The Devil's Advocate would say that H.264 would likely not have become ubiquitous if the creators knew that they wouldn't be able to patent it.
You could still patent it and earn royalties, until the point when it becomes ubiquitous.
From what I can gather myself, as working for the videoconference company that is proposing a likely candidate for H.265, is that they care more about standardizing good codecs and use them in their products. Royalties are certainly a nice extra, but it's not the business model driving the codec design, at least that is what I feel.
It almost certainly wouldn't be as open as it is now. Do you think that Linux would have native H.264 playback if the MPEG-LA had to resort to close-sourcing it rather than relying on patents to protect their codec?
It's a standard. Various people make implementations, some open-source, some closed source. I have to say I honestly don't understand your point here. Are you trying to say that without patents, more implementations would be closed source? That's silly. Open source implementations of H.264 (libavcodec, x264) are not made by MPEG-LA licensors as far as I know.
Is this some sort of joke? This is similar to claiming that is too important to fail, thus the government should take it over and run it "for the people."
I don't see it as a joke, on the contrary I find it very sensible. I guess it's a matter of political opinion. The government should ensure the best for the people rather than allowing a single company (or consortium) to get royalties for things that have become ubiquitous in today's world, as that is hindering both innovation and regular activity.
What is sure is that I'm not going to pay unless the quality of the service is at least as good as that provided by scene or p2p releases. That includes being able to download the video at high speeds (no crappy streaming, thank you), and have the video in HD with a high bitrate, using standard DRM-free formats.
You do realize JavaScript is the same language that is used in Flash right? It may be called ActionScript, but it's the same language. It's actually also the same JIT implementation as Firefox.
If only HTML5 actually worked on Linux... Firefox has become crap on everything but Windows it seems. It's slow, memory hungry, and crashes all the time; of course it performs way more poorly at HTML5, or anything else for that matter, than the Windows version.
The only decent browser left is a proprietary one, Opera. Just plain sad.
Another example is Good Old Games [gog.com] which has gotten me to buy plenty of games I normally wouldn't have
This website actually looks awesome. A lot of the "old" games are actually less than 8 years old. Honestly, I don't really see the difference between that time and now graphics-wise (I was never impressed by so-called amazing graphics). And they're less than 10 dollars each?
There is no need to play right into the game companies' hand and play their games right away as they are released, paying the premium price. Just buy them when they're "old", it will be much cheaper, and there are enough old games to keep you busy anyway.
Slashdot should have enough articles demonstrating how evil Apple is, and how even more evil the iPhone and iPad are. Why is a slashdotter buying an iPad? That is the real news to me.
You are basically saying a good game is one you enjoy, and if other people don't enjoy the same games, their not a real gamer.
No, I'm saying games should be designed for power users. Imagine if we designed operating systems for the average person... They would be useless. They need to accommodate both, and feature-wise be designed for power users.
"The sad part is that game producers are focusing on the first method nowadays. This is just ignorant. Some producer choose to tap a market your not interested in; however some porbably due.
Numbers show expenses on marketing have dramatically increased these past few years.
*Drakensang is one of the most underrated RPGs ever. I liked it a lot more then Dragon Age. Can't wait for the Sequel.
Thanks for the Drakensang recommendation, I'll check it out. I didn't find Dragon Age so good either.
The "idea" boils down to a story/setting, and some gameplay.
And that's the problem. I don't give a fuck about story and setting. What makes the game is its gameplay mechanics.
All games have the same mechanics these days; and even though it is known what kind of gameplay certain player groups are asking for, developers have yet to fully implement them.
I don't care about crappy authors coming up with random background info and ridiculous race names (an attempt at making something generic less generic) when it serves no purpose for gameplay.
Because the majority of players suck doesn't mean you should dumb down your games.
On the contrary, who do you think "bad" players ask for advice of what good game they should get? Their real gamers friends, the game reviewers, etc. What attracts semi-casual players to games is how much hype there is about them, and that is simply a factor of how good it is for real players and reviewers.
So now, as a game producer, you can either build up reputation spending tons of money on marketing (special events at E3/TGS works well, and they're not that expensive), or simply make a good game. The sad part is that game producers are focusing on the first method nowadays.
What kind of weird world do you live in? Jobs are offered to me regularly without me asking for it, my current company that I just joined 6 months ago provides me with lots of benefits and gives me whatever I feel like I need; I'm also free to come in whenever I want.
I say this whole crisis is nothing but a myth. Or maybe it only affects completely useless jobs.
if a copy of the data is made, then you've broken copyright.
Of course not: there are exceptions to this. Fair use, fair dealing, whatever it is called in your applicable law. The exact exceptions depend on your country. In most of Europe, for example, doing as many copies as you like is perfectly legal as long as it is for private use, and there is nothing the copyright holder can do to limit this.
Furthermore, if the copy is transmitted to someone else for them to use as they see fit, then it's also theft.
No it isn't. Theft is a criminal offense (you can go to jail), this is a purely civil one (you pay compensation to an individual or organization).
Slashdot Mirror
You could still patent it and earn royalties, until the point when it becomes ubiquitous.
From what I can gather myself, as working for the videoconference company that is proposing a likely candidate for H.265, is that they care more about standardizing good codecs and use them in their products.
Royalties are certainly a nice extra, but it's not the business model driving the codec design, at least that is what I feel.
It's a standard.
Various people make implementations, some open-source, some closed source.
I have to say I honestly don't understand your point here. Are you trying to say that without patents, more implementations would be closed source? That's silly. Open source implementations of H.264 (libavcodec, x264) are not made by MPEG-LA licensors as far as I know.
I don't see it as a joke, on the contrary I find it very sensible.
I guess it's a matter of political opinion. The government should ensure the best for the people rather than allowing a single company (or consortium) to get royalties for things that have become ubiquitous in today's world, as that is hindering both innovation and regular activity.
What is sure is that I'm not going to pay unless the quality of the service is at least as good as that provided by scene or p2p releases.
That includes being able to download the video at high speeds (no crappy streaming, thank you), and have the video in HD with a high bitrate, using standard DRM-free formats.
They don't? Round up.
You do realize JavaScript is the same language that is used in Flash right? It may be called ActionScript, but it's the same language. It's actually also the same JIT implementation as Firefox.
If only HTML5 actually worked on Linux...
Firefox has become crap on everything but Windows it seems. It's slow, memory hungry, and crashes all the time; of course it performs way more poorly at HTML5, or anything else for that matter, than the Windows version.
The only decent browser left is a proprietary one, Opera. Just plain sad.
Yes, those soldiers that complain of superficial wounds are just pussies.
This website actually looks awesome.
A lot of the "old" games are actually less than 8 years old. Honestly, I don't really see the difference between that time and now graphics-wise (I was never impressed by so-called amazing graphics). And they're less than 10 dollars each?
There is no need to play right into the game companies' hand and play their games right away as they are released, paying the premium price. Just buy them when they're "old", it will be much cheaper, and there are enough old games to keep you busy anyway.
The difference isn't just bandwidth and whether it provides power.
USB uses a lot of CPU, while SATA uses none at all.
This may change for USB 3.0 though, I don't know.
There are pretty good HD cameras used in videoconferencing that are affordable.
There are only a couple of good fonts, the rest doesn't render well at small sizes without antialiasing.
Slashdot should have enough articles demonstrating how evil Apple is, and how even more evil the iPhone and iPad are.
Why is a slashdotter buying an iPad? That is the real news to me.
No, I'm saying games should be designed for power users.
Imagine if we designed operating systems for the average person... They would be useless. They need to accommodate both, and feature-wise be designed for power users.
Numbers show expenses on marketing have dramatically increased these past few years.
Thanks for the Drakensang recommendation, I'll check it out.
I didn't find Dragon Age so good either.
Bullshit.
Blender game engine is one of the most advanced engines in open-source software.
And that's the problem.
I don't give a fuck about story and setting. What makes the game is its gameplay mechanics.
All games have the same mechanics these days; and even though it is known what kind of gameplay certain player groups are asking for, developers have yet to fully implement them.
I don't care about crappy authors coming up with random background info and ridiculous race names (an attempt at making something generic less generic) when it serves no purpose for gameplay.
...including game players.
Because the majority of players suck doesn't mean you should dumb down your games.
On the contrary, who do you think "bad" players ask for advice of what good game they should get?
Their real gamers friends, the game reviewers, etc.
What attracts semi-casual players to games is how much hype there is about them, and that is simply a factor of how good it is for real players and reviewers.
So now, as a game producer, you can either build up reputation spending tons of money on marketing (special events at E3/TGS works well, and they're not that expensive), or simply make a good game.
The sad part is that game producers are focusing on the first method nowadays.
It's not another syntax, it's basically CSS.
I never said it did.
Except more chips doesn't mean more performance.
Aren't the US first on the list of country with bad IP laws?
Yet they were entitled to refund you upon your request.
What kind of weird world do you live in?
Jobs are offered to me regularly without me asking for it, my current company that I just joined 6 months ago provides me with lots of benefits and gives me whatever I feel like I need; I'm also free to come in whenever I want.
I say this whole crisis is nothing but a myth. Or maybe it only affects completely useless jobs.
You should get a refund of your money, not have it be transferred to iTunes.
What you agreed to pay for was Lala's service, not iTunes'.
Of course not: there are exceptions to this. Fair use, fair dealing, whatever it is called in your applicable law. The exact exceptions depend on your country.
In most of Europe, for example, doing as many copies as you like is perfectly legal as long as it is for private use, and there is nothing the copyright holder can do to limit this.
No it isn't.
Theft is a criminal offense (you can go to jail), this is a purely civil one (you pay compensation to an individual or organization).
I don't ask permissions to take my CDs on the road with me.