According to a FOLDOC article, Sperry merged with Burroughs to form this company. Primary consumer-visible product - here. The patent still subsists for about eight more months in Canada, Europe, and Japan.
Thier proprietary solutions by and large are dead.
I don't know about "by", but Sperry-Burroughs proprietary technology is used in a "large" number of images displayed on the World Wide Web. I'd guess that at least 90 percent of web sites, Slashdot included, use the Sperry-Burroughs proprietary product I mentioned.
I'd like to see an analogous "Music Law Guide for Songwriters". Which of these books or any other book do people recommend? Until I get some hard facts on how to avoid George Harrison's mistake (Bright Tunes v. Harrisongs), the guide I wrote suggests: Don't.
Not all countries make copyright infringement a crime, eliminating police costs. The court costs are generally paid by the copyright owner (or by the loser, if legal tradition so dictates).
Snopes
seems to think "Happy Birthday to You" is still
copyrighted and owned by Time Warner. But it
may
not be different enough from an earlier
song called "Good Morning to All", whose U.S.
copyright has already expired, to be considered
a distinct work worthy of a separate copyright.
You limited your question to "in thirty years." I'm assuming that as long as the patents subsist, the patent holder will continue to maintain the reference implementation, and immediately afterward, the free software community will step in and create a permanent solution in a language that won't just up and die. (Fortran hasn't died out completely; why should C?)
Am I understanding you that there is not a constant quantizer for audio compression? If this is the case, how is decompression handled?
The popular lossy audio codecs store the quantizer information in the audio bitstream. As I understand it: In MP3, each block of audio has scale factors sent before the block, one for each of 21 "critical bands." In Ogg Vorbis, every block has a linearly interpolated de-emphasis curve sent before the block.
Windows Media Audio with digital restrictions management encoding is encrypted, and it's decrypted, decompressed, and output through a Secure Audio Path (explanation). But because these services do in fact allow recording audio to a CD-RW disc, the limitation of no direct transcoding to MP3 is only a minor hurdle.
Unfortunately, Clear Channel makes it really easy to find crappy artists and hard to find good artists in the car. Clear Channel often has a monopoly or near-monopoly on broadcasting recordings to a moving vehicle.
You probably won't hear the higher precision of a format that claims to have higher precision than Compact Disc Digital Audio. A CD, encoded in 16/44 PCM with a decent noise-shaped dither, already pushes quantization noise far below the noise floor that the human ear can pick up. The "better quality of 24/96" is most likely just the generally better quality of more expensive stereo equipment as opposed to mass-market Philips stereo sold for $200 at Best Buy or Circuit City. The "analog warmth" is actually a gentle treble rolloff plus a bit of pleasing harmonic distortion.
Also gone: playing any 33 1/3 album at 45 for that Chipmunks sound
Two words: 59535 Hz. Use any audio editor (or heck, even a hex editor) to change the wav file's sample rate from 44100 Hz to 59535 Hz, and you have your 45 RPM effect. Incidentally, the "Hampsterdance" wav is a 45 RPM record played at 78 RPM.
Significantly? Have you tried it? How, specifically, would you characterize the extra artifacts of wav -> AAC -> MP3 vs. wav -> MP3 more than a vague "there are more"?
and the legality is questionable
And answerable with "yes" as long as your copying is non-commercial (17 USC 1008).
Good for you, but the cheap CD players that most CD buyers already have do not have SPDIF out, and the cheap sound cards that most PC owners already have do not have SPDIF in. I'm guessing that most PC owners are not willing to spend $$$ extra for a new CD player and a new sound card. And what happens when the recording industry finally ditches CD in favor of DVD Audio for the most part just like it ditched vinyl in favor of CD for the most part?
Hanson, Haddaway, 4 Non Blondes, The Wonders, Right Said Fred, and Deadeye Dick. What do they have in common? Their "greatest hits CD" is a single. Best Buy doesn't have a lot of singles.
Many "more talented artists" don't have the finance to promote their recordings on commercial radio (FM, XM, Sirius), which is the only broadcast medium that can be received in moving vehicles. Without promotion that reaches vehicles, how can I learn of "more talented artists" if I don't have time to listen to much music other than in the car (i.e. no time for iRATE)?
Most JPEG implementations use a constant quantizer matrix for a given "image quality" setting. Given a constant quantizer matrix, JPEG image compression uses the same step function for repeated compression and decompression of the same image. JPEG also works with each DCT block as it finds it and doesn't overlap them; a change to one block won't affect the others. Therefore, if you always use the same quality setting, you can edit small portions of a JPEG image without damaging the rest.
MP3 and Vorbis, on the other hand, changes quantizers based on the observed characteristics of the audio after the frequencies have been convolved with a masking function. This can subtly change some frequency bands' step functions on repeated compression. In addition, MP3 and Vorbis process using an MDCT, which processes overlapping blocks of signal, and an error can spread from block to block on repeated recompression. Heck, MP3 codecs don't even seem to have a consistent idea of the encoder's delay, so blocks may not be aligned from one save to the next.
In thirty years, the patents on currently popular audio codecs will expire, and through the miracle of free software, XMMS and Zinf will be able to play every format that Winamp can now play. XMMS and Zinf will run on any POSIX conforming system, and even if the computer industry moves beyond POSIX to some incompatible native API, there will probably still be a way to emulate POSIX behavior on whatever's popular (as we have now with Cygwin for Windows).
Or just run Winamp in a Bochs. This is emulation. Likewise, there exist laser based devices that emulate a stereo phonograph.
Slashdot Mirror
THIER proprietary technology is basically dead.
Unisys's most popular proprietary technology is not dead worldwide yet, but it is terminal with eight months to live in Japan, Europe, and Canada.
Sperry - gone. Burroughs - gone.
According to a FOLDOC article, Sperry merged with Burroughs to form this company. Primary consumer-visible product - here. The patent still subsists for about eight more months in Canada, Europe, and Japan.
Thier proprietary solutions by and large are dead.
I don't know about "by", but Sperry-Burroughs proprietary technology is used in a "large" number of images displayed on the World Wide Web. I'd guess that at least 90 percent of web sites, Slashdot included, use the Sperry-Burroughs proprietary product I mentioned.
It was probably given sans license period.
"Sans license period" is actually quite strict.
As in, "here it is, as is, do with it what you will, we are no longer involved."
What you described in this sentence, on the other hand, is a BSD style license.
Authors of prose typically do not run into patents except in technical writing, and I'm guessing technical writing has its own set of law guides.
I'd like to see an analogous "Music Law Guide for Songwriters". Which of these books or any other book do people recommend? Until I get some hard facts on how to avoid George Harrison's mistake (Bright Tunes v. Harrisongs), the guide I wrote suggests: Don't.
This time limit is in the Berne Convention
The Berne Convention specifies at least life plus 50, which Australia already has even without this proposed Bono Act.
Would you want to be paying royalties to the descendants of the caveman who invented the wheel?
That's from FOLDOC by Denis Howe.
Not all countries make copyright infringement a crime, eliminating police costs. The court costs are generally paid by the copyright owner (or by the loser, if legal tradition so dictates).
Are these assertions valid under Australian constitutional law as well?
The Walt Disney Company may have already lost the copyright on Mickey Mouse due to a faulty copyright notice.
Snopes seems to think "Happy Birthday to You" is still copyrighted and owned by Time Warner. But it may not be different enough from an earlier song called "Good Morning to All", whose U.S. copyright has already expired, to be considered a distinct work worthy of a separate copyright.
You limited your question to "in thirty years." I'm assuming that as long as the patents subsist, the patent holder will continue to maintain the reference implementation, and immediately afterward, the free software community will step in and create a permanent solution in a language that won't just up and die. (Fortran hasn't died out completely; why should C?)
Am I understanding you that there is not a constant quantizer for audio compression? If this is the case, how is decompression handled?
The popular lossy audio codecs store the quantizer information in the audio bitstream. As I understand it: In MP3, each block of audio has scale factors sent before the block, one for each of 21 "critical bands." In Ogg Vorbis, every block has a linearly interpolated de-emphasis curve sent before the block.
Windows Media Audio with digital restrictions management encoding is encrypted, and it's decrypted, decompressed, and output through a Secure Audio Path (explanation). But because these services do in fact allow recording audio to a CD-RW disc, the limitation of no direct transcoding to MP3 is only a minor hurdle.
They're not hard to find if you look.
Unfortunately, Clear Channel makes it really easy to find crappy artists and hard to find good artists in the car. Clear Channel often has a monopoly or near-monopoly on broadcasting recordings to a moving vehicle.
possible better than CD quality format
You probably won't hear the higher precision of a format that claims to have higher precision than Compact Disc Digital Audio. A CD, encoded in 16/44 PCM with a decent noise-shaped dither, already pushes quantization noise far below the noise floor that the human ear can pick up. The "better quality of 24/96" is most likely just the generally better quality of more expensive stereo equipment as opposed to mass-market Philips stereo sold for $200 at Best Buy or Circuit City. The "analog warmth" is actually a gentle treble rolloff plus a bit of pleasing harmonic distortion.
Also gone: playing any 33 1/3 album at 45 for that Chipmunks sound
Two words: 59535 Hz. Use any audio editor (or heck, even a hex editor) to change the wav file's sample rate from 44100 Hz to 59535 Hz, and you have your 45 RPM effect. Incidentally, the "Hampsterdance" wav is a 45 RPM record played at 78 RPM.
the quality will suffer
Significantly? Have you tried it? How, specifically, would you characterize the extra artifacts of wav -> AAC -> MP3 vs. wav -> MP3 more than a vague "there are more"?
and the legality is questionable
And answerable with "yes" as long as your copying is non-commercial (17 USC 1008).
My CD player has SPDIF out
Good for you, but the cheap CD players that most CD buyers already have do not have SPDIF out, and the cheap sound cards that most PC owners already have do not have SPDIF in. I'm guessing that most PC owners are not willing to spend $$$ extra for a new CD player and a new sound card. And what happens when the recording industry finally ditches CD in favor of DVD Audio for the most part just like it ditched vinyl in favor of CD for the most part?
AAC is an open format. MP3 is an open format.
Not in the United States.
Or maybe just go buy a greatest hits CD instead.
Hanson, Haddaway, 4 Non Blondes, The Wonders, Right Said Fred, and Deadeye Dick. What do they have in common? Their "greatest hits CD" is a single. Best Buy doesn't have a lot of singles.
Many "more talented artists" don't have the finance to promote their recordings on commercial radio (FM, XM, Sirius), which is the only broadcast medium that can be received in moving vehicles. Without promotion that reaches vehicles, how can I learn of "more talented artists" if I don't have time to listen to much music other than in the car (i.e. no time for iRATE)?
Most JPEG implementations use a constant quantizer matrix for a given "image quality" setting. Given a constant quantizer matrix, JPEG image compression uses the same step function for repeated compression and decompression of the same image. JPEG also works with each DCT block as it finds it and doesn't overlap them; a change to one block won't affect the others. Therefore, if you always use the same quality setting, you can edit small portions of a JPEG image without damaging the rest.
MP3 and Vorbis, on the other hand, changes quantizers based on the observed characteristics of the audio after the frequencies have been convolved with a masking function. This can subtly change some frequency bands' step functions on repeated compression. In addition, MP3 and Vorbis process using an MDCT, which processes overlapping blocks of signal, and an error can spread from block to block on repeated recompression. Heck, MP3 codecs don't even seem to have a consistent idea of the encoder's delay, so blocks may not be aligned from one save to the next.
In thirty years, the patents on currently popular audio codecs will expire, and through the miracle of free software, XMMS and Zinf will be able to play every format that Winamp can now play. XMMS and Zinf will run on any POSIX conforming system, and even if the computer industry moves beyond POSIX to some incompatible native API, there will probably still be a way to emulate POSIX behavior on whatever's popular (as we have now with Cygwin for Windows).
Or just run Winamp in a Bochs. This is emulation. Likewise, there exist laser based devices that emulate a stereo phonograph.