv video right now...

[alphamugwump]

For debian users (maybe ubuntu too), you probably want to add debian-multimedia to your sources list, so you can get all your dodgy codecs from one place. Seriously, though, MPlayer will play most stuff WMP does AND MORE; it can even encode a lot, too. Even WMV9 is supported in win32codecs, and there is experimental support in FFMpeg already. At this point, the only excuse is ignorance, and illegality. But, most of the time you're getting your multimedia illegally anyway, which kind of makes that a moot point.

Now, admittedly, support for streaming on linux really sucks, with Real (and youtube, if you want to count that) probably being the best thing out there. Personally, I find that konqueror (with the KMplayer Kpart) does a much better job at this than firefox does, but whatever.

Re:I'm watching wmv video right now...

[TheDarkSavant]

I was wondering what all the hubbub was about. I too followed the link and was able to watch a video on my Linux box using the mplayer plugin.

Of course, this is illegal in the US, since I am using unlicensed drivers, but those counsel meetings are just so intriguing that I'll risk it.

Re:Instead of rallying...

[fishbowl]

"Why don't we just create a world wide class action law suit against companies or organizations that do not support independent OS architecture?"

The community is not even really asking for *support*; merely to not be explicitly suppressed.

I have a banking site that I must use, which uses the user agent to decide who may and who may not use the web site to pay their bills.
I do not want "support" for my browser, I just want them to stop purposely trying to prevent me from using it. They do *more* work to try to suppress users than they would do to "support" them.

And any banking institution that has IT staff who consider it appropriate to use the User Agent string as part of security, should be approached with great suspicion anyway. This is not some small independent savings and loan -- it is Wells Fargo. The thing is, Wells Fargo's online banking system is pretty good. But their "Financial Services" division is nowhere near at the same level of competence.
Because *I* owe *them* money in this case, it's not exactly like I can choose to walk away. So I sort of have to take it. I'm just waiting for them to accuse me of fraud because instead of using my normal browser user agent string ("Bond/007; UK; Licensed to Kill"), I change it to something close enough to Internet Explorer 6 to get me in. (Great security *there*, Wells Fargo.)

What happened to more eyes, shallow bugs?

[jbn-o]

I guess we're supposed to ignore all the people who have been using Ogg Vorbis+Theora feeds for years (many listed on the Ogg Theora website and instead give in to an argument based on a version name and vague goals of "readiness", or for another overmoderated post in this thread, market presence built on violating the law. We're not supposed to advocate for people using unencumbered FLOSS software to do this job across platforms in a non-discriminatory way. Even according to the open source argument which dismisses social solidarity out of hand (something governments ought not do), discouraging use seems particularly unwise.

Re:What happened to more eyes, shallow bugs?

[MidnightBrewer]

There are only four links listed on the site, and I doubt that any of them are organizations the average person has ever heard of. Their site is also very user-unfriendly to the uninitiated, which means they're doing a rather poor job of trying to spread the word to the masses, as it were. They list four players that will work with Theora, helpfully listed as "Binaries," and no explanation as to which is going to really fulfill their needs. In other words, you're forcing your users to do research in order to get things going, which doesn't exactly inspire someone who just came there looking for a way to watch the EU feeds. Better to stick with proprietary solutions that work out-of-the-box for 99% of your constituents. I'm not satisfied with that as a solution, either, but those wanting OSS to win are going to have to step up and make some effort to rally people to the cause. Redesigning the web site so that people will want to visit and find it helpful would be a good first step. Complaining about it on Slashdot is just preaching to the choir and doesn't solve anything.

Re:What happened to more eyes, shallow bugs?

[jbn-o]

You must be looking at a radically different site than I because the site I see has numerous links to places carrying Ogg Theora files, most (if not all) with Vorbis audio tracks.

The rest of your reaction basically boils down to complaining about popularity (websites nobody has heard of, codecs that aren't bundled with popular OSes) and oxymoronically complaining that only technical people can read theora.org and claiming I'm speaking only to a technically minded audience here on /.. This is simultaneously no real response to the issue at hand (governmental organizations favoring proprietors over operating in the best interest of the public), and something that would be easy to change if it weren't for the prejudice of the market—the free market is designed to favor large established players (as I've already alluded to in the case of Microsoft illegally leveraging its power). Therefore the thing to do is to spread word of sites carrying free content to your friends, help your friends by sharing players that can play Ogg Vorbis+Theora files (including the Ogg Vorbis+Theora plugin for Windows Media Player) and in so doing challenge a situation that doesn't benefit us. The free software community faced similar hurdles over 20 years ago and, with work, today the server world is run on FLOSS (much to Microsoft's chagrin). Desktop software is very far along and ordinary computer users can get work done with a FLOSS OS such as GNU/Linux.

Finally, just to be clear, I'm not championing the Open Source movement. I'm encouraging you to consider the rhetoric of that movement and the recommended actions (which are placating popularity even at the expense of an honest pursuit of the narrow developmental message that movement offers to programmers). I support software freedom for all computer users and increased social solidarity based on an ethical examination I hope more people will undertake, therefore I am a Free Software movement advocate.

Open Government

[Anonymous Coward]

Same arguement applies here as it does with any other form of computerized documentation. All forms of government computerized documention should be done to open standards so it won't become unreadable when the license is no longer supported by the compan/y/ies that owns the patents. Really now, does anyone in the world want their governments computerized/digitized documentation controlled by some company that controls the patents for the method of storage? Does anyone want their governments documentation in a format that is digitalized by an executable with unknown code written in a country other then your own? Does anyone really want to trust their government or the maker of the file creating software not to include something akin to the SONY rootkit?

Citizens of the world should unite in the cause of demanding that all closed software be removed from all government computers and all government files. Citizens of the EU and other places often throw it up that the US is not as free as its forefathers planned and attempted to maintain with its Constitution and unfortunately too often they are right. Here is a chance for the EU to help lead the way, some of its countries already moving to keep closed formats out of government documents, time to increase that though. In the EU one should not need the permission of a US company to view EU government at work.

The pettetion

[smeckert]

>The petition to urge them to use a platform-independent format is a good answer.

I am not sure, but the petition appears to encourage you to
use a valid email address, but then doesn't send a link
as it urges, then replies go to a gmail account.

I wonder if this is just a clever ruse to get email addresses.

Anyone heard of petitionspot.com before?

Werks for me

[synonymous]

Followed the link and the videos seem to work fine for me. I honestly cant remember a file I couldnt play. The lack of support is what has made me happy for using my OS. I could care less for those that don't do anything for us's OS, and those that do care, hey whatever, guess you want your stuff to be seen and or used. Kudos. It's like, how could someone or company even start to care after ignoring for so long when a OSS has taken its place. Theyd be competing against themselves.

Is watching it online a Privilege or a Right?

[RealGrouchy]

Many people are throwing around OS usage statistics, like from www.w3schools.com. These statistics are worldwide, and do not reflect the [potential] visitors to this geographically-specific site.

Nevertheless, the number of people using Linux--and probably MacOS as well--pales in comparison to those who do not have a computer at all. (or hispeed internet, or a fast enough machine, etc.)

Assuming the CotEU is required to provide streaing video for those without Windows or MacOS, then who's to say they shouldn't have to make it available to those without a computer at all?

In my city (Ottawa, Canada), City Council meetings are open to the public. Anyone can go. Can't participate, but you can watch. You can also watch Council meetings on the local Cable channel (which means you have to purchase cable from Rogers--and this has been the case for decades without public outcry) You can also watch online. I think they use a RealMedia format.

If you don't have a computer (or cable TV) at home, there are computer terminals at all the public library branches and at many community centres. Assuming the City has a right to make these meetings available for live viewing to all citizens (which, really, is covered by letting any citizen attend meetings in person) then they have done so by making these computer terminals available at local libraries. Not incidentally, this would also cover off the Linux-using population in the case of the CotEU.

If your computer cannot access the stream (because it can't run on Linux, or is too old, or your internet connection isn't fast enough), then you can go to one of these places to view it. Or, if you want equality, the Council can stop streaming online, and everyone will be unable to watch it.

- RG>

Re:Is watching it online a Privilege or a Right?

[DannyO152]

Cable is a distribution technology (and I'm assuming that government access as basic service is required as the terms of granting the monopoly -- I am a US-ian and Canada may have a different cable structure), not a format. Is the cable feed unviewable for certain brands of televisions? Of course not.

Regarding the assertion that if one wants to participate in government, one will get (or borrow) a Windows machine: first, has Microsoft guaranteed that those files will be fully readable forever? Second: aren't you as a taxpayer concerned that any platform-tied file format might be costing you more because your government agency's choice in server and requirements for server liceneses are restricted and may need maintenance in perpetuity in order to use your archive?

Again, from a US-ian perspective, one huge problem down here is that people don't participate in government. Interfering with participation by erecting technology barriers, even in this one instance where the practical effect is no doubt minor, seems wrong.

2 Solutions

[MBHkewl]

MPlayer & Xine!
I'm 100% positive that MPlayer can play WMV streams. I use KMPlayer for the GUI.

Oh, and there's a video-media plugin for FireFox to help the user choose which media player to use (MediaPlayerConnectivity: https://addons.mozilla.org/firefox/446/)

Re:2 Solutions

[Anne Thwacks]

I'm 100% positive that MPlayer can play WMV streams.

On FreeBSD it won't - the port of WIN_32_CODECS it depends on for this is marked illegal because of multiple remote execution exploits.

If I was not wearing my tin-foil hat, I would say that the EU only want to support users who are remotely exploitable!

It works FINE in VLC

[Jah-Wren Ryel]

I just tested one stream out and it works fine.
I had to dig out the URL form the "Page Info" in order to test it, but that's just user-interface issues, not codec ones.

Try it yourself with the current release of VLC:

vlc mms://ceu.streampower.be/ceu/archive/CEU_PRESS_CON FERENCE/ceu_video1_or_20061221_573.wmv

The EU does not have software patents (yet, at least) so there should be no legal issues with using VLC to decode this stream.

Only morons code for a browser/version/os

[rcbutcher]

Repeat after me : "my web content will meet a standard, not an operating system or browser/version". Based on my experience with my bank and university, web admins get so bogged down in complaints that they eventually drop their websites complexity down to a level where nobody complains. For my bank that meant dropping java and javascript for online banking and relying 100% on ordinary html forms - it will work now for ANY user. Only morons code for a browser/version/os.

We need to get our story straight...

[harlows_monkeys]

Numerous times, I've seen people who were considering Linux ask whether they would still be able to play their media files from Windows or Mac. And they are usually told "Yes! Linux can handle them! It's easy...just get mplayer and install the right codecs...they are easy to find, and you'll be watching your video in no time".

But whenever we see some site choose to make new content available in those very same Windows formats, many of the same people who were telling potential new users that all these things were easy on Linux suddenly switch and say that Linux users are locked out.

If we want to get people to use Linux, we have to get our story straight as to what Linux can do!

Re:We need to get our story straight...

[cranos]

Yes "Linux" can do WMV, just grab win32codecs for your distro.

No its most likely not legal, instead being a breach of the EULA that covers those codecs. Thats where the switch comes in.

Re:We need to get our story straight...

[evilviper]

many of the same people who were telling potential new users that all these things were easy on Linux suddenly switch and say that Linux users are locked out.

Not at all. Linux users can play WMV video and audio. As of a few months ago, you don't even need the binary codec DLLs or an x86 system for the large majority of WMV video and audio formats.

The reason that's not openly supported by organizations, of course, is the patent licensing fees, which prevent most distros from including programs like MPlayer to begin with. Since the EU is repeatedly trying to get software patents into law, it would be rather hypocritical for them to suggest programs like MPlayer, wouldn't it?

Linux isn't the issue, it's just the reason it was posted on /.

The issue is a government that requires you to use commercial software to play. One that uses secret, undocumented file formats (even Real video would be a bad choice, in this regard). etc.

Quicktime, at least sticks with open and standard video/audio codecs, and MP4 container, despite the patent issues.

And if they put a little bit of effort into it, they could use patent-free formats as well.

Re:We need to get our story straight...

[shish]

many of the same people who were telling potential new users that all these things were easy on Linux suddenly switch and say that Linux users are locked out.

By "same people" do you mean "Slashdotter A" and "Slashdotter B"? If so, I should point out that just because they agree on some things doesn't mean that they are all one group with one unified set of opinions -- it's quite possible to have two groups of people~

Re:We need to get our story straight...

[Ash-Fox]

Yes "Linux" can do WMV, just grab win32codecs for your distro.

Or latest VLC which uses a less hacky method (it's own implementation in the ffmpeg library).

Re:We need to get our story straight...

[Ash-Fox]

Have you actually tried to compile the latest VLC without having to install a dozen or more 3rd party libraries' -dev packages just to compile it in linux?

No. But why would I want to? Each library has it's own special function and it does it well.

I also don't see it being difficult to build from the source, a single command for me 'sudo apt-build install vlc' (you can also do this graphically with a package manager -- but I don't feel like explaining how to use a GUI -- as you can figure it out yourself).

PHB's Said So

[mpapet]

Nevermind there are ANY alternatives open closed or whatever.

This is about the PHB's having a meeting with no technical people. Like most government agencies. PHB's make up nonsense claiming they can't because the sky will fall if they switch and senior PHB's who don't care just go along.

It's the PHB who will lose their job for going against Microsoft. Massachusetts' toying with ODF to get a better deal out of Microsoft is a perfect example. The MA IT PHB who had to quit his job for stating the obvious is exactly what would happen in the EU. The PHB that states the obvious (not even implement!) in the EU will lose his job too.

Technically, FOSS can do the heavy lifting and everyone knows it. This is an excellent example of how the patently obvious never gets implemented because the other pays better.

Re:PHB's Said So

[Watson Ladd]

How does using a Microsoft solution for a video streaming problem pay better then using mpeg?

Oh the noes.

[kewagi]

This sounds like a typical middle-class IT fuckup - the task of creating a video streaming solution was assigned to the boss' cousin, who doesn't know there are operating systems besides Windows and always watches his porn as WMV streams, so the solution was clear for him. I'm far from being a mindless EU basher, but the quality controll still leaves a lot to be desired.

Re: Oh the noes.

[tietokone-olmi]

This is exactly how it goes in any government-type organization. Competence in matters related in any way to IT is little and far between, since all competent people got hired away for bigger salaries at private companies. So what you get are consultants who'll push microsoft this, microsoft that, because Microsoft gives them a cut of any and all expensive software and hardware installations they manage to have set up. Or the decision-maker's cousin's dog, but it's the same thing really.

It's corruption, Jim, but not as we know it.

Forget it

[ardor]

One serious problem is that there are no working Theora VFW plugins (some exist, but they are unusable). You *have* to install VLC or mplayer. Add to this the fact that NO video editing software supports it, and you have a real mess (and don't start with mencoder -crypticoption1 -crypticoption2, I am talking about stuff like Premiere, or tools like VirtualDub. Oh, and there is no streaming server for Theora. This alone rules it out already.

Re:Forget it

[Anonymous Coward]

I just got done ripping a DVD with menencoder and having read the man page I can't help but wonder if the reason video seems more complex than networking is because of all the disparate formats out there. We don't have different standards for SMTP or TCP/IP, we have one peer reviewed standard that works. Why should we have so many standards for video?

It's all ones and zeros, the real art is in the encoding compression, but seems there should be at least some consensus on handling this. I'd like to bet most of the problems here are purely mathematical and what we have with different companies coming up with different systems and patenting them is kind of like that Newton and Leibniz would have patented calculus independently had they made their discoveries today.

With video we have stuff like interlacing, progressive scanning, frames per second, etc.. Everyone seems to want a patent on the most trivial procedures and what we end up with is a big mess. Somewhere there should be a video RFC and a community of geeks should come up with a standard. Companies can still contribute, or if their ideas are so revolutionary and unique, fork and go off on their own.

Re:Forget it

[ardor]

You forget that the geeks have nothing to say about this. This is a result of a patent and IP war. Video encoding is one of the most locked down areas of IT. So, no "gathering" of geeks will change anything.

Re:Forget it

[Marcion]

ador wrote:

>One serious problem is that there are no working Theora VFW plugins (some exist, but they are unusable). You *have* to install VLC or mplayer.

I am an mplayer man, but Realplayer supports ogg, what is wrong with that? In the UK at least most people will have it as it is required for BBC and so on.

Re:Forget it

[bigmammoth]

assuming this is not a troll....

there are no working Theora VFW plugins

Well there is the java cortado player that we use on metavid. So IE users support it out of the box. For in browser playing we also support the VLC Mozilla and IE active X plugin.

NO video editing software supports it

Besides the directShow filters that enable ogg theora to work in all windows media editing application and the QuickTime extension that allows ogg theora to work in all apple quicktime applications there is native cross platform ogg support in open source editors such as jahsaka and in linux editors such as cinelerra

and finally

no streaming server for Theora

there is icecast which we have used on metavid.org to do live broadcasts to the java based player. Also the gstreamer flumotion suite.

Re:Forget it

[ardor]

I didn't know the java player, this is a nice project.
But as for the DShow filters, these are the ones I meant. Forget them. Often they crash, and when they don't, the frames jump, or playback stops altogether. VLC is just a much better option. Also, "Updated: 2 May 2004" does not sound very good...

Besides, Premiere still doesn't support theora...

Re:Forget it

[cheesybagel]

FFDShow support Ogg Theora via libavcodec.

I use the CCCP pack. Seems fine here.

Re:Forget it

[DrSkwid]

Study the subject properly and you will see why.

I'll throw in a few pointers :

PAL/SECAM/NTSC/film

60Hz/50Hz AC power

YUV/RGB

Tape cassette transports / tape speed

Error correction / dropout protection

Q. Why is WMV so popular anyways? A. Inertia

[AHumbleOpinion]

There are so many other options: from .mov to video containing mp3 files. Why .wmv?

Inertia, it works, ... basically people have been successfully using it for a while. Technically QuickTime is older but prior to iTunes QuickTime was a bit flaky on the PC side and Windows Media filled the void. It is harder to displace a "defacto standard" than fill a void.

They're just being sneaky.

[belmolis]

I'm amazed that nobody has pointed out a reason that seems obvious even to a non conspiracy theorist such as myself: they are aware that users of FOSS operating systems and browsers are particularly likely to be opposed to software patents and don't to make it harder for them to monitor the activities of the Council. This is the same Council that not long ago tried to sneak software patents past the European Parliament.

Re:They're just being sneaky.

[fritsd]

Loosen your tin-foil hat; it was the Commission that tried to shove software patents down our throat, not the council (the Council is just the term for the assembled ministers of foreign affairs of the EU countries).

Re:They're just being sneaky.

[belmolis]

Ah, you're right. There are too many bodies with similar names. (The Council of Europe is yet another.)

They voluntarily opted out ...

[AHumbleOpinion]

Just because the consumer can't find out what proportion of the price of a new PC is for the MS software doesn't automatically imply that it's not expensive. What a silly suggestion.

Actually he was arguing that they already paid the Microsoft tax and were entitled to run Windows, and having already paid the Microsoft tax there is no initial cost saving when choosing to go Linux. Also, the price of an OEM version of Windows has been well documented for many years, there is no mystery regarding the price.

Re:They voluntarily opted out ...

[trewornan]

I can only go by what the guy said, you might understand that he meant something different but in his own words:

But you can't argue that Windows is expensive when it's a cost incorporated into 99.9% of consumer PC's.

Which is a idiotic statement for the reason I pointed out.

I'm surprised if you can tell me with any certainty what a company like Dell or Sony is paying Microsoft per copy for windows. Price for an OEM copy of windows generally varies from around $100 to $170. Of course it's up to the individual to decide if that's expensive but if you don't know how much you're paying (via some third party) doesn't necessarily make it inexpensive.

Neither does the fact that it's difficult to buy a computer without windows make it any cheaper.

Re:They voluntarily opted out ...

[AHumbleOpinion]

I'm surprised if you can tell me with any certainty what a company like Dell or Sony is paying Microsoft per copy for windows. Price for an OEM copy of windows generally varies from around $100 to $170.

A couple of years ago I paid $135 for a single copy of OEM WinXP Pro, that would be an upper bound appropriate for calculations. Dell or Sony would certainly pay less, but the unit cost for a single OEM version of Windows would be an appropriate comparison for the unit cost of a single OEM CPU from Intel/AMD, motherboard., video etc. The percentage of overall cost will be close enough.

Neither does the fact that it's difficult to buy a computer without windows make it any cheaper.

I don't think the original poster was addressing that point itself. In any case a new computer from Dell or Sony with or without the Microsoft tax would be too much for the "poor". Using the word "poor" loosely of course. The truly poor don't rank browsing an EU committee website from their home very highly on their list of problems. It is a highly flawed argument.

Civil Rights are Violated.

[twitter]

That's an unbelievably bizarre metaphor - equating operating system support as anything like racial discrimination.

I can't understand why anyone would confuse freedom and civil liberties, can you? Is it worse to screw everyone for the benefit of a few, than it is to screw other races? Violating others is wrong, regardless of numbers.

A government that forces non free software for popular participation is not interested in popular participation or does not mind having a third party as a mediator of that participation. It is perverse and wrong for governments to force people to chose between software freedom and participation in their culture. They would have more control if they were to broadcast on TV only. They will have more particpation if they chose a free format and force the third parties to make due. Microsoft is never going to behave and the problems will never end unless people quit using their shit.

Re:Civil Rights are Violated.

[EXMSFT]

It's software. Not slavery. Take a few deep breaths - you're obviously a bit obsessed with hating Microsoft - so I can see why my post became fodder for you. But puh-leeze... "the problems will never end"? What problems? The e-ville empire? You're obviously a free software fan, and I'm guessing you hate Microsoft because they represent everything about commercial software (besides just being "big old e-ville Microsoft". But ending a sentence with "...people quit using their shit." isn't really a good way to reinforce any point.

I again state my case that anyone who is confusing basic civil liberties with what the EU has done needs to seriously revisit their understanding of both philosophy and economics.

Re:Civil Rights are Violated.

[TheShadowzero]

You have a choice (usuallY) with software. You never have a choice with race.

They also don't fully support.....

[jonfr]

The council of the European Union also doesn't support Firefox or Opera to there full extend. They say that them self right here, http://ceuweb.belbone.be/faq.php?lang=EN

And I quote.

"In what browsers can I view the live streaming media service of the Council of the European Union?
The live streaming media service of the Council of the European Union supports Internet Explorer 5 and higher, Netscape Navigator 6 and higher. If you encounter problems with a lower version of your browser, the browser should be updated to facilitate the live streaming media service. Firefox and Opera will be supported with a minimal of functionalities: No possibilities to use the Table Of contents for positioning the streaming. All the buttons for the player will disappear and the standard buttons of the player must be used to control the stream."

There stream is nothing more then mms that works with mplayer of properly configured at the servers end. This is a typical fuckup of a admin who doesn't actually know anything about computers and how to stream a video.

Re:They also don't fully support.....

[sid1950]

I agree, that this is just laziness. I can view the archive sessions, using Firefox 2, with the MPlayer plug-in on Suse Linux 10.2 and Mandriva Free2007. There were no live sessions when I looked this morning.

I've come across other sites, which are so badly coded they won't work properly. If the streaming server has been correctly configured, and the website is fully HTML & W3C compliant then the platform and browser shouldn't matter. None of the Micro$oft web design tools generate fully compliant code, and their server tools are similar.

My test is that if I can play the streams on CNN, then my browser/plug-in setup is working properly. However there are some sites, which detect your browser, and if it is on their "not-approved" list (i.e. the ones they are too lazy to test with), then they throw you off to a page insisting you install, or upgrade to IE 6 or whatever. That is just plain bad design, and trying to hide behind a "legal problem" is stupid and lazy.

I suggest the Council of the EU look at what has been done by some states and cities in Germany, and by DB railway, and the MUST read the legislation passed by the Brazilian government regarding the issue of Open Source Software.

both true

[twitter]

1. "Yes! Linux can handle them! It's easy...just get mplayer and install the right codecs...they are easy to find, and you'll be watching your video in no time".
2. whenever we see some site choose to make new content available in those very same Windows formats, many of the same people who were telling potential new users that all these things were easy on Linux suddenly switch and say that Linux users are locked out.

Both are true. It is easy to make the formats work. The problem is that it requires binaries of dubious legality. That's not an excuse for governments to make immoral laws or to force people to use non free software to participate in their own governance. I mostly avoid the content and consider the formats an affront: forcing people to chose between cultural participation and software freedom is evil.

Re:both true

[rg3]

The problem is that it requires binaries of dubious legality.

This is not exactly true. MPlayer or VLC, both using ffmpeg, can play those WMV streams without needing the popular w32codecs package. So they do not requiere binaries of dubious legality, unless you consider writting a decoder for those formats is illegal. Software patents are still not allowed in the EU, so I would discard that. However, if you have more detailed information about it, I'd like to hear it.

Sure they can

[Sycraft-fu]

Or, rather, they can decide that they aren't going to support any and every strange thing citizens want.

There's a real difference between accommodating a minority who's that way because of a physical problem they can't overcome (such as loss of limb use, blindness, etc) and a minority who's that way because they choose to be so.

For example suppose you tried to mandate that the government had to provide parking at their official buildings for any kind of vehicle someone might want. Now suppose that a trucker decides that they want to use their rig, complete with trailer, as the means of transportation. Now you have to have to go to a large amount of trouble because someone is choosing to try and make things difficult.

Of course in that case the government doesn't need to accommodate them. That person is perfectly capable of using another car or taking the bus or riding a bike or whatever.

Well the same goes for computers. The government can say they are only supporting the major OSes. You can't say "but they have to support all OSes!" because they don't and that's clearly impossible. What about the guy using a Commodore 128 to get on the net (it happens, encountered a guy who used one to play MUDs back in my MUD days)?

Re:Sure they can

[Trelane]

The government can say they are only supporting the major OSes

There is a vast difference between not providing support for an OS and prohibiting others from supporting an OS. The EU--by choosing a proprietary, patent-encumbered format--has chosen the latter, not merely the former.

Re:Sure they can

[Trelane]

They don't have to support your zealous desire to never have to use closed-source or proprietary software.

Interestingly, my supposed "zelatous desires to never have to use closed-source or proprietary software" (interesting, then, that I have vmware, RealPlayer, Mathematica, Matlab, cxoffice, NWN, UT2004, and other software on my box!) have nothing to do with my argument at all.

Microsoft openly licenses the WMV format.

For certain values of "openly", certainly.

There are closed-source players for it available to Linux.

Where did Linux factor into the equation? Are there closed-source players for every OS and harware the citizenry runs and will run? If not, then your argument falls on its face.

The fact of the matter is that government documents should be readable by any citizen who wants to on whatever system they want to. This does not mean that the government must make sure the software exists to use their system on every OS/hardware combo ever to be in existance, but rather that there is nothing standing in the way of the citizenry to do so. Proprietary, patent-encumbered formats are an impediment to the citizenry being freely able to keep tabs on their government and participate fully in the democratic process. That is my argument.

Is this the same EU...

[geminidomino]

that is supposed to have Microsoft quaking in its boots at the spectre of the "interoperate or pay" ruling?

Yep, they sure showed Microsoft who's boss... Billy will be coming over for his crown next week.

What is wrong with QuickTime, its open

[cheekyboy]

Why dont people just use the quicktime package format, wasnt it made open years ago and can handle just about any thing, its not
codec specific, why re-invent more crap. Extend whats out there and open.

Re:What is wrong with QuickTime, its open

[evilviper]

Why dont people just use the quicktime package format,

Because Quicktime is despised just slightly less than Ogg.

Off the top of my head:

Significant overhead.
Metadata at the end of files (like AVI).
This precluding good playback of partial files, and causes really terrible problems with partially damaged MOV files.
Unbelivably large number of different ways to do anything.
An unbelivably huge and complex standard that probably nobody on earth understands entirely.
14 different versions of the standard, and a field in the MOV header to dictate which version of the standard the player should use to read the file.
And finally: patents

If quicktime wasn't so horrible, you certainly wouldn't have ever seen formats like Ogg or MKV.

Re:What is wrong with QuickTime, its open

[cortana]

Patents.

Re:What is wrong with QuickTime, its open

[HeroreV]

The .mp4 container format (MPEG-4 Part 14) is based on QuickTime's .mov container format. If you want to use .mov, use .mp4 instead.

Re:What is wrong with QuickTime, its open

[Grishnakh]

Hold on a sec here... why are patents a problem? The article is about the EU Council; to my knowledge, software patents don't apply in the EU, only the USA. So if the problem is the EU government is putting up videos that EU Citizens need to be able to view legally, patents shouldn't be a problem as long as the EU Citizens aren't trying to watch the videos while on vacation in the USA.

Re:What is wrong with QuickTime, its open

[cortana]

There are no EU directives that harmonise the patenting of software accross the EU. That doesn't mean that individual countries don't have a mishmash of existing and conflicting legislation.

Re:What is wrong with QuickTime, its open

[Bloke down the pub]

I thought they sneaked them through by pencilling them in at the botton of the 238th page of something about whether herrings are a fruit or not?

Re:What is wrong with QuickTime, its open

[cortana]

For instance, check out http://www.mp3licensing.com/patents/index.html. Each patent is filed separately in many EU countries.

Re:What is wrong with QuickTime, its open

[Grishnakh]

Right, the patents are filed there, but that doesn't mean they're enforceable. In most of those countries, the patents aren't enforceable. Of course, Fraunhofer doesn't bother to tell you that.

Irony of hammering m$ and then requiring it.

[Maxo-Texas]

First they hammer microsoft for almost a billions of dollars in fines.

Then they say it is is required to play the video.

Re:Irony of hammering m$ and then requiring it.

[stud9920]

Not so contradictory (fyi contradiction and irony are not the same).

The EU is pissed not because MS (since 1999 it's officially no longer funny to say m$) has billions ad thy want it. The EU is pissed because MS has a monopoly and abuses it on different levels.

WMV is not even a domain in which MS has a monopoly. See QT, RAM, mp4.

Re:Irony of hammering m$ and then requiring it.

[NoOneInParticular]

You apparently haven't followed the news since 1999. The entire lawsuit of the EU against Microsoft was centered around the abuse of Microsoft's desktop monopoly to obtain a monopoly in the field of media content. Although the lawsuit on the surface centered around bundling the Media player itself (*), the true danger the EU tried to curtail was that MS would use its desktop, with bundled media-player to obtain a monopoly in streaming content: i.e., entrench WMV as the safe choice to stream any content.

In the light of this, it is both contradictory and deeply ironic that this same EU is now actively promoting WMV as the method of choice for streaming media content. As other posters have noticed, this also promotes the use of Windows on handhelds (like mobile phones), as only windows based mobile phones will be able to play this content. Is the EU interested in Microsoft obtaining a monopoly there as well?

(*) Sort of like how Al Capone was hit with a tax law suits.

I have sent them an email: You should do the same!

[erlehmann]

To whom it may concern:


I am interested in politics - especially on the European level, because political decisions heavily influence the way we, citizens of the EU states, live. As have learnt through Slashdot, a news website [1], the Council of the EU has decided to offer a streaming media service.

In my opinion, this is a very interesting service with great potential to provide citizens with more information to actual issues.

Unfortunately, the stream is only avaiable in a proprietary format named Windows Media Video (WMV). In your frequently asked questions [2] you state that "[the] live streaming media service [...] supports [only] Internet Explorer 5 and higher, Netscape Navigator 6 and higher.", that "[the stream] can be viewed [only] on Microsoft Windows and Macintosh platforms." and "[you] cannot support Linux in a legal way.".

As a user of free and open source software, this cought my attention. As a politically interested citizen, I would like to know why a proprietary (secret, probably patent-encumbered) format was chosen over an open video standard like Ogg Theora or XviD.

Proprietary formats, like WMV, are vendor-specific: They prevent or make it difficult for others to implement the specification. In this specific case, one has to download Windows Media Player, which is not avaiable for GNU/Linux, the operating system I am using. In constrast, open standards enable everyone to implement them: They are a vendor-agnostic, royalty-free and allow for a wide range of implementations. This can be compared to the analogue radio program, which can be heard with any radio, not just radios from microsoft.

As you can see, the use of a proprietary format is unfair, discriminatory behaviour against those who can not or do not want to use Microsoft Windows Media Player. The fact that this is done by a government entity makes it worse. In my opinion, gouvernment should not discriminate people - not even based on their choice of software. This is somehow a policital issue, but I doubt any reasonable citizen would oppose my position.

Most likely it is technically possible to offer the streaming media service in an open format to enable everyone with a capable computer and a good internet connection to watch it. You could do this, for example, with the free and open source software VLC Media Player [3], which is avaiable for a wide range of operating systems free of charge. Another way to provide wide access to your media stream could be the use of a java applet like Cortado (also free and open source software) which eliminates the need for a media player.


XXXX XXXX, a concerned citizen of the European Union


[1] http://linux.slashdot.org/comments.pl?threshold=0& mode=thread&commentsort=0&op=Change&sid=214392
[2] http://ceuweb.belbone.be/faq.php?lang=EN
[3] http://videolan.org/
[4] http://www.flumotion.net/cortado/

What does 'legal' mean?

[nine9]

When I read what they said, I immediately wondered if they were using another meaning of the word 'legal'.

We often use legal to mean regarding laws and the legality of an action. However, it can also be used to express possible things as opposed to impossible things. I was thinking--though I could be wrong--that the legal sum of 2 and 2, is 4...

mplayer+firefox+MediaPlayerConnectivity = success

[freakxx]

well, if I am not wrong, what this discussion is all about?? I tried the link and I could manage to watch the video using Firefox + mplayer combination with the help of MediaPlayerConnectivity [https://addons.mozilla.org/firefox/446] extension installed !! Are there something much deeper things involved out here what I am not able to get?? May be questions about standard media etc.???

If you are really concerned about this ...

[jopet]

If you are really concerned about this, do not just calm yourself by quickly signing the petition.

Send a protest by email, or better yet, written letter to them: streaming.helpline@consilium.europa.eu (technical) or Public.info@consilium.europa.eu (organizational),
Council of the European Union
Rue de la Loi, 175 B-1048 Bruxelles
Telephone (32-2) 281 61 11
Fax (32-2) 281 69 99

Contact your local/national members of the european parliament or even better, members of the council directly.

Microsoft and related industries has a lot of well paid lobbyists at the EU, open source advocates and private people who just want to use Linux as an alternative have nothing.

Make some pressure.

Re:Instead of rallying...

[Anne Thwacks]

world wide class action law suit

Because the EU does not support the concept of class actions for one.

What I want to know is "How is it legal to force the population to use the products of a convicted corporation who have yet to pay their fines?"

This sounds like "aiding and abetting" in normal life.

Vista Icons on their Site?

[paniq]

Huh? Their site is full of Windows Vista icons? They care about a legal status of Linux and use Microsofts intellectual property on a website?

Seriously, wtf?

Ah - that's another angle!

[cheros]

Actually, you've got a point there. If the EU does not support an alternative format it means one part is effectively supporting the monopoly the other part is trying to break.

So, a second complaint should go to Neelie Smith-Kroes of the monopoly commission as this weakens their position.

If we do support linux...

[nurb432]

We might not get those millions from Microsoft.

Re:I have sent them an email: You should do the sa

[TheRaven64]

Please spell-check first. Spelling caught with an 'o' will detract from your argument. Also, write to your MEPs. One of the nice things about the EU is that you have a few of them. Most of mine are useless, but one responds to emails and has a history of campaigning against things like software patents, which brings me on to the next point:

The only thing stopping them from 'legally' supporting Linux is the existence of software patents, which are not valid in the EU. Remind them of this.

Finally, remind them that this is not about Linux users. No one cares about Linux users. This is about users of anything other than Windows, including mobile phones. My mobile can play H.263, MPEG-4, and RealVideo 7,8 formats. If they pick WMV, this means the only people who can watch the video on their mobile phones are Windows Mobile users; they are helping Microsoft leverage a monopoly on the desktop to gain on in the mobile space. If they pick H.263 or MPEG-4, then anyone can watch them, whether they have Windows, Mac, or *NIX on their desktop, or Windows, Symbian or Linux on their mobile.

Re:I have sent them an email: You should do the sa

[erlehmann]

hmm.. i almost always mention GNU/Linux, *BSD, Solaris, but never thought of handy users. *very* nice idea.

wmv2 or 3

[Vexorian]

I am not sure if they are using wmv3 , If they were using wmv2 VLC would work well enough and the lazy tech guy wouldn't be blamed for "supporting linux" . If they are using wmv3 they could move to wmv2 either way. It all seems that wmv3 is only supported by media player this kind of limitation doesn't sound great to me, even for mac users.

WMV Decoder for *nix?

[yosofun]

why not have a wmv decoder for *nix?

Re:Ogg Theora? or I want my money back!

[Marcion]

Another case of the EU being irresponsible with our money.

I am a taxpaying citizen of the European Union who uses a European compiled distribution of Linux.

I should be able to access its services free from discrimination and without requiring the products of foreign monopolies.

If the EU cannot be bothered to provide services in this way then they should not provide these services at all and stop wasting out money on crap software.

I think we should abolish the unelected European Commission and give its powers to the elected European Parliament. Then at least we can attempt to control the runaway budget through our votes.

What's MPEG-4, chopped liver?

[danaris]

OK, I'm lost here. Why are WMV, Real, and Flash the only possibilities? What's wrong with an MPEG-4 based codec, like h264? It's excellent at any bitrate, and widely supported (to my understanding)...though I don't know offhand how well it performs when streaming, or what software can be used to do so (though I'd bet Darwin Streaming Server can do it, and the server side of VLC certainly could).

Is it you that doesn't consider it, or were they being ridiculously oblivious?

Dan Aris

Re:What's MPEG-4, chopped liver?

[Air-conditioned cowh]

OK. Plan a webcast for 10000 viewers with whole-world coverage with a two-week deadline. Scan the internet and see what options Straming Solution Providers offer you ;-)

Re:The grandparent's numbers are risible.

[westlake]

I would guess that the main reason is that, since [Linux] is free and easily downloaded, statistics based on sales have no meaning.

Sales statistics have meaning in the markets where the OEM or POS system install is the norm for users. The home and SOHO markets, small business, small business.

I can't believe that non-technical end users are downloading and burning Linux ISOs in any significant numbers.

Re:I have sent them an email: You should do the sa

[aboujraf]

I don't understand your letter. I have some questions related to it:

Why would you like to express to the MEP what they know already about?

Providing names of tools is easy but what about the support? To whom the MEP should address their requests for support?

Are you sure that it's not easier for more than 90% of the users of internet to use media player to play any kind of video?

Last but not least, what is the market of the linux users watching the council meetings?

Kind regards,

Re:I used xine to watch a past meeting

[fabianmg]

I think they were talking about linux support for retards.

Closed government and closed source

[mcalwell]

The EU has much in common with closed source software, so this comes as no surprise. Nobody understands how it works, nobody can change it, it's expensive, when it goes wrong nobody takes responsibility and it takes an army of overpaid people to operate.

True...

[woolio]

If no one picked it up to use on the desktop when it wasn't ready, it will likely never be ready. OTOH, the more people use an open piece of software, the more development it attracts.

I agree.... I think others are just quibbling over the bitter reality that one cannot expect governements to fully support a "not quite yet ready" Linux solution.

(I for one would be amazed and thilled if my county tax office could process a vehicle title form in less than 1-2 months... I would be infinitely more shocked if they were could be motivated to support Linux )

EU needs a target....

[EricTheO]

The EU can't officialy support Linux because they can't figure out who to sue in court first. Can't sue the Penguin and I don't think suing Microsoft to make them change Linux to the EU's liking would work. ;-p

The FAQ page has been changed

[goghgoner]

The verbiage "We cannot support Linux" has been removed from the Council's FAQ web page. Ahhh, the power of Slashdot -- we may not get them to start streaming with an open source format, but at least we can get their FAQ modified. http://ceuweb.belbone.be/faq.php?lang=EN

UPDATE: The legal issue with Linux was a mistake

[juliancoccia]

After a letter written from the Spanish Observatorio de Neutralidad Tecnológica about the actual reasons why they believe supporting Linux is illegal, the EU responds stating "it was a mistake" and was fixed right away.

Now that they understand there is no legal reasons to prevent so, I hope they fix their website which is currently discriminating Linux users.

Dear EU

[Sjaaksken]

I have written a letter to the technical support on the EU council page:
http://ceuweb.belbone.be/contact.php?lang=EN

I advise everyone with the same problem as me to do the same.

"Hi,

I have been trying to get your stream to play on my system. I must advise you that I'm an ICT professional and yes I know how to play a stream. The problem is, I am using linux. I have looked everywhere on your site to make your stream play. The link for media player 10 doesn't work. Offcourse it does display information, like that I should buy a microsoft windows license? Since the EU council is a public organisation and it's their duty to not discriminate people (taxpayers included) I reckon the EU is going to buy me a windows license so I can watch the stream? If not this is one hell of a technical problem.

I advise you to stop discriminating your inhabitants. The EU council does not have the right to force windows upon their inhabitants. If microsoft doesn't bring out a codec for open source systems (like linux or bsd) to play than the EU council will have to abandon microsoft as their supplier.

After all, it is our tax money.

Kind regards and hoping for a solution soon,

Sjaaksken"