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Fluendo announces Windows Media and MPEG codec support for LinuxFluendo announces Windows Media and MPEG codec support for LinuxPosted Jan 16, 2007 14:34 UTC (Tue) by gdt (subscriber, #6284)Parent article: Fluendo announces Windows Media and MPEG codec support for Linux
I'd be a bit careful. As far as I know Microsoft has never opened a patent pool or otherwise asked for intellectual property assertions for its WMA/WMV formats. So Fluendo's license with only Microsoft for WMA/WMV patents may not be adequate. You'd want an indemnification clause in the contract in case other parties come forward with patent claims against you. The Microsoft patents have not been tested. It is possible that they will not survive a challenge. So you'd want a clause that if someone challenges the patents then you pay into a trust fund from that moment and your trust monies are returned if the patent is defeated. Also, you need to be careful about global differences in patent laws and registers. Our EU friends don't have software patents. And the patent register in other countries may differ from that in the USA. In this gloabal scenario you don't want a license for specific patent so much as an license for all patents held by Microsoft that may reasonably by used in creating or using WMA/WMV technologies. But without seeing the license who know what you are buying? I don't understand why end-users need patent licenses at all. The economic value of the patent can't be much -- Microsoft gives its media playing software away, Fluendo is selling them <$10. So in parts of the world that treat a patent breach as a economic crime you're looking at a fine of $10. I also don't understand why these are binary. After all you've paid for the patent license. Perhaps MS have licensing terms with a NDA, but MPEG doesn't. As binary modules which remove a small legal risk for people in the USA the Fluendo offering isn't that attractive. The risk of binary modules stuffing your system is much more than the risk of MS stuffing your system.
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