Blizzard: HTML5 video and H.264 - what history tells us and why we're standing with the web
Remember, this is still very early in H.264's history so the licensing is very friendly, just like it used to be for MP3. The companies who own the IP in these large patent pools aren't in this for the fun of it — this is what they do. They patent and they enforce and then enjoy the royalties. If they are in a position to charge more, they will. We can expect that if we allow H.264 to become a fundamental web technology that we'll see license requirements get more onerous and more expensive over time, with little recourse."
Posted Jan 25, 2010 17:56 UTC (Mon)
by xav (guest, #18536)
[Link]
Posted Jan 25, 2010 18:10 UTC (Mon)
by ctwise (guest, #10952)
[Link] (29 responses)
Posted Jan 25, 2010 18:53 UTC (Mon)
by coriordan (guest, #7544)
[Link] (27 responses)
Two aspects make it hard for any wealthy friend to buy freedom for us:
I've gathered some documentation about this and other topics on the swpat.org documentation wiki. It's publicly editable, help very welcome:
H.264,
Audio-video patents,
HTML5,
Harm to standards.
Posted Jan 25, 2010 19:34 UTC (Mon)
by Oddscurity (guest, #46851)
[Link] (26 responses)
Posted Jan 26, 2010 10:18 UTC (Tue)
by DonDiego (guest, #24141)
[Link] (25 responses)
Posted Jan 26, 2010 14:34 UTC (Tue)
by patrick_g (subscriber, #44470)
[Link] (19 responses)
Posted Jan 26, 2010 16:51 UTC (Tue)
by DonDiego (guest, #24141)
[Link] (18 responses)
Here is a good comparison of different codecs and codec implementations when dealing with animation material:
http://x264dev.multimedia.cx/?p=102
This is comparable to the (in)famous YouTube video quality link in that it deals with animation material. The result is that the most recent libtheora release can beat MPEG-2, which is quite an achievement for a codec based off of VP3, but nowhere near H.264.
Posted Jan 26, 2010 18:40 UTC (Tue)
by patrick_g (subscriber, #44470)
[Link] (17 responses)
Posted Jan 26, 2010 18:52 UTC (Tue)
by DonDiego (guest, #24141)
[Link] (16 responses)
Posted Jan 26, 2010 21:12 UTC (Tue)
by Trelane (subscriber, #56877)
[Link] (15 responses)
Posted Jan 26, 2010 21:47 UTC (Tue)
by DonDiego (guest, #24141)
[Link] (14 responses)
Posted Jan 26, 2010 22:11 UTC (Tue)
by Trelane (subscriber, #56877)
[Link] (13 responses)
"YouTube encoded just H.264 baseline profile while the Theora encoding was tweaked to be optimal."
Yes, it was in answer to "YouTube can't use Theora." It naturally used YouTube to compare against.
"Still the resulting quality is better and the file smaller..."
Actually, the Ogg bitrates were slightly lower (486 vs 490kbps, 325 vs 327kbps).
Posted Jan 26, 2010 22:38 UTC (Tue)
by DonDiego (guest, #24141)
[Link] (12 responses)
The Vorbis audio does not sound better to my ears, on the contrary. It would also be a very big surprise if 64kbit Vorbis could beat 106.5kbit AAC.
So if I apply your argument that audio is more important, H.264 wins two times, because it allows dedicating more bits to the audio while preserving a slightly higher video quality.
> Actually, the Ogg bitrates were slightly lower (486 vs 490kbps,
False:
-rw-rw-r-- 1 diego staff 13871183 Jan 26 22:41 bbb.h264
The clip is 284 seconds long, so the bitrate is 423kbps for Theora and 390kbps for H.264.
This test also says nothing about the suitability of Theora for YouTube. Judging from this sample, YouTube still has ample room for improvement in the H.264 encoding pipeline. You can rest assured that they know about this and will eventually tweak their system to produce better results.
Posted Jan 26, 2010 22:50 UTC (Tue)
by Trelane (subscriber, #56877)
[Link] (11 responses)
So far, that's all tangential accusation and precious little fact.
"The Vorbis audio does not sound better to my ears, on the contrary. It would also be a very big surprise if 64kbit Vorbis could beat 106.5kbit AAC."
Umm, ok. Didn't know your ears were the benchmark here.
"So if I apply your argument that audio is more important, H.264 wins two times, because it allows dedicating more bits to the audio while preserving a slightly higher video quality."
Except that you're wrong?
"False:
-rw-rw-r-- 1 diego staff 13871183 Jan 26 22:41 bbb.h264
du -bs bbb_*
dir bbb_*
Sure you downloaded the right files? Oddly, your file names aren't the ones from the site. (http://people.xiph.org/~greg/video/ytcompare/bbb_theora_4... and http://myrandomnode.dyndns.org:8080/~gmaxwell/ytcompare/b...) What's going on here?
"The clip is 284 seconds long, so the bitrate is 423kbps for Theora and 390kbps for H.264."
The bitrate was included in the captions. Bitrate isn't filesize divided by time either.
"This test also says nothing about the suitability of Theora for YouTube. Judging from this sample, YouTube still has ample room for improvement in the H.264 encoding pipeline. You can rest assured that they know about this and will eventually tweak their system to produce better results."
Except that YouTube is shipping with it now, and the results are at worst comparable, one codec without costing anyone a patent penny. So yes, YouTube can use Theora now.
In addition, if we count future tweaking in, Theora doens't lose again. From your link at http://www-cs-faculty.stanford.edu/~nick/theora-soccer/:
So basically, it's comparable to what's currently in use, while at the same time being royalty-free. I don't see a loss there, friend.
Posted Jan 27, 2010 0:25 UTC (Wed)
by DonDiego (guest, #24141)
[Link] (10 responses)
> Umm, ok. Didn't know your ears were the benchmark here.
The AAC stream captures the water sound better than the Vorbis stream to my ears. Anyway, bit by bit AAC and Vorbis are roughly comparable codecs. But you seem to expect that Vorbis can beat AAC with 60% of the bitrate. This is not at all realistic, Vorbis is an excellent audio codec, but not fairy dust.
> Sure you downloaded the right files? Oddly, your file names aren't
I extracted the raw video streams from the containers in order to be able to compare video sizes directly.
> > The clip is 284 seconds long, so the bitrate is 423kbps for Theora
> The bitrate was included in the captions.
The bitrate in the captions refers to the complete file together with audio and container overhead. That number is thus not suitable for video bitrate comparison.
> Bitrate isn't filesize divided by time either.
What we care about here is the total/average bitrate for the whole clip, i.e. file size divided by time.
> In addition, if we count future tweaking in, Theora doens't lose again.
The Theora we have today is also the result of years of tuning on the encoders. The question is how far tweaking can get it. There is a limit to the quality you can coax out of the Theora bitstream format. The 60% bitrate difference quoted above is a *lot* of ground to cover.
Note that H.264 decoders are also being improved. Much more work is being dedicated to H.264 encoders than to Theora encoders. If you don't believe me, compare the x264 development activity to libtheora and keep in mind that libtheora is the only Theora encoder, but x264 is not the only H.264 encoder.
This is not a good vs. evil fight. It's a technical question. Compression formats are not created equal. Theora technology is two generations behind H.264. You cannot expect Theora to improve beyond H.264, much less since all patented techniques are out of bounds. I'm sorry that it's not a fair race, but facts remain facts.
Posted Jan 27, 2010 3:48 UTC (Wed)
by paulj (subscriber, #341)
[Link]
Note that H.264 decoders are also being improved. Much more work is
being dedicated to H.264
E.g. the BBC apparently have been able to reduce the bitrate of
their High-Def H.264 broadcasts by 16% without loss of quality, thanks to
newer, better encoding technology.
Posted Feb 3, 2010 21:56 UTC (Wed)
by gmaxwell (guest, #30048)
[Link] (8 responses)
I'm also completely baffled regarding the mention of "raw quality" in your comment. Are you really attempting to say that there is some issue with raw quality? If you crank the bitrate sufficiently pretty much any codec should be transparent.
...and of course the comparison is saying something about the suitability of Theora for Youtube, the fact that they could possibly improve their H.264 processing chain doesn't change the fact that Theora was working OKAY compared to what they actually were using. If you're nitpicking about a couple of kbit/sec here or there, you're missing the point. It's intended to be an order of magnitude comparison to give some perspective. When people here codec ricers blather on with hyperbolic language about which codec is superior, they tend to think of enormous differences. But the differences are usually not enormous in a comparison unless you run it right up against the quality/bitrate knee.
Personally, I think it is insane to compare the files without container overhead. What else do you care about when transferring a file than the whole system? If one container has higher overhead than another, then thats a cost you're going to have to deal with in the real world.
I did also put up a strict buffer constrained rate controlled and lower bitrate file for people who emailed asking about that but since the screenshot looked the close enough to me I didn't think it was worth adding links to it and trying to explain the benefits that strict rate control has for streaming all post-publication.
You comment that "The Theora we have today is also the result of years of tuning on the encoders." is laughably, but sadly, wrong. The Theora encoder has had no more than one person working on it part-time at a time for the past two years, and had a number of years gulf of no active development. Go look at the SVN history. There simply haven't been the resources available to go work on it, and the overwhelming majority of the people working on "open source" video encoding have been contributing to the patent encumbered formats... they are more exciting because they are ahead and avoiding patents is nasty boring work.
With a bit of available funding and attention it made enormous progress in a short span of time and the ptalarbvorm development branch is already obviously improved vs 1.1 (about 2dB on SSIM on average, and casual subjective testing seems to suggest that much or somewhat more). There will be no miracles: After all, from a format perspective H.264 is nearly a superset of Theora, but there is clearly a decent amount of room for improvement.
Posted Feb 4, 2010 15:36 UTC (Thu)
by DonDiego (guest, #24141)
[Link] (7 responses)
Correct. You were not trying to mislead anyone. However, people are misreading your comparison and drawing the wrong conclusions.
> I'm also completely baffled regarding the mention of "raw quality" in your comment. Are you really attempting to say that there is some issue with raw quality? If you crank the bitrate sufficiently pretty much any codec should be transparent.
I spoke imprecisely. I meant bit-by-bit quality.
> ...and of course the comparison is saying something about the suitability of Theora for Youtube, the fact that they could possibly improve their H.264 processing chain doesn't change the fact that Theora was working OKAY compared to what they actually were using.
This assumes that YouTube is not planning ahead for a future in which they may wish to stream 1080p video to desktops worldwide. Do you think this is a realistic assumption?
> If you're nitpicking about a couple of kbit/sec here or there, you're missing the point. It's intended to be an order of magnitude comparison to give some perspective.
I'm not nitpicking, I'm putting your comparison in perspective. You sacrifice audio quality to achieve a not-quite-on-par video quality.
If you can live with that, fine. But your comparison is being touted as proof that Theora produces bit-by-bit quality comparable to H.264. As you very well know, this is simply not true.
> Personally, I think it is insane to compare the files without container overhead. What else do you care about when transferring a file than the whole system? If one container has higher overhead than another, then thats a cost you're going to have to deal with in the real world.
I agree, but the container overhead is higher for Ogg, so that's another drawback for Theora. What are you trying to say?
I know that Theora encoders still have room for improvement. I never disputed that fact. However, the same applies to H.264 encoders. Due to the technical superiority of the format and the different amount of work being dedicated to both, the gap is more likely to widen further than it is to shrink.
Also, I take issue with your putting open source video encoding in quotes. These are the people that are keeping Linux viable as a general-purpose desktop platform. They deserve thanks, not criticism.
Posted Feb 4, 2010 16:34 UTC (Thu)
by gmaxwell (guest, #30048)
[Link] (6 responses)
But I don't we need to argue that take a gander at This Theora vs the YT H.264, or for the lazy the Theora still vs the YT h.264 still.
So there you have, lower bitrate pure video than the H.264, same keyframe interval, same input, etc. How do you think it looks?
Would sir like his hat medium or rare?
Obviously we don't know anything about the YT cpu consumption, so you can still argue that. The theora encoder is pretty fast, I've seen others compare it to the fast mode in x264, even though its not deeply optimized at all. But we have no idea how fast YT's tools are. I concede the encoder cpu consumption is usually relevant, and that other H264 encoders are better, ... and I never claimed otherwise. Can you concede that, for the purpose of this test, that the quality/bitrate is basically there?
It's in quotes because people are widely ignorant about the implications, it isn't intended as an insult. Open source in the context of the tools for encumbered media formats doesn't quite mean the same thing as it does for most other pieces of open source software.
Obviously I'm mostly discussing high end encoders when I made that point.
There is a fine line between embracing the encumbered world enough to capture their users and outright embracing it. When the resulting tools are widening the gap between unencumbered and encumbered formats, its doing the format owners a much bigger favour than its doing everyone else. ::shrugs::
It's also a little frustrating that some of the popular tools like ffmpeg don't offer world-class support for the things like Ogg/Theora while a few of their developers are spending a lot of time and effort slinging unadulterated FUD. Can you sense my finger wagging? Come on, at least look at the freeking priority dates, dude.
Posted Feb 4, 2010 16:51 UTC (Thu)
by gmaxwell (guest, #30048)
[Link]
Cheers.
Posted Feb 5, 2010 0:53 UTC (Fri)
by DonDiego (guest, #24141)
[Link] (4 responses)
Ogg has more than 300% the overhead of MP4 here. You wanted to talk about the Youtube case, so there is no escaping that number here.
I made a listening test of both audio streams myself. To my ears the waterfall in the beginning really sounds like water for the AAC stream, the Vorbis stream is much more washed out.
I'm happy to see your latest encoder branch make further progress. I'll be even more happy to see it perform in a straight comparison with x264 and various FFmpeg encoders. If you want to have credibility, perform a fair test.
FFmpeg's Ogg muxer produces high overhead because Ogg is a deeply flawed container format and so far nobody has been willing to go out of their way to work around its deficiencies. We continue to have the fastest Vorbis decoder around and our Theora decoder has seen considerable speeups recently. David Conrad has a branch with some serious tweaks that is on its way to getting merged. It should at least match libtheora 1.1 in speed and eventually surpass it when further tweaks get applied. We clearly have no world-class support yet, but it's slowly improving. Also, we accept patches, yours are welcome as well.
There is the "encumbered" world, the "unencumbered" world and the real world. In the real world people try to listen to music and watch movies. FFmpeg, VLC, MPlayer, x264 and the rest of the bunch enable people to do just that. Without them free software desktop market share would be orders of magnitude smaller and decreasing. You seem to think this is worth sacrificing in order to avoid a patent threat that some day might affect some person in some part of the world. I wholeheartedly disagree.
I'll stop wondering about submarine patents the moment you guys earn my trust by publishing your findings. And yes, I'm wagging my finger at you. You act exactly as if you had something to hide. "There is no toxic waste drop here. We have made a study and come to the conclusion that this water is safe. We cannot show you the study, but you can *trust* us!" Trust is not something that is handed out for free, you have to earn it through integrity and transparency. I just wanted to say something about Iraq and weapons of mass destruction, but I'll shut up before I dig myself in deeper ;-)
Posted Feb 5, 2010 14:13 UTC (Fri)
by gmaxwell (guest, #30048)
[Link] (3 responses)
The way the patent system is setup you are very strongly discouraged from disclosing your research: The parties suing for infringement have the stronger position and making them aware of your position allows them to avoid arguing particular things. For example "my own work is prior art for that claim" and "I don't practice that technique" are mutually exclusive defences. If the attacker knows how you will defend they can make the legal battle much longer and more expensive to win. Don't hate the player, hate the game.
The whole purpose of Xiph is to produce/promote unencumbered formats. We expend a fair amount of additional effort, and accept considerable limits because of what techniques we're not permitted to practice. Knowingly allowing something encumbered would be self-defeating in the most enormous way. Of course, mistakes could be made.
What I can give point to you is a decade of shipment, by a large number of parties (some with decently deep pockets) with no publicly known litigation related the formats, which is better than you can say for many mpeg standards. I can also point you to shipments by large organizations who had their own legal teams look at it. I'm sorry if thats not enough for you, but as far as I can tell nothing would be.
What you were doing by slinging a bunch of irrelevant patent numbers was pure FUDing, in a particularly vile way. I think it speaks a lot to your motivation and character, and it's a warning about the futility of engaging with you which I should have heeded.
Cheers.
Posted Feb 7, 2010 21:21 UTC (Sun)
by DonDiego (guest, #24141)
[Link] (1 responses)
> Well, what can I say? I wrote a clearly described specific comparison about YT because of an outrageous goggler quote. Now you're running around the internet calling my statements fraudulent because they weren't a comparison with something else.
Your comparison is constantly being presented to me and others as proof that Theora is as good as H.264. If that was not your intention, fine. It does not change the fact that your comparison is being misread all the time. And sorry, but you are not exactly going out of your way to prevent this.
> > Without them free software desktop market share would be orders of magnitude smaller and decreasing.
> I fail to see how advancing the state of the art in the best encumbered format encoders does much of anything to preserve free desktops by helping people "listen to music and watch movies".
Simple. People use their computers to listen to music and watch movies. There are popular formats to make music and movies available in digital form. If no free software is available to handle these formats, people will use something else to get at their movies and songs. Free software loses, badly.
> But to each his own. There are perfectly viable ways to get legally'licensed encoders for your desktop even if tools like ffmpeg didn't exist, but its existence wasn't something that I was protesting.
Fluendo is much more recent than FFmpeg or MPlayer. But if Fluendo is an alternative option for you, then you don't value free software. I'm not such a person.
Posted Mar 9, 2010 20:59 UTC (Tue)
by gmaxwell (guest, #30048)
[Link]
I measured it as 86245 using one method (segment sizes from mp4dump). A friend who has implemented the mp4 demux checked the file and also calculated 86245 using his own method. My guess was that mplayer must be including packet length data in the dump output, but I just repeated your method and got 13871183 bytes video, 3796188 bytes audio. Resulting in 86245. Exactly the same figure calculated by two other distinct methods.
Perhaps you could explain why I'm getting a different figure using exactly the same method as you? I'm using Mplayer SVN-r29800-4.4.2.
I remuxed the above Theora file we were discussing for minimum overhead using a copy of libogg with the default 4k page size target removed:
http://people.xiph.org/~greg/video/ytcompare/bbb_theora_4...
This file has 84604 bytes of container overhead.
This is somewhat lower overhead than your mp4 file. Now that I understand a bit more about the mp4 format I find it actually somewhat surprising Ogg provides a lot of properties that MP4 does not. Like being incrementally written in a complete form.
I hope this update convinces you to discontinue spreading these mistaken claims.
Cheers.
Posted Feb 7, 2010 21:34 UTC (Sun)
by DonDiego (guest, #24141)
[Link]
> You could at least get the terminology right. A "submarine patent" isn't what you should be worried about, submarine patents are an old technique for making effectively secret patents that could last for decades, scary indeed.
I'm not a native speaker and was indeed unfamiliar with the meaning you connect to the term "submarine patent". Note however, that this very same confusion exists between the German and English Wikipedia entries.
Posted Jan 26, 2010 23:02 UTC (Tue)
by rickmoen (subscriber, #6943)
[Link] (1 responses)
I can't help noticing that the basis of comparison was the Theora 1.0 codec, which was certainly relevant in June 2009, when the author wrote that comparison, but is no longer. It would be accurate to say that Theora did not stack up well towards H.264. However, I hear that things have changed.
Rick Moen
Posted Jan 27, 2010 0:30 UTC (Wed)
by DonDiego (guest, #24141)
[Link]
http://x264dev.multimedia.cx/?p=102
which clearly shows how far 1.1 improves over 1.0 and also how it fares compared to other codecs.
Posted Feb 2, 2010 9:01 UTC (Tue)
by greycells (guest, #63306)
[Link] (2 responses)
Let's face it, when streaming to mobile devices, quality ain't the issue. When streaming to fixed devices, bandwidth is not (usually) an issue. Either way, most users won't notice the difference between h264 and Theora.
Unfortunately, greed overrules the common good every time so we're likely stuck with h264 in order to pay those 1000+ patent holders their pound of flesh (http://lwn.net/Articles/371751/).
*not as in beer
Posted Feb 2, 2010 15:15 UTC (Tue)
by DonDiego (guest, #24141)
[Link]
Flash is many things, I assume you refer to the H.263 video transported in FLV containers as used by Adobe Flash. That's a codec from the same generation as Theora, the quality is horrible and it's insufficient for all serious usage.
In any case, it's not a way forward. Video quality on the web has to improve, not remain on the current crappy level. H.264 is considered to be the tool to achieve that, so you have to compare H.264 with Theora, not some ancient legacy codec, which is clearly on its way into obsolescence.
Also notice that H.264 will continuously improve and likely at a much higher rate than Theora since it receives more development resources and is a more advanced design to start with.
> Let's face it, when streaming to mobile devices, quality ain't the issue.
False. Nowadays mobile devices have high-definition displays and this trend will not reverse itself in the future, on the contrary. Just think 5 years into the future.
> When streaming to fixed devices, bandwidth is not (usually) an issue.
False. Content providers have to pay for bandwidth and content consumers often have to pay for bandwidth as well. Just think of mobile devices, bandwidth is expensive there and nobody wants to squander it.
Posted Feb 2, 2010 15:20 UTC (Tue)
by farnz (subscriber, #17727)
[Link]
Note that Flash video is H.264 in modern Flash versions. And, as we know that H.264 is better than Theora, your claim that the Free codec is already better than Flash is trivially false.
Posted Jan 26, 2010 19:37 UTC (Tue)
by martinfick (subscriber, #4455)
[Link]
Posted Jan 25, 2010 19:17 UTC (Mon)
by nhippi (guest, #34640)
[Link] (18 responses)
Even on PC's, H.264 is supported in hardware by recent nvidia (purevideo HD) and ati cards (avivo HD)- and I presume intel follow. Lets see if intel will do it on a codec on their GMA graphics chips or with SSE264 extension featuring DECODE264 SIMD instruction will be interesting to see...
Why is that relevant? Because if implemented in hardware, the software doesn't need a patent license. When implemented in hardware, it will be no more relevant than the patented X86 instructions are to users. Sure, they eliminate competition, but it doesn't free software from using them.
I'm afraid mozilla has choosen an fight they can't win. IE, safari and chrome will support H.264, and someone will write a firefox plugin to do it as well. The only thing the fight will create is delay in html5 video adoption - and meanwhile the video still gets distributed in H.264 - in flash container. Which leads to the question:
Is it more important to eliminate flash or H.264? Mozilla has seemingly taken the latter one as more important.
[1] Which actually might be a DSP executing firmware.
Posted Jan 25, 2010 19:28 UTC (Mon)
by coriordan (guest, #7544)
[Link] (3 responses)
1. Are the codecs in unwritable memory on the cards? Or do they get put there by injecting binary blobs into the cards on bootup/upgrade? If the latter, then we should replace those binardy blobs with free software. So that "solution" only works if we accept binary blobs?
2. Say I want to encode a video into H.264, and say I want to modify a H.264 video and save it in another format. Wouldn't I need H.264 software on my harddisk for these tasks? The blob in my video card wouldn't do this for me, would it? (I know these tasks aren't what Firefox does, but if we accept it for online video, we'll be stuck with it for other things)
Right? Wrong?
Posted Jan 25, 2010 19:46 UTC (Mon)
by Oddscurity (guest, #46851)
[Link] (2 responses)
So it's still software, part of which runs on the CPU as implemented in the
Posted Jan 25, 2010 19:54 UTC (Mon)
by drag (guest, #31333)
[Link]
Like stated above there are 22 different companies involved in the Mpeg
So it's likely that there are dozens and dozens of patents covering all
Posted Jan 25, 2010 21:02 UTC (Mon)
by nhippi (guest, #34640)
[Link]
I believe that is what the early VDPAU versions did. Later versions offload full decoding to the video card. Then again, this is based on external observations of cpu load rather than knowing what the VDPAU library really does..
Posted Jan 25, 2010 19:34 UTC (Mon)
by Imroy (guest, #62286)
[Link] (2 responses)
Oh, and I can't find anything about this "DECODE264" instruction.
Posted Jan 25, 2010 19:43 UTC (Mon)
by Cyberax (✭ supporter ✭, #52523)
[Link]
Yet they do exactly this. And the main reason is power consumption. Specialized ASICs are still faster even compared to GPGPU.
Posted Jan 25, 2010 20:47 UTC (Mon)
by nhippi (guest, #34640)
[Link]
It was a joke. The latest intel processors already have AESDEC and AESENC so..
Posted Jan 25, 2010 19:42 UTC (Mon)
by Per_Bothner (subscriber, #7375)
[Link] (9 responses)
Remember, Is it more important to eliminate flash or H.264?
While Flash is more annoying because of bugs etc, it is in principle the lesser evil, since (I believe) it can be legally re-implemented in Free Software. H.264 cannot, in many parts of the world.
Posted Jan 25, 2010 21:12 UTC (Mon)
by coriordan (guest, #7544)
[Link] (3 responses)
I'd've thought that implementing Flash would raise lots of patent problems, but this doesn't seem to have happened. When I heard Rob Savoye of Gnash complaining about software patents last February, he was complaining about codec patents. I can't find any info online right now, but I seem to remember him saying the the main legal difficulty with implementing Flash is that he can't hire any programmers in the USA because there's a draconian clause in Adobe's licence that's enforceable in the USA and nowhere else. Something about "if you use this software, you agree not to use the gained knowledge for the purpose of writing a competing program". Not sure where you'd find the details... anyone know what I'm talking about?
Posted Jan 25, 2010 21:50 UTC (Mon)
by MarkVandenBorre (subscriber, #26071)
[Link]
Posted Jan 26, 2010 2:20 UTC (Tue)
by butlerm (subscriber, #13312)
[Link] (1 responses)
Posted Jan 26, 2010 13:31 UTC (Tue)
by dannyobrien (subscriber, #25583)
[Link]
It's funny you should say that... actually EFF is heavily involved in
this fight (it was counsel on two of the three cases listed on the page
you linked to), and I do believe we're expecting to work on a number of
key cases in this area in the next year. We generally describe this as
the fight over first sale (partly because the
fight also includes patent issues
as well as shrinkwrap licenses), but it's the same counterargument.
Posted Feb 2, 2010 9:37 UTC (Tue)
by njwhite (guest, #51848)
[Link] (1 responses)
While Flash is more annoying because of bugs etc, it is in principle the lesser
evil,
since (I believe) it can be legally re-implemented in Free Software. H.264 cannot, in many
parts of the world. I think it's still the case though that codecs you send over flash are still patentable
(and
largely patented). Which is why the gnash devs get so annoyed that people get annoyed
when it doesn't work with youtube, because they won't distribute the codecs themselves,
so have to hope that the distributions will (and often distributors get it wrong). Even if flash is perfectly reimplemented, then, we still have all the problems with
codec
patent issues.
Posted Feb 2, 2010 17:21 UTC (Tue)
by DonDiego (guest, #24141)
[Link]
Posted Feb 2, 2010 15:19 UTC (Tue)
by DonDiego (guest, #24141)
[Link] (2 responses)
This is wrong, please get a clue about patents. It is not illegal to implement a patented technique, in free or proprietary software, anywhere in the world.
Posted Feb 2, 2010 16:41 UTC (Tue)
by Trelane (subscriber, #56877)
[Link] (1 responses)
Posted Feb 3, 2010 1:47 UTC (Wed)
by DonDiego (guest, #24141)
[Link]
This is very much unlike stealing or murder, where the state has an obligation to go after you and where you can never be excused or make a deal.
Posted Jan 26, 2010 2:05 UTC (Tue)
by roc (subscriber, #30627)
[Link]
Even if it was true that all hardware supported H.264 so there were no free software issues on the client, there would still be huge problems for content providers and Web authors, as Blizzard's post explains.
> Is it more important to eliminate flash or H.264? Mozilla has seemingly
No, it's a strategic issue.
Flash is deeply entrenched on the Web. Reducing its usage is a long-term project, which first requires us to create standards-based alternatives for Web authors to use instead of Flash. We're doing tons of work on that, but we're still far away from being able to disable Flash and still have a browser a lot of people would use.
On the other hand, <video>+H.264 is still very new on the Web, and there is Flash fallback, so pushing back against it is still possible without wiping out our market share and destroying all our influence over the Web.
Posted Jan 25, 2010 20:26 UTC (Mon)
by danpb (subscriber, #4831)
[Link] (138 responses)
- closed source
HTML5 video + h264 addresses 3 out of these 4 major problems with the current de-facto standard of flash video which would be a massive step forward from the current position. This blog posting focuses only on the choice between h264 and Theora in the context of HTML5 video & the issue of IP/patent licensing around h264, and thus denies firefox users the chance to benefit from other aspects of HTML5.
I'm not suggesting Mozilla distribute h264 codecs themselves, since clearly that's not viable with the licensing scheme. This is not a new problem though & it has been solved by every open source media player that exists today - allow for 3rd party codecs to be plugged in via GStreamer or an equivalent system. If it ends up being a choice between Firefox with either Flash or HTML5/Theora, or a WebKit browser with either Flash or HTML5+option to plugin any possible codec, then Firefox is going to loose.
Posted Jan 25, 2010 21:14 UTC (Mon)
by coriordan (guest, #7544)
[Link] (135 responses)
Posted Jan 25, 2010 22:37 UTC (Mon)
by danpb (subscriber, #4831)
[Link] (125 responses)
Posted Jan 25, 2010 23:11 UTC (Mon)
by drag (guest, #31333)
[Link] (124 responses)
Posted Jan 26, 2010 3:09 UTC (Tue)
by roc (subscriber, #30627)
[Link] (123 responses)
Not at all. Integrating an H.264 codec, or integrating support for various system codec frameworks, are features that we have chosen to not add, features that would require major engineering effort to create and support, given we need faithful adherence to the HTML5 spec. If you don't believe this, you can take the Firefox source and show us how easy it is.
See also http://weblogs.mozillazine.org/roc/archives/2009/06/direc....
> They can make it simple for other applications to support it as well as
Making Firefox install apparently unrelated software that will be picked up and used by other applications would be a support nightmare. Being responsible for keeping that software up to date with security patches would also be a nightmare (especially if Firefox is uninstalled). Furthermore, some people would be very upset to find Firefox installing unrelated software and changing the behaviour of other applications.
Posted Jan 26, 2010 9:51 UTC (Tue)
by DonDiego (guest, #24141)
[Link] (45 responses)
> Not at all. Integrating an H.264 codec, or integrating support for various
You could just have used FFmpeg instead of the Xiph libraries.
Posted Jan 26, 2010 13:08 UTC (Tue)
by __alex (guest, #38036)
[Link] (42 responses)
Things like gstreamer, directshow and quicktime at least provide the
Posted Jan 26, 2010 16:58 UTC (Tue)
by DonDiego (guest, #24141)
[Link] (41 responses)
Mozilla could use a system FFmpeg just like Chrome does. No patent liabilities would be incurred on Mozilla.
Posted Jan 26, 2010 17:09 UTC (Tue)
by __alex (guest, #38036)
[Link] (3 responses)
Also I'm not sure they could pay MPEG-LA and still maintain the re-
Posted Jan 26, 2010 17:33 UTC (Tue)
by DonDiego (guest, #24141)
[Link] (2 responses)
False. There is no need for Mozilla to distribute FFmpeg libraries with H.264 decoding capabilities themselves.
> Also I'm not sure they could pay MPEG-LA and still maintain the
This is nonsense FUD. Please back up your claims or refrain from making them.
Posted Jan 26, 2010 17:45 UTC (Tue)
by __alex (guest, #38036)
[Link] (1 responses)
Well I can hardly predict the outcome of any potential legal action against
If Mozilla is offering me redistribution rights to an H.264 decoder as part of a
Posted Jan 26, 2010 18:44 UTC (Tue)
by DonDiego (guest, #24141)
[Link]
Mozilla is not giving you redistribution rights to FFmpeg. They cannot because they are not the authors. The FFmpeg project does it. No contract with the MPEG-LA is required to do this, much less some sort of non-standard one.
Posted Jan 26, 2010 17:16 UTC (Tue)
by pboddie (guest, #50784)
[Link] (12 responses)
So that's the argument, is it? Just pay up? There are people who redistribute Mozilla software, you know, and the whole business has significant implications for Free Software implementations of Web technologies. And let us not forget all the companies who would rather have various MPEG-related technologies embedded in Web standards instead of ones which are ostensibly unencumbered. Which brings us back to the patent licensing controversy where Google's licence covers Google, naturally, and Google's "evangelists" insist that they're not violating the licensing terms of FFmpeg even according to the spirit of those terms.
Posted Jan 26, 2010 18:34 UTC (Tue)
by DonDiego (guest, #24141)
[Link] (11 responses)
> So that's the argument, is it? Just pay up?
I never said anything of the sort. I just had to counter the nonsense claim that Fluendo codecs are in any way more "legal" than those from FFmpeg. Those from FFmpeg are fast free software, Fluendo gives you slow proprietary software. If, for whatever weird reason, company X feels the need to pay the MPEG-LA, they have the liberty to do the wrong thing.
> There are people who redistribute Mozilla software, you know, and the
Spare me the condescending tone please.
There are people who have been writing and distributing multimedia software for more than the last decade. We never had any sort of problem to speak of. Much less than in the area of word processors or web browsers, which nobody is afraid to distribute.
> > Mozilla could use a system FFmpeg just like Chrome does. No patent
> Which brings us back to the patent licensing controversy where Google's
Google is violating neither the letter nor the spirit of FFmpeg's license. What gives you such weird ideas?
Posted Jan 27, 2010 15:02 UTC (Wed)
by pboddie (guest, #50784)
[Link] (10 responses)
If you want implementations of the MPEG cartel's technologies in Mozilla software, then you more or less have to advocate that the Mozilla organisation pays up: they aren't going to get away with distributing the software as a US-based organisation without doing so. The alternative is that Mozilla doesn't incorporate such technologies. Yes, it is a disgrace that people can use patents to paint legitimately distributed software as not being "legal" and to undermine the licensing terms of Free Software. The ways to get around this include campaigning for an end to software patents and avoidance of encumbered technologies until the former objective is achieved. Well, it is about redistribution. High-profile distributors given the choice of either being pursued by an aggressive patent cartel or not distributing an application, all because encumbered technology was embedded in a Free Software application, will not choose the former option regardless of any insistence that the licensing fees are optional. Oh, just some weird Web site called LWN.net...
Posted Jan 28, 2010 10:44 UTC (Thu)
by DonDiego (guest, #24141)
[Link] (9 responses)
> > I never said anything of the sort. I just had to counter the nonsense
> If you want implementations of the MPEG cartel's technologies in Mozilla
Why? Because you say so even though the MPEG-LA licensing terms disagree?
> Yes, it is a disgrace that people can use patents to paint legitimately
Avoidance is not viable when everything except "Hello World!" is patented, which is the situation we are in now...
> > > There are people who redistribute Mozilla software, you know, and
> > Spare me the condescending tone please.
> Well, it is about redistribution. High-profile distributors given the
VLC, MPlayer and FFmpeg are not high-profile distributors? It seems that
> > Google is violating neither the letter nor the spirit of FFmpeg's
> Oh, just some weird Web site called LWN.net...
A patent license from the MPEG-LA does not in any way interact with the LGPL. How would it? If Google has an MPEG-LA license and passes along FFmpeg to you it can only do so under the full terms of the LGPL. And this is what Google is doing: Distributing FFmpeg with all the rights that we passed along to them attached, as specified by the LGPL.
Anything else is impossible. The LGPL clearly states that if obligation X keeps you from distributing without passing along all rights, you may not distribute at all.
Even if they wanted to, neither Google nor the MPEG-LA can restrict the rights we granted you under the LGPL. FFmpeg is LGPLed, period. Not even a decree from the pope himself can change that. If somebody passes along FFmpeg to you, it happens under the terms of the LGPL.
Google can make any side deals they want. If those side deals prevent them from distributing according to the terms of the LGPL, then Google has a problem, but nobody else. Nobody else made a side deal. It doesn't matter if you get your FFmpeg from us directly or from Google. You are not a party to any sort of side deal, thus you are not affected by such side deals.
Note that this is how both FFmpeg and the Software Freedom Law Center see the issue. I never felt there was anything to clarify there, but apparently people are willing to take random quotes from random people as facts just because they are reprinted at lwn.net...
Posted Jan 28, 2010 12:36 UTC (Thu)
by pboddie (guest, #50784)
[Link] (8 responses)
From the location mentioned previously, I can find a summary of the terms - the real terms being sent out only on request, it would seem - which clearly impose restrictions on the purposes for which encoder/decoder products can be used. So, in fact, even if someone does obtain a licence from the cartel, it isn't clear whether that licence covers the whole spectrum of distribution given that Free Software doesn't distinguish between "personal consumer use" and "providers". It's true that patent claims are ubiquitous, but when the choice is to proliferate known patent-encumbered technologies licensed by an active enforcement organisation, or to seek to use other technologies that are not known to be encumbered and are more easily defended, the responsible path is the latter not the former. As others have pointed out, the lack of interest in pursuing these projects is no guarantee that they will not be pursued in the future. And not only does the organisation producing a Web browser with 30% or so market share have to worry about this, but they also have to worry about the effects on those who redistribute their software under the much more high-profile brand that they maintain. A set-top box manufacturer selling products based directly on FFmpeg would need to be sniffed out by the cartel's enforcement department, but one selling products with Firefox branding would be very visible indeed. Such a patent licence cannot interact with the LGPL for redistribution to be permissible under those terms. But given what I've read about segmenting the recipients of the software (from the summary, above), it's quite possible that Google claim that Chrome is for "personal consumer use" whilst anyone else who repackages Chrome (as Chromium, for example) is not their responsibility. Thus, the latter group are burdened with dealing with the cartel when they seek to distribute, rather than use, the software, particularly if it turns out that the software is intended for "personal computer use" or for "providers". You can claim that the patent licence is merely some kind of "insurance". No-one is being forced to buy such insurance, but in practical terms a set of extra obligations are being added to certain recipients of the software. Whether people manage to sneak around section 11 of LGPLv2.1 or not on this basis - and I am reminded of the whole Microsoft/Novell covenant scheme - the lasting impression is that various principles of Free Software have been undermined. Some more "random quotes" for you here. Of course, you can claim that it's merely a case of sour grapes that the GStreamer people are publishing advice from the FSF that conveniently supports their position. Again, we can probably only take Google's word for it that their agreement with the cartel is compatible, but as I note above, even if our trust is well-placed - that Google have not technically done "evil" - the consequences may not be so benign.
Posted Jan 28, 2010 15:21 UTC (Thu)
by DonDiego (guest, #24141)
[Link] (7 responses)
And why should we care in the least? If such issues exist, they are between the MPEG-LA and its licensee. None of it affects the general public.
> > VLC, MPlayer and FFmpeg are not high-profile distributors? It seems
> As others have pointed out, the lack of interest in pursuing these
You seem to think that FFmpeg is some sort of fringe software product. The opposite is the case. YouTube uses it, Facebook uses it, it is used in Hollywood postproduction, it is the basis of VLC and most free and a lot of the proprietary transcoding solutions. So it touches most multimedia files that are consumed nowadays at some point of their existence. FFmpeg or VLC are not escaping the attention of the MPEG-LA due to living in some sort of small niche. There are many companies that use FFmpeg and are MPEG-LA licensees at the same time.
> A set-top box manufacturer selling products based directly on FFmpeg
Trust me, it's not hard to find out whether some program or set-top box uses FFmpeg. It's much easier to verify it uses MPEG-LA technology of some sort. Just perusing the feature list should be enough.
> > A patent license from the MPEG-LA does not in any way interact with
> Such a patent licence cannot interact with the LGPL for redistribution
So? Such are the sad facts of life. They may also have to deal with the cartel if they get FFmpeg directly from us.
> You can claim that the patent licence is merely some kind of
I think the main confusion stems from not differentiating between patent licensors and patent licensees. Google is just a licensee. A patent license is not theirs to hand out.
There are indeed free software licenses that have provisions about allowing to use your *own* patents as related to a specific piece of software. However, the LGPL v2.1 is not one of them and Google is not an MPEG-LA licensor.
> > Note that this is how both FFmpeg and the Software Freedom Law Center
> Some more "random quotes" for you here. Of course, you can claim that
This is completely in line with what I am saying. Where do you see anything that does not support my position?
The LGPL forbids extra restrictions, but Google is not placing any extra restrictions on FFmpeg. They are distributing exactly as required by the LGPL. Please point out the exact infringing action and the section of the LGPL it violates.
> Again, we can probably only take Google's word for it that their
Again, what do we care if Google is complying with their MPEG-LA contract? It's entirely between them to resolve any issues they might have.
Posted Jan 28, 2010 17:27 UTC (Thu)
by pboddie (guest, #50784)
[Link] (6 responses)
Yes, but the "obligations" I mentioned are administered by a third party. Google acknowledges such obligations by obtaining a patent licence - you or I may refuse to do so - and it is this acknowledgement which acts as an admission that recipients of the very code they distribute may also have to obtain a patent licence. This undermines Free Software precisely because it opens the affected works up to potentially limitless claims from anyone who feels that their "intellectual property" is being infringed, and the copyright licence is then no longer the ultimate arbiter of the rights or privileges it describes. I would have a hard time obtaining a patent licence grant only for myself and then distributing Free Software affected by such a grant to others, but I guess my own standards of behaviour are different from those of others. Right at the very end: Although this refers to the GPL, the same language supporting this conclusion appears in the LGPL.
Posted Jan 28, 2010 20:13 UTC (Thu)
by DonDiego (guest, #24141)
[Link] (5 responses)
> Yes, but the "obligations" I mentioned are administered by a third
There is nothing that requires admission. Do you think we can play pretend and say that the file libavcodec/h264.c in FFmpeg implements "Hello World!" or that a transcoding tool by the filename "ffmpeg" cannot in fact convert from one MPEG format to the other? You cannot solve problems by shutting up and there are no sleeping dogs to wake here.
I have said it multiple times already, let me repeat it: FFmpeg is not a secret in the industry and not a secret to the MPEG LA.
> > This is completely in line with what I am saying. Where do you see
> Right at the very end:
> "If you take a license which doesn't allow others to distribute original
Again: no problem for us. Apparently Google is not bound by such an agreement. And if they are, it's their problem. Or the MPEG LA's problem depending on your point of view.
Posted Jan 29, 2010 12:07 UTC (Fri)
by pboddie (guest, #50784)
[Link] (4 responses)
You cut this out in your reply which makes my point clear: In case it isn't obvious to you, I'm putting myself in Google's position here. The fact that this is Google's problem was my point four messages ago when I wrote: By "the spirit of those terms" take a look at the first quote above. And if the FSF's legal opinion were to stand on this matter, one would have to reassess Google's position beyond the mere spirit of those terms. Naturally, the participants in the FFmpeg project, which I presume includes yourself, may not need to worry about being served with an injunction. After all, why would the cartel want to prevent the proliferation of software which is, according to them, subject to their licensing programme? It's a nice way of generating business. Getting such technologies into an open standard is a bonus for the cartel (and a danger for everyone else), once everyone has convinced themselves that there's no risk in providing them to others (where "risk" includes unforeseen budget items related to patent licences that one was assured were not necessary), which was the caution given in the referenced article. It's distasteful to burden Free Software with such liabilities (see first quote, above, again) even if one's advice to people amounts to "it's cool" and "don't worry about it" (selective enforcement of patents is noted in the referenced article, by the way), but to burden open standards with them - noting the background of lobbying that goes on for "non-discriminatory licensing" in open standards (by patent holders) that would open the door for such inclusion - would push the boundaries of tastelessness still further. This is all covered adequately by the referenced article, of course.
Posted Jan 31, 2010 10:07 UTC (Sun)
by DonDiego (guest, #24141)
[Link] (3 responses)
> > I would have a hard time obtaining a patent licence grant only for
> In case it isn't obvious to you, I'm putting myself in Google's position
So you want them to get a patent license valid for every person on earth? That basically means buying out all those patents. Do you think such a thing would be available at all? At a price Google would be willing and able to pay?
The alternative would be for Google to not get a patent license and exclude itself from using multimedia technologies. That's not an option. And please don't start the Theora fairy tales again, it's not an alternative.
> Which brings us back to the patent licensing controversy where Google's
>By "the spirit of those terms" take a look at the first quote above. And
What do you call the "FSF's legal opinion" on the matter? I know for sure that Eben Moglen agrees with us (FFmpeg) that patent side deals do not have any bearing at all on LGPLv2.1-licensed code, such as FFmpeg. The Software Freedom Law Center works for FFmpeg, BTW.
> Naturally, the participants in the FFmpeg project, which I presume
Correct. My name is Diego Biurrun and I work on FFmpeg.
> may not need to worry about being served with an injunction. After all,
Your bitterness does FFmpeg a disservice. We're a big part of the free software computing stack, thus making Desktop Linux viable. In this day and age, computing without multimedia support is unthinkable.
Posted Feb 4, 2010 13:16 UTC (Thu)
by pboddie (guest, #50784)
[Link] (2 responses)
It doesn't mean buying those patents at all, but merely licensing them, which I'm sure has happened on a large scale before. But if Google's licence means that only they are practising the associated patent claims when distributing the code, and that recipients are not able to do so without a trip via the cartel's toll booth, then I think this contradicts the advice given by the FSF. Sure, you can claim that people aren't obliged to pay up to the cartel, but that's like claiming people don't have to pay their road tax or their television licence. Well, I referenced the advice given by the FSF to the GStreamer project above and in a previous comment. If that's not their legal opinion then maybe you ought to tell the GStreamer people. I'm not bitter about FFmpeg, although to claim such a thing makes for a great distraction from the points being made in the original article(s). I'm merely pointing out that there are valid reasons for considering other multimedia technologies that don't appear on the MPEG cartel's pricing menu. (And really, I don't have that much to say about Theora, so maybe you're grouping me together with a bunch of other people. Now something like Dirac is interesting because it's definitely a "professional" format and one whose patent infringement status has been thoroughly investigated by an organisation who should be able to comment on such matters with some certainty. I'm sure that some people might like to brush such formats aside and insist that everyone should get with the MPEG programme - in which case I'd really have suspicions about those people if their arguments were not limited to "it's what people on Windows expect".)
Posted Feb 5, 2010 10:53 UTC (Fri)
by DonDiego (guest, #24141)
[Link] (1 responses)
This is a good comparison in fact. Nobody would think about banning cars and television worldwide just because in some parts of the world you have to pay a tax to use them.
Posted Feb 5, 2010 14:18 UTC (Fri)
by pboddie (guest, #50784)
[Link]
Right, but I'm not advocating a "ban". I'm saying that by introducing a de-facto standard based on known-encumbered technologies, Google and friends are setting people up for such taxation. And I think that there are those of us that grudgingly accept things like genuine taxes and regulations because there is some kind of pretense of accountability and common sense behind their imposition. So, although some Free Software project may let you, for example, operate some kind of radio station, one has to grudgingly accept that for various reasons, there may be other restrictions from place to place that curtails the practical exercise of the freedoms/rights/privileges described in the software licence. Where patents are concerned, however, there are those of us who do not consider them to be legitimate, not least because the system that upholds patents is not accountable - it's practically set up to enrich itself as its primary objective. Now, when such instruments collide with Free Software licensing, I would certainly wish to disregard them entirely and insist that they impose no limitations on the freedoms/rights/privileges described in the software licence. However, in practice, patents are used to undermine the usage and distribution of Free Software. By licensing the MPEG patents for themselves (contrary to advice which apparently casts this strategy in a dubious light), Google acknowledges an obligation which resides beyond the software licence; through their market position, they proliferate this obligation, and then "to compete with Windows" or "to provide a proper experience" everyone becomes exposed to this obligation; since this obligation may impose unreasonable burdens on some parties (it may not be affordable for them to license the patents, for example, or maybe the cartel tells someone that they live in a "bad" country), it thereby excludes people from exchanging Free Software, thus dividing the community between the rich (with the privilege of using and distributing Free Software) and everyone else. Google's actions are more like a strong dose of car advocacy, or even an act to mandate car ownership, when having a car at the very least probably doesn't make sense for many people, and it might even be an unwanted financial burden for others. All I and others are trying to do is to encourage more sustainable alternatives.
Posted Jan 26, 2010 17:22 UTC (Tue)
by rahulsundaram (subscriber, #21946)
[Link] (21 responses)
Posted Jan 26, 2010 17:35 UTC (Tue)
by DonDiego (guest, #24141)
[Link] (20 responses)
Posted Jan 26, 2010 17:47 UTC (Tue)
by __alex (guest, #38036)
[Link] (19 responses)
Posted Jan 26, 2010 18:36 UTC (Tue)
by DonDiego (guest, #24141)
[Link] (18 responses)
Posted Jan 26, 2010 18:54 UTC (Tue)
by rahulsundaram (subscriber, #21946)
[Link] (1 responses)
Posted Jan 26, 2010 20:43 UTC (Tue)
by DonDiego (guest, #24141)
[Link]
It is enabled out of the box.
> You seem to have left out SUSE as well
openSUSE does not include FFmpeg and lists it on
http://en.opensuse.org/Application_black_list
but they appear to ship VLC. At least
http://software.opensuse.org/search
reveals VLC packages hosted on opensuse.org. No idea what those packages contain and how they are configured. If somebody can enlighten us, I'm all ears.
Posted Jan 26, 2010 20:52 UTC (Tue)
by __alex (guest, #38036)
[Link] (2 responses)
http://git.debian.org/?p=pkg-
>Currently the following video encoders are disabled in the ffmpeg package:
Posted Jan 26, 2010 21:24 UTC (Tue)
by DonDiego (guest, #24141)
[Link] (1 responses)
BTW, this is completely irrational. The MPEG-LA charges the same amount for encoders as it does for decoders.
Posted Jan 27, 2010 0:54 UTC (Wed)
by cortana (subscriber, #24596)
[Link]
Posted Jan 26, 2010 21:32 UTC (Tue)
by roc (subscriber, #30627)
[Link] (12 responses)
Posted Jan 26, 2010 21:50 UTC (Tue)
by DonDiego (guest, #24141)
[Link] (11 responses)
Posted Jan 26, 2010 22:03 UTC (Tue)
by roc (subscriber, #30627)
[Link] (10 responses)
Plus, living at the ongoing mercy of the MPEG-LA just isn't a good idea. Blizzard's latest blog post recaps the efforts of patent holders to squeeze out the last drop of royalties out media patents near the end of their life:
And aside from all that, there are huge licensing problems for content providers that don't go away even if we think we're somehow immune.
Posted Jan 26, 2010 22:16 UTC (Tue)
by DonDiego (guest, #24141)
[Link] (9 responses)
Posted Jan 27, 2010 1:28 UTC (Wed)
by roc (subscriber, #30627)
[Link] (8 responses)
It's highly questionable that the MPEG-LA considers Mozilla to already have a patent license just because we don't "sell" Firefox. You don't get a license just by meeting the terms, you have to explicitly enter into an agreement. So I suggest you prove your point by obtaining a free license from the MPEG-LA to distribute a large number of units of a product with a price of zero. Let me know when you've got that.
Beyond that, what if someone sells a product that includes Firefox? What if the MPEG-LA revises their license terms? What if the corporations that run the MPEG-LA just decide they don't like us? You'd have us bet everything on the long-term goodwill of the MPEG-LA. That would be extremely foolish.
Posted Jan 27, 2010 11:58 UTC (Wed)
by DonDiego (guest, #24141)
[Link] (7 responses)
Yes, but the MPEG-LA knows about VLC and FFmpeg and they have never moved a finger. Why would they? To skim off all the money we have made so far, i.e. nothing, and get lots of bad press in return?
> It's highly questionable that the MPEG-LA considers Mozilla to already
Go look at the terms. You don't need a license from the MPEG-LA (and neither does FFmpeg) because you don't qualify for requiring one:
http://www.mpegla.com/main/programs/AVC/Pages/Agreement.aspx
> Beyond that, what if someone sells a product that includes Firefox?
Then they have a problem to deal with depending on who they are, how much money they have and in which country they reside? But why does that concern you? Software patents on multimedia technology are in no way special. You did not stop shipping plugin support in Firefox when Microsoft got sued. There is a multitude of other software patents that apply to Mozilla software. Why is this case in any way special?
> What if the MPEG-LA revises their license terms?
The new licensing terms should come out any moment now since they were slated to be replaced in January. I'm just as curious as you are.
> What if the corporations that run the MPEG-LA just decide they don't
They sue you and get no money out of you. Then you have to stop US downloads for Firefox or offer a crippled version instead. Their loss. However, it will make the software patent nonsense newsworthy and fuel the discussion.
What exactly are you afraid of? I was never afraid that somebody might make me pay a billion bucks. I never had them and never will. So what exactly is it that you are fearing?
I can imagine hilarious scenarios of course: airport controls for software patent contraband :-)
Posted Jan 27, 2010 23:55 UTC (Wed)
by roc (subscriber, #30627)
[Link] (4 responses)
OK, VLC and FFmpeg are not interesting because they have no money. But as soon as anyone with money wants to distribute VLC or FFmpeg, then they could be a target.
> Go look at the terms. You don't need a license from the MPEG-LA (and
I don't see anything in there which says we wouldn't require one. Can you quote specific text that implies certain distributors of codecs don't require a license?
Typically when a patent holder makes a patent available royalty-free they don't say that "you don't require a license" ... that doesn't make much sense, since it's axiomatic that everyone who infringes a patent "requires a license". Instead they make a blanket grant of a free license to everyone, or grant something equivalent like a covenant to not sue. For example, see
> You did not stop shipping plugin support in Firefox when Microsoft got
Patents that are essential for implementing a Web standard (as the MPEG-LA patents threaten to be), are much more of a problem than patents like the Eolas patent that can be worked around or avoided in particular browser implementations.
Also, "stop shipping plugin support" was never been an option since it would not leave us with a viable browser. And yes, if shipping an H.264 codec is ever a necessity for being a viable browser, we'll try to find a way to ship one somehow. Compromise is better than irrelevance.
> They sue you and get no money out of you.
They'd get money. http://blog.lizardwrangler.com/2009/11/19/state-of-mozill...
> Then you have to stop US
We'd be out millions of dollars and back where we started ... actually, even worse, since we would have to return to our free-codec efforts having lost time and credibility.
And remember, this entire discussion ignores the issues for content providers. Even if H.264 decoding was entirely unencumbered, having to pay MPEG-LA taxes to publish video on the Web is unacceptable.
Posted Jan 28, 2010 12:55 UTC (Thu)
by DonDiego (guest, #24141)
[Link] (3 responses)
> OK, VLC and FFmpeg are not interesting because they have no money. But
I think the fundamental problem is that you are the sort of person that wants insurance policies and buys them, while I am not.
> > Go look at the terms. You don't need a license from the MPEG-LA (and
> I don't see anything in there which says we wouldn't require one. Can
There is nothing in there which says you require one.
Scenarios for which you require a license are listed and they do not apply to you, isn't that enough?
> > Then you have to stop US downloads for Firefox or offer a crippled
> We'd be out millions of dollars and back where we started ... actually,
There are two points I think you are not assessing correctly:
1) H.264 video + AAC audio + MP4 container as industry standard
Multimedia used to be completely fragmented with a multitude of competing and incompatible standards fighting for market share. Now we have a standard for lossy video and audio and it is being adopted across the board. It is not just used for web video, it is used on Bluray disks, it is used in cinemas and in Hollywood production, it is used by the ripping scene, it is used by video sharing sitesa already.
All these places now have the encoding infrastructure in place and no interest in changing or exchanging it.
2) viable alternatives
Let's face it, Vorbis is an excellent audio codec, but Theora is not a state of the art video codec and Ogg is a horrible container. Theora still has room for improvement of course, but it will never close the gap to more modern video codecs. Comparatively little effort is being spent on it and it must fight with one hand behind its back due to avoiding anything that might be patented. Even without such a handicap Theora will never be able to match the quality standards of more modern video codecs.
Keep in mind that web video is not YouTube and the unspeakable quality it offers nowadays. Think a few years into the future and web video will all be high-definition content.
> And remember, this entire discussion ignores the issues for content
This reminds me of something: Mozilla made a study about possible submarine patents on Theora. What did you find? Why was the study never published? If you found nothing, there surely wouldn't be a reason to keep mum about it, don't you agree?
Posted Jan 28, 2010 20:29 UTC (Thu)
by roc (subscriber, #30627)
[Link] (1 responses)
Maybe that is because we have built up a large organization that serves hundreds of millions of users, and you have not. Or maybe it's because we're used to seeing and fighting threats to the open Web.
> Scenarios for which you require a license are listed and they do not
No. The document lists scenarios for which a license is offered and is silent about other scenarios. More about this in the other part of the thread.
> There are two points I think you are not assessing correctly:
How great H.264 is is not the issue here. The licensing is the problem.
> This reminds me of something: Mozilla made a study about possible
For reasons I honestly don't understand, our lawyers tell us not to talk about it. All I can do is point to our actions in distributing Theora.
Posted Jan 31, 2010 11:37 UTC (Sun)
by DonDiego (guest, #24141)
[Link]
> Maybe that is because we have built up a large organization that serves
Oh, VLC alone has over a hundred million downloads, add to that all other multimedia software based on FFmpeg. Then think of YouTube and Facebook, which are probably the largest users of FFmpeg and how many users they have.
FFmpeg is less visible than Firefox, but by no means do I believe it has less users. I'll turn your argument around:
If tomorrow all copies of Firefox deleted themselves, most people will curse and fire up the alternative browsers that are likely already installed on their machines.
If tomorrow all copies of the FFmpeg libraries delete themselves, a lot of things will stop working where no viable replacement is available or only available for a considerable amount of money.
Free software multimedia will be reduced to dealing with the <5% of fringe content for which alternative libraries exist. Large content providers will have to reengineer their backend infrastructure.
> Or maybe it's because we're used to seeing
Maybe we act the way we do because we have been treading the patent-filled lands of multimedia for a decade or more. You are the newbies here, not us.
> > There are two points I think you are not assessing correctly:
> How great H.264 is is not the issue here. The licensing is the problem.
I'm not particularly fond of H.264 myself. It's far too complex a standard and the quality to decoding complexity tradeoff is forcing me to upgrade my vintage hardware.
However, we finally have an open standard for lossy video encoding. This is great news in the world of multimedia.
> > This reminds me of something: Mozilla made a study about possible
> For reasons I honestly don't understand, our lawyers tell us not to talk
This confirms the rumors that there are submarines lurking in the Theora ocean. Nothing else can explain your actions and why Nokia (who supposedly holds patents that Theora infringes) is afraid of touching Theora.
Posted Feb 1, 2010 14:29 UTC (Mon)
by nye (subscriber, #51576)
[Link]
Just to take this discussion further off track:
I think it's interesting to look at the technologies used as standard by pirate groups. Since they are already infringing copyrights, these people tend to have very little interest in any legal or philosophical issues attached to any particular technology, and gravitate towards the technically superior solution.
For HD, pirated video is almost exclusively H264, plus AAC or Vorbis (no clear winner here), in a Matroska container. For whatever reason, nobody seems willing to use MP4 unless they have to for compatibility with hardware (and perhaps software) produced by companies with a vested interest in that container.
Not especially relevant, but I found it interesting...
Posted Jan 28, 2010 8:15 UTC (Thu)
by cmccabe (guest, #60281)
[Link] (1 responses)
> They sue you and get no money out of you. Then you have to stop US
Mozilla made $78 million in revenue in fiscal 2008. That's not "no money." They don't want to encourage users to adopt a patented codec that will end up costing them. Can you really blame them?
Anyway, IE still has a huge honking market share and probably won't implement any kind of HTML5 video. I wonder if someone will write a plugin to do it. I'm not familiar with how the plugin architecture works so I don't even know if such a plugin would be feasible.
> I can imagine hilarious scenarios of course: airport controls for software
I can imagine some kind of futuristic tablet computing device where installing unauthorized software was impossible. All software would have to be approved by some centralized authority, who would be an easy target for patent litigation. In that case, distributing free software that used patented codecs could easily become impossible.
Of course, that could never happen. Pure science fiction :)
Posted Jan 28, 2010 10:52 UTC (Thu)
by DonDiego (guest, #24141)
[Link]
> I can imagine some kind of futuristic tablet computing device where
Apple ships an H.264 decoder with that device already, patent license and all. So no problem from that side...
Posted Jan 26, 2010 21:33 UTC (Tue)
by roc (subscriber, #30627)
[Link] (1 responses)
Posted Jan 31, 2010 11:46 UTC (Sun)
by DonDiego (guest, #24141)
[Link]
Posted Jan 26, 2010 21:35 UTC (Tue)
by roc (subscriber, #30627)
[Link] (1 responses)
Posted Jan 26, 2010 22:50 UTC (Tue)
by DonDiego (guest, #24141)
[Link]
Posted Jan 26, 2010 12:41 UTC (Tue)
by __alex (guest, #38036)
[Link] (75 responses)
If Mozilla want to play the long game and pursue a Free Software compatible
Has anyone even attempted to integrate gstreamer, ffmpeg, directshow or
Posted Jan 26, 2010 16:24 UTC (Tue)
by TRS-80 (guest, #1804)
[Link]
Posted Jan 26, 2010 21:30 UTC (Tue)
by Trelane (subscriber, #56877)
[Link] (72 responses)
Of particular interest to you is Mozilla Bug 422540,
The gstreamer backend has been a part of the plan from the beginning, see Mozilla bug tagged "video" https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=video "Implement WHATWG Video spec"\
So everyone can quit with the grandstanding, mozilla-bashing, and drama queening and get back to work. Synopsis: Using platform-specific media systems will not work, at least because of DirectShow (see the mozillazine link above). To fill the gap, Moz is integrating gstreamer support into Gecko. They can't provide MPEG-LA licensing to downstream users, so they used a patent-free codec for an initial implementation and hoped others would go along with it. In addition, they have been working on gstreamer, in order to support additional codecs. If you want to write an h.264 deocder, then, you can do so and write it for the gstreamer backend. Meanwhile, with GStreamer in place, Dirac and other future Free codecs can also be implemented without as much necessary work.
Posted Jan 26, 2010 22:10 UTC (Tue)
by DonDiego (guest, #24141)
[Link] (71 responses)
gstreamer already uses FFmpeg to decode almost everything.
Posted Jan 26, 2010 22:12 UTC (Tue)
by Trelane (subscriber, #56877)
[Link] (70 responses)
You may use FFMPeg in the GStreamer system, but it's hardly synonymous.
Posted Jan 26, 2010 22:46 UTC (Tue)
by DonDiego (guest, #24141)
[Link] (69 responses)
Fluendo also offers an alternative H.264 decoder that hooks into gstreamer. In exchange for money they take away your freedom. It's tasteless.
Posted Jan 26, 2010 22:54 UTC (Tue)
by Trelane (subscriber, #56877)
[Link] (47 responses)
Unless you need a patent license, in which case you're going to want to use Fluendo's codec.
"Fluendo also offers an alternative H.264 decoder that hooks into gstreamer. In exchange for money they take away your freedom."
Umm, jein. Unlike FFmpeg, they *have* a patent license. So, you know, you don't get sued. With software patents, you're screwed either way. Pretty sure Fluendo *can't* ship a Free codec; it's almost certainly in the MPEG-LA license terms. I've asked the MPEG-LA to clarify their position towards Free and open source codecs for their FAQ; we'll see if anything comes of it. So, really, either way your freedom is gone.
Shipping known-patented code without a license is tasteless IMHO. Same as selling your friend stolen goods.
Posted Jan 27, 2010 11:36 UTC (Wed)
by DonDiego (guest, #24141)
[Link] (46 responses)
> Unless you need a patent license, in which case you're going to want to
See below for details about patent licenses..
Note that Fluendo contacted us (FFmpeg) some time ago to negotiate a patent exception for FFmpeg's H.264 decoder. The request was declined. I think they then licensed some proprietary H.264 decoder from somewhere. Writing one from scratch is an entirely nontrivial task.
What Fluendo offers you is common and garden-variety proprietary software. If this is compatible with your moral standards, fine. But presenting them as the champions of software freedoms is - IMNSHO - tasteless.
> > Fluendo also offers an alternative H.264 decoder that hooks into
> Umm, jein. Unlike FFmpeg, they *have* a patent license. So, you know,
What makes you think that? Please get a clue before making such broad and insulting claims. Patent licenses are completely orthogonal to software licenses and not tied to any software implementation. In fact, you can get them separately and there are companies that do exactly that. The two most prominent users of FFmpeg are YouTube and Facebook, both are MPEG-LA licensees. Also, why would the MPEG-LA care which software you run after they have received their money?
All the claims about a license being required in order to be "legally" allowed to use or even distribute H.264 decoding software are completely made up. Check the MPEG-LA licensing terms yourself:
http://www.mpegla.com/main/programs/AVC/Pages/Agreement.aspx
They only speak of selling products, not of using or distributing software.
I don't need a license from the MPEG-LA, neither does FFmpeg or VLC and neither do you or 99.9% of the world's population. The problem only exists for companies that deal in MPEG technologies, have deep enough pockets and reside in certain parts of the world where the legal system is antisocial. Now I'm very sorry that people find themselves in such a situation and I have personally fought against the problem spreading. But holding the rest of the world hostage to account for the situation of a chosen few is not helpful.
> I've asked the MPEG-LA to clarify their position towards Free and open
Send me an email if/when you see results. Or have our beloved editor in chief post it as a news story. It will surely be newsworthy.
Posted Jan 28, 2010 0:00 UTC (Thu)
by roc (subscriber, #30627)
[Link] (2 responses)
Ah, this seems to be the source of your confusion.
MPEG-LA can sue anyone who's practicing the claims of their patents who doesn't have a license. If they don't offer a license that covers your usage, that's too bad for you.
Posted Jan 28, 2010 11:10 UTC (Thu)
by DonDiego (guest, #24141)
[Link] (1 responses)
> Ah, this seems to be the source of your confusion.
I'm not confused about how patent licensing works.
> MPEG-LA can sue anyone who's practicing the claims of their patents who
Yes, they *can*, but they do not have to. Also, they can just flatly deny you a license. Patent licensing is not compulsory. I know all that.
But the MPEG-LA is a patent pool. It's designed to maximize revenue for the parties forming the patent pool and simplify the access to patents for licensees. Denying you a license is not in their best interest, nor is suing every single entity that distributes technology that may infringe on their patents.
> If they don't offer a license that covers your
We're going in circles here. Why are you so hell-bent on getting a license? The MPEG-LA states that licenses are only necessary in certain circumstances. When I point out that these circumstances don't apply to you, you sense impending doom instead of being happy...
Posted Jan 28, 2010 20:49 UTC (Thu)
by roc (subscriber, #30627)
[Link]
Denying us a free license is certainly in their best interest. They could extract millions of dollars a year in revenue from us. Ditto for every other entity with significant income.
> The MPEG-LA states that licenses are only necessary in certain
I haven't found that stated anywhere. The MPEG-LA offers a license that covers certain circumstances. For all other circumstances, it is silent.
Maybe you're arguing that the MPEG-LA's silence about those other circumstances indicates that they don't care and would not choose to sue over those cases? That is extremely doubtful; it would be a most unwise business practice to forgo licensing for unforeseen product categories. And I already explained why relying on the beneficence of the MPEG-LA is not desirable.
My guess is that the MPEG-LA has simply not considered the possibility that an organization which could afford to pay significant licensing revenue would give away for free software that includes an H.264 codec.
Anyway, you can settle this. Go ahead and ask the MPEG-LA to declare that free distribution of FFmpeg does not require a patent license. If you get that in writing, that would be really interesting.
Posted Jan 28, 2010 22:56 UTC (Thu)
by Trelane (subscriber, #56877)
[Link] (42 responses)
==========REPLY==========
By way of background, I would like to point out that the Licenses
Our MPEG-4 Visual Patent Portfolio License includes 29 patent owners
Under the Licenses, coverage is provided and rights are granted for (a)
In response to your specific question, under the Licenses royalties are
I would also like to mention that while our Licenses are not concluded
Therefore, we suggest that all End Users deal with products only from
Best regards,
Allen
Allen Harkness
Posted Jan 28, 2010 23:04 UTC (Thu)
by Trelane (subscriber, #56877)
[Link] (32 responses)
187. Fluendo S.A.
I don't see ffmpeg as a licensor.
Posted Jan 29, 2010 7:53 UTC (Fri)
by roc (subscriber, #30627)
[Link] (29 responses)
Posted Jan 29, 2010 14:45 UTC (Fri)
by pboddie (guest, #50784)
[Link] (27 responses)
Posted Jan 30, 2010 2:38 UTC (Sat)
by Trelane (subscriber, #56877)
[Link] (26 responses)
Thank you for the information. I think I grok, but I do have two
From Allen Harkness on Thursday, 28 January, 2010:
What are these thresholds? Ideally, I'd like numbers, but information
>maximum annual royalty caps to provide more cost predictability for
How does this work in an open source or Free software setup, where
Two scenarios come to mind:
2) A corporation downloads one copy of Chrome from Google, and redistributes
3) Same scenarios as above, but for a home user distributing to others.
Thanks!
-Joseph
I've not received an answer to date. I'll post if they respond back.
Also, I'd like to take this moment to thank Fluendo for providing a licensed method. I hate software patents, particularly for what are otherwise open standards. Maybe we need patentleft to kick things off? It is, after all, another license in the end.
Finally, I'll also go ahead and say that all my videos that I have control over are Theora. :)
Posted Jan 31, 2010 11:55 UTC (Sun)
by DonDiego (guest, #24141)
[Link] (23 responses)
A company is thanked for providing proprietary software. This must be a precedent on lwn.net. Anyway, you could have said that you don't care about free software right at the start. That would have saved us going back and forth about the finer points.
Posted Jan 31, 2010 13:21 UTC (Sun)
by nix (subscriber, #2304)
[Link] (14 responses)
(apologies for sexist phrasing, but this particular odious characteristic
Posted Jan 31, 2010 20:37 UTC (Sun)
by Trelane (subscriber, #56877)
[Link] (8 responses)
It wasn't poking with a stick, your assumptions about my motivation are completely off the mark, and your conclusion based on the above is also completely wrong. Fortunately, I don't have to prove myself to random jerks on the Internet.
"Or, rather, given a choice between free software and his being right, his being right would come first every time."
Also incorrect. Not surprising. I think your own prejudices color your perceptions here.
Posted Feb 1, 2010 0:45 UTC (Mon)
by nix (subscriber, #2304)
[Link] (7 responses)
Posted Feb 1, 2010 1:09 UTC (Mon)
by Trelane (subscriber, #56877)
[Link] (2 responses)
All I did was ask for clarification on their FAQ. At worst, I hastened the inevitable by some unknowable quantity. At best, my email has helped show better where the licensing necessities are.
Posted Feb 1, 2010 1:14 UTC (Mon)
by Trelane (subscriber, #56877)
[Link] (1 responses)
Posted Feb 4, 2010 0:30 UTC (Thu)
by nix (subscriber, #2304)
[Link]
Posted Feb 1, 2010 16:04 UTC (Mon)
by bronson (subscriber, #4806)
[Link] (3 responses)
I don't see a downside to getting everything into the open. It might mean some short term difficulty for the ffmpeg project (difficulty that I'm sure they're expecting anyway), but it means long-term stability for everybody.
Nice work Trelane. You're doing this for all of us. Thanks!
Posted Feb 1, 2010 16:36 UTC (Mon)
by Trelane (subscriber, #56877)
[Link]
It's also the start of a dialog, if they choose to go there. I'd be willing to talk with them about Free Software and patents and direct them at more knowledgeable people. Let's try to keep this positive!
Posted Feb 2, 2010 15:29 UTC (Tue)
by DonDiego (guest, #24141)
[Link]
Posted Feb 4, 2010 1:14 UTC (Thu)
by nix (subscriber, #2304)
[Link]
Posted Jan 31, 2010 23:25 UTC (Sun)
by DonDiego (guest, #24141)
[Link] (2 responses)
Posted Feb 1, 2010 0:52 UTC (Mon)
by nix (subscriber, #2304)
[Link]
Posted Feb 1, 2010 19:45 UTC (Mon)
by rawler (guest, #60308)
[Link]
As the mail states, there are intentional exceptions for low-volume (in
Posted Feb 1, 2010 14:38 UTC (Mon)
by nye (subscriber, #51576)
[Link] (1 responses)
I think this kind of comment is highly out of place on LWN.
Posted Feb 4, 2010 1:12 UTC (Thu)
by nix (subscriber, #2304)
[Link]
Posted Jan 31, 2010 20:41 UTC (Sun)
by Trelane (subscriber, #56877)
[Link] (7 responses)
Nice troll. You almost had me going there.
Posted Jan 31, 2010 23:23 UTC (Sun)
by DonDiego (guest, #24141)
[Link] (6 responses)
If you thank Fluendo for providing you with "legally licensed" proprietary software, then you should build a throne for Google, which is providing you with "legally licensed" free software, don't you think?
Do you also thank Adobe for "legally licensed" Flash and Microsoft for "legally licensed" Windows 7? They all come with an MPEG LA license..
Posted Jan 31, 2010 23:36 UTC (Sun)
by Trelane (subscriber, #56877)
[Link] (5 responses)
I also buy Codeweavers Crossover Office because they help Wine to a great degree.
"Do you also thank Adobe for "legally licensed" Flash"
I thank them for having a Linux plugin. I don't like Flash over Free, patent-free standards, though. (See also the "I produce Theora content") I'm doing my part to keep us viable now (Fluendo and their plugin work) and in the future (Fluendo's Free software, Theora/Xiph, and my FSF membership).
and Microsoft for "legally licensed" Windows 7?"
If I ran Windows, I'd thank them for licensing the codec.
You do nobody any favors when your patent protection plan is the equivalent of burying your head in the sand, putting your fingers in your ears and saying "There ain't no patent threat" three times fast. You counter it by helping establish Free, patent-free standards and filling the gap until we get to that point.
Posted Feb 1, 2010 14:26 UTC (Mon)
by DonDiego (guest, #24141)
[Link] (4 responses)
Posted Feb 1, 2010 15:34 UTC (Mon)
by Trelane (subscriber, #56877)
[Link] (3 responses)
From poking around in wikipedia and talking to GStreamer people, this isn't entirely accurate, although it's not entirely inaccurate either. My information was apparently out of date.
"Why you would thank them for offering products for sale to you is beyond me, but hey..."
Had you stopped prior to this sentence, this would have been a helpful and informative post. This sentence took that work and overshadowed it by jerkishness.
Posted Feb 2, 2010 15:41 UTC (Tue)
by DonDiego (guest, #24141)
[Link] (2 responses)
> From poking around in wikipedia and talking to GStreamer people, this
I got the information from Edward Hervey who works on gstreamer (and for Collabora, the company that funds gstreamer development nowadays) and hangs around in the #ffmpeg-devel IRC channel. Just look at the gstreamer commit graph of thomasvs, who works for Fluendo and commented in this discussion before:
http://www.ohloh.net/accounts/thomasvs
> > Why you would thank them for offering products for sale to you is
> Had you stopped prior to this sentence, this would have been a helpful
You're not exactly a role model either, but the remark was dead serious. I never felt like thanking a supermarket for offering me goods for sale. Why would you thank any company for offering you their goods?
Posted Feb 2, 2010 16:35 UTC (Tue)
by Trelane (subscriber, #56877)
[Link] (1 responses)
"Why would you thank any company for offering you their goods?"
If it was the only place or one of the few places to get it legally, I'd be pretty grateful for it. Perhaps that's what you're not comprehending. Maybe we're just different people and see things differently, eh?
Posted Feb 3, 2010 1:40 UTC (Wed)
by DonDiego (guest, #24141)
[Link]
Posted Feb 1, 2010 20:06 UTC (Mon)
by rawler (guest, #60308)
[Link] (1 responses)
"royalties (beginning January 1, 2005) per legal entity are 0 - 100,000
Posted Feb 2, 2010 2:08 UTC (Tue)
by Trelane (subscriber, #56877)
[Link]
Posted Feb 1, 2010 0:37 UTC (Mon)
by DonDiego (guest, #24141)
[Link]
What I'm saying is that only corporations with deep pockets in certain parts of the world need to worry at all. You seem convinced that you are such an entity. Very well, good luck with your HTML 5 efforts. I don't care what browser makes my life without Flash more bearable, but I'm certainly willing to switch browsers to enjoy the privilege.
Then again, I'm convinced that you will punt and use system infrastructure to decode video in the medium-term future. Hopefully you will manage without hurting your market share too much...
Posted Jan 29, 2010 8:09 UTC (Fri)
by roc (subscriber, #30627)
[Link]
Posted Jan 30, 2010 12:34 UTC (Sat)
by DonDiego (guest, #24141)
[Link]
Posted Jan 31, 2010 5:09 UTC (Sun)
by luya (subscriber, #50741)
[Link]
Posted Jan 31, 2010 16:00 UTC (Sun)
by jrincayc (guest, #29129)
[Link] (4 responses)
Posted Feb 1, 2010 19:47 UTC (Mon)
by jxself (guest, #63302)
[Link] (2 responses)
Posted Feb 3, 2010 8:38 UTC (Wed)
by DonDiego (guest, #24141)
[Link] (1 responses)
Posted Mar 29, 2010 17:43 UTC (Mon)
by jxself (guest, #63302)
[Link]
I'm glad that I tried. If they're now saying that end users can be held responsible, I will keep these signed licenses (and the entire email chain) in my records. In the event that I am sued my plan is to pull these out and say, "look -- I tried to get licensed -- they refused" and go on about how it doesn't seem quite right to refuse to license to me while also suing me for not being licensed. Anyway, here's the relevant snippet from the email.
"Although our Licenses do not directly provide coverage for an end user and anyone in the product chain may be held responsible for an unlicensed product, a royalty paid for an end product by the end product supplier would render the product licensed in the hands of the end user. Therefore, the end user would not normally pay a royalty to MPEG LA for using such a product, but where a royalty has not been paid, such product is unlicensed.
In this case, as you appear to be the end user, we suggest that you choose a player from a licensed supplier. In that regard, we maintain lists of Licensees in Good Standing to each of our Licenses in the corresponding sections of our website http://www.mpegla.com.
Finally, please note that since you will not benefit from coverage under the Licenses, we will not execute the signed Licenses that you have returned to us."
Posted Feb 1, 2010 20:02 UTC (Mon)
by rawler (guest, #60308)
[Link]
If nothing else, if someone wants to break the system, a suggestion on
Posted Feb 4, 2010 23:36 UTC (Thu)
by PaulWay (guest, #45600)
[Link] (2 responses)
My immediate question would be:
"Given that Microsoft and several other vendors have been hit for billions of dollars in patent infringements after they bought a license from MPEG-LA to use the MPEG-2 intellectual property, we will only buy a license from MPEG-LA if they guarantee that no intellectual property other than their own is infringed by the technology they're licensing, and they indemnify and promise to be liable for any lawsuit held against any company implementing the AVC/H.264 standard."
It's extremely hypocritical for MPEG LA and its members to cast aspersions on the possibility that Theora may be at risk of attack from submarine patents, and yet stand idly by while patent trolls attack companies that have licensed technology from MPEG LA. If you buy the license to implement the standard, you should be buying a license for <u>everything</u> that implements the standard. You shouldn't then be told "oh, sorry, you did it in this slightly different way, we don't cover that, hope you like paying lots of money to other patent trolls".
It just highlights the complete stupidity of trying to claim that ideas are property.
Posted Feb 5, 2010 9:01 UTC (Fri)
by DonDiego (guest, #24141)
[Link] (1 responses)
Posted Feb 5, 2010 14:35 UTC (Fri)
by pboddie (guest, #50784)
[Link]
Posted Jan 28, 2010 11:30 UTC (Thu)
by thomasvs (guest, #36955)
[Link] (20 responses)
Why do we take away your freedom? Feel free not to buy our codecs. No one is forcing you to give us money. I don't see how offering an option for those people that want a legal properly licensed codec takes away freedom. It's hollow rhetoric.
Posted Jan 28, 2010 12:46 UTC (Thu)
by DonDiego (guest, #24141)
[Link] (19 responses)
> Why do we take away your freedom? Feel free not to buy our codecs. No one
There you're doing it again. Insinuating that the only way to get a "legal properly licensed" codec is by forfeiting software freedom and giving you money. By corollary you're also saying that free software implementing those same codecs is somehow illegal and should be avoided in favor of your proprietary software. This is tasteless and insulting.
Posted Feb 3, 2010 11:10 UTC (Wed)
by thomasvs (guest, #36955)
[Link] (18 responses)
In our reading this conflicts with the combination of patents and their usage license when they are volume-based instead of one-time fee. If I distribute the code, I'm not going to pay the end user license for everyone that gets my software; I don't even know how you would be able to track that.
In the case of mp3, since there was a one-time fee, we did exactly that.
Of course, this reasoning a) assumes that patents and patent licensing are legally valid (which for example is the case in the US) and b) is our (and our lawyer's) interpretation of the situation.
Diego, feel free to disagree with this; in the end what we saw is a practical situation (no distro feels legally safe to ship ffmpeg/xine/vlc/mplayer).
But don't blow up the discussion with insinuations that we think ffmpeg is illegal, or that we try to take away anyone's freedom. That's just intentionally polarizing the discussion. Your arguments are stronger when you don't put words in the mouth of the other.
Posted Feb 3, 2010 13:37 UTC (Wed)
by paulj (subscriber, #341)
[Link] (3 responses)
If you choose not to distribute a codec because you know it is patented, then
I think the above may be what Don Diego is trying to communicate, and it fits
If you come to an agreement with the patent holder, then obviously you
The next question, which I think you or others in the Mozilla camp (and
Posted Feb 3, 2010 13:46 UTC (Wed)
by paulj (subscriber, #341)
[Link]
Posted Feb 3, 2010 18:13 UTC (Wed)
by DonDiego (guest, #24141)
[Link] (1 responses)
But you are not portraying my stance correctly, see my other posts for reference.
Posted Feb 3, 2010 21:29 UTC (Wed)
by paulj (subscriber, #341)
[Link]
Re the patent licence case, after digging relatively carefully through the GPL
"If you come to an agreement with the patent holder, then obviously you
It seems the *actual* obligations imposed by the GPL do not go that far.
I'm starting to think you're right.
Posted Feb 3, 2010 13:42 UTC (Wed)
by DonDiego (guest, #24141)
[Link] (13 responses)
False. You need to give recipients the same rights that you received when getting the software. You received FFmpeg as (L)GPL from us, you have to pass it along as (L)GPL again. The (L)GPL says nothing about a contract with the MPEG LA.
I'll give you another example: The original author has the right to publish the software under any license. This right is *not* passed along with GPL software. I could also sell you some FFmpeg code I wrote under a proprietary license. Then you have the right to use that code under said proprietary license, but you do *not* pass that right along when you redistribute FFmpeg. You have the right, but you need not pass it along, you are not even allowed to pass it along.
> in the end what we saw is a practical situation (no distro feels
FALSE !!!
Do you really believe what you were saying there? Just scroll up and read a bit of the discussion above or verify such statements before making them.
> But don't blow up the discussion with insinuations that we think
You profit from making people think that you are the only "legal" way to run multimedia software under Linux. Some people are easily scared and gullible and believe what you write. These people then run your proprietary software instead of free software to do the same job at least as good. These people are thus deprived from their software freedom and you have profited.
There is no way around these facts. If you were putting all the money you earn with that stuff into a big fund to sponsor free software or if you donated it, then fine, I would believe you. Or if there was a note in your shop that said "no private person has ever needed this, you can use free software X instead also". But you do no such thing.
Which is fine, be that way if you want, I would welcome you to act differently, but I do not condemn you. However, please be honest about what you do. You sell proprietary software like any other company and are in no way special.
> That's just intentionally polarizing the discussion. Your arguments
I have heard "FFmpeg is illegal.", "Playing DVDs under Linux is illegal.", "Someone will end up in jail." more times than I can count. Just try to spend a day at an FFmpeg/MPlayer booth for a day during LinuxTag or some other event.
This discussion is already polarized and lopsided in one direction. I intend to balance the scales a bit by countering the FUD and anticipatory obedience that has become the hallmark of parts of our community.
Posted Feb 3, 2010 14:38 UTC (Wed)
by mjw (subscriber, #16740)
[Link] (12 responses)
> False. You need to give recipients the same rights that you received when
Actually the LGPL does if such contracts are about patent licenses (quotes from GPLv2.1, but other versions have similar obligations):
Finally, software patents pose a constant threat to the existence of any free program. We wish to make sure that a company cannot effectively restrict the users of a free program by obtaining a restrictive license from a patent holder. Therefore, we insist that any patent license obtained for a version of the library must be consistent with the full freedom of use specified in this license.
Posted Feb 3, 2010 15:08 UTC (Wed)
by paulj (subscriber, #341)
[Link]
It is a fallacy to say that every distributor of GPLed software must ensure they
See also my other reply, an uncle of sorts to this one.
Posted Feb 3, 2010 15:28 UTC (Wed)
by DonDiego (guest, #24141)
[Link] (10 responses)
> Finally, software patents pose a constant threat [...]
This is from the preamble of the LGPL. As it has no effect on the license itself and is in no way legally binding, it is best ignored.
> If you cannot distribute so as to satisfy simultaneously your
This just means that other contracts do not excuse you from the obligations of the LGPL. Any downstream recipient must continue to receive the full LGPL rights, the redistributor is not allowed to restrict them, no matter what other obligations say.
If somebody has a contract with the devil that claims a limb for each redistribution of FFmpeg then that person will quickly run out of limbs and then have a serious problem with the devil, but with nobody else.
Downstream recipients are not affected. They have no contract with the devil, they need not fear for their limbs, they just need to abide by the terms of the LGPL.
Posted Feb 3, 2010 15:48 UTC (Wed)
by mjw (subscriber, #16740)
[Link] (6 responses)
Of course it is not smart to ignore the text of the license. The preamble makes clear what the intent is of the legal clauses. In case their is any doubt how to interpret a particular clause one looks at the intent to see that "any patent license obtained for a version of the library must be consistent with the full freedom of use".
> > if a patent license would not permit royalty-free
Yes, but it does affect the (re)distributor. If they get a patent license, then they have to make sure that it covers not only themselves, but also all the recipients of any copies of the library. You might think that is the problem of those who take out such a patent license, and that they would be foolish to get into a contract with something like the MPEG LA. (And you might be right about that.) But it is still a real problem for such companies that do.
Posted Feb 3, 2010 16:02 UTC (Wed)
by DonDiego (guest, #24141)
[Link] (5 responses)
>Of course it is not smart to ignore the text of the license. The preamble makes clear what the intent is of the legal clauses. In case their is any doubt how to interpret a particular clause one looks at the intent to see that "any patent license obtained for a version of the library must be consistent with the full freedom of use".
Sure? OK, let's try:
PREAMBLE
The book club is a non-profit, for-good, honest, no-nonsense organization that strives to bring its members peace, prosperity, happiness and easy access to their favorite books with absolutely no hooks attached
CONTRACT
666. (f) If you have read this far, we will now inform you that we will send you a few books per week at not exactly premium conditions. They will be a random choice of the old stuff we could not sell otherwise. You may not give them back and pay within three days.
Construct a slightly less contrived example if you wish, but still the fact remains: the preamble is not legally binding.
> > This just means that other contracts do not excuse you from the obligations of the LGPL. [...] Downstream recipients are not affected.
> Yes, but it does affect the (re)distributor. If they get a patent license, then they have to make sure that it covers not only themselves, but also all the recipients of any copies of the library.
No. BTW, the SFLC agrees with us.
Posted Feb 3, 2010 16:49 UTC (Wed)
by rahulsundaram (subscriber, #21946)
[Link] (4 responses)
Posted Feb 3, 2010 17:53 UTC (Wed)
by DonDiego (guest, #24141)
[Link] (3 responses)
Much more importantly, this is the official interpretation of FFmpeg. Since we are the copyright owners, our interpretation is the one that matters. We still need to put that in writing.
Posted Feb 4, 2010 16:00 UTC (Thu)
by rahulsundaram (subscriber, #21946)
[Link] (2 responses)
Posted Feb 4, 2010 16:07 UTC (Thu)
by DonDiego (guest, #24141)
[Link] (1 responses)
I would like you to provide me with the contrary interpretation in writing as well. You claim that the FSF has made statements to a different effect, but I never saw such a thing.
Posted Feb 4, 2010 16:27 UTC (Thu)
by rahulsundaram (subscriber, #21946)
[Link]
Posted Feb 3, 2010 15:59 UTC (Wed)
by paulj (subscriber, #341)
[Link] (2 responses)
Where you seemed to be saying that non-licensees were unaffected (other
Posted Feb 3, 2010 15:59 UTC (Wed)
by paulj (subscriber, #341)
[Link] (1 responses)
Posted Feb 3, 2010 17:58 UTC (Wed)
by DonDiego (guest, #24141)
[Link]
Posted Jan 26, 2010 21:38 UTC (Tue)
by roc (subscriber, #30627)
[Link]
Posted Jan 28, 2010 20:31 UTC (Thu)
by DonDiego (guest, #24141)
[Link]
> Not at all. Integrating an H.264 codec, or integrating support for various
But you are already working on a gstreamer backend for fennec (embedded Firefox)
https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=422540
What gives?
Posted Jan 26, 2010 8:53 UTC (Tue)
by paulj (subscriber, #341)
[Link] (8 responses)
At present the world is Flash / H.264. Surely replacing Flash with HTML5 is a
Further, the dimensions are not completely independent, for Flash intrinsically
Therefore if you can encourage the adoption of HTML5 over Flash, regardless
Basically, this is how you change the world:
Flash + H.264
You stand far less chance of making the world a more free place by spurning
(and yes, I know Ogg Theora is a container format itself, I don't know the
1. they have the ability to ensure any free re-implementations are always
Posted Jan 26, 2010 10:23 UTC (Tue)
by DonDiego (guest, #24141)
[Link] (7 responses)
Ogg is the container, Theora is the codec. Theora is derived from the VP3 codec originally created by On2.
Ogg is a deeply flawed container format, for details see
Posted Jan 26, 2010 10:41 UTC (Tue)
by paulj (subscriber, #341)
[Link] (6 responses)
So perhaps replace Ogg with Avi? E.g. replace "Ogg Theora" in my comment
Posted Jan 26, 2010 13:02 UTC (Tue)
by __alex (guest, #38036)
[Link] (5 responses)
Posted Jan 26, 2010 21:38 UTC (Tue)
by Trelane (subscriber, #56877)
[Link] (1 responses)
Xiph has them. Dunno if they're perhaps ffmpeg-based, but it seems unlikely.
Posted Jan 27, 2010 11:40 UTC (Wed)
by DonDiego (guest, #24141)
[Link]
Posted Feb 1, 2010 14:45 UTC (Mon)
by nye (subscriber, #51576)
[Link] (2 responses)
Posted Feb 4, 2010 1:13 UTC (Thu)
by nix (subscriber, #2304)
[Link] (1 responses)
Posted Feb 4, 2010 23:30 UTC (Thu)
by DonDiego (guest, #24141)
[Link]
Posted Jan 25, 2010 21:56 UTC (Mon)
by rfunk (subscriber, #4054)
[Link]
There's one other option: Silverlight. Which has its own complications, and
I'm concerned that this HTML5 video dispute may somehow help Silverlight.
Posted Jan 26, 2010 2:12 UTC (Tue)
by roc (subscriber, #30627)
[Link]
Access to third-party codecs doesn't solve any problem for most of our users, since Windows XP and Vista don't include an H.264 codec.
Posted Jan 26, 2010 21:52 UTC (Tue)
by MisterIO (guest, #36192)
[Link] (4 responses)
Posted Jan 26, 2010 22:15 UTC (Tue)
by Trelane (subscriber, #56877)
[Link] (3 responses)
Posted Jan 27, 2010 0:05 UTC (Wed)
by coriordan (guest, #7544)
[Link]
(Maybe things have changed. I think it was 2008 when I read that.)
Posted Jan 30, 2010 16:06 UTC (Sat)
by DonDiego (guest, #24141)
[Link] (1 responses)
Posted Jan 30, 2010 16:19 UTC (Sat)
by DonDiego (guest, #24141)
[Link]
is completely useless and provides little information unfortunately...
Posted Jan 27, 2010 14:37 UTC (Wed)
by dion (guest, #2764)
[Link] (3 responses)
I wonder why Mozilla doesn't simply make an International build available that has h264 and and a gulag build without h264 for the poor, oppressed masses in the US and Japan.
Web site operators would need to either stream their video from The Free world or use Ogg Theora and stream from the US, but users behind the lawsuit-curtain could probably get their hands on a Free version of Firefox via Samizdat.
Posted Jan 27, 2010 15:29 UTC (Wed)
by pboddie (guest, #50784)
[Link]
You're mixing up a number of issues here: In fact, as I recall, the US versions of programs like Netscape Navigator/Communicator had "full-strength" encryption employing the patent-encumbered RSA technologies; most other countries got the "export-strength" encryption; countries like France had special encryption-free versions. I imagine that there may well have been programs used widely outside the US that would not have been tolerated in the US, but that would quite likely have more to do with patent claims than the other factors. Yes, it's tempting to say "to hell" with the patent cartels, but doing so in their backyard while proliferating their technologies (and thus drawing vendors into having to support those technologies, thus funding those cartels still further) cannot be regarded as the most prudent strategy for an outfit like Mozilla.
Posted Jan 28, 2010 0:02 UTC (Thu)
by roc (subscriber, #30627)
[Link] (1 responses)
Maybe all the non-US patents are noneforceable, but that's at best unproven.
Posted Jan 28, 2010 14:53 UTC (Thu)
by dion (guest, #2764)
[Link]
Posted Jan 28, 2010 15:42 UTC (Thu)
by DonDiego (guest, #24141)
[Link] (4 responses)
http://apps.shareholder.com/sec/viewerContent.aspx?compan...
and look for the exhibits at the bottom
AVC PATENT PORTFOLIO LICENSE
That should provide for interesting reading.
Posted Feb 2, 2010 16:17 UTC (Tue)
by DonDiego (guest, #24141)
[Link] (3 responses)
Posted Feb 2, 2010 16:43 UTC (Tue)
by Trelane (subscriber, #56877)
[Link]
Posted Feb 2, 2010 16:49 UTC (Tue)
by Trelane (subscriber, #56877)
[Link] (1 responses)
Posted Feb 3, 2010 10:39 UTC (Wed)
by DonDiego (guest, #24141)
[Link]
Posted Jan 28, 2010 22:31 UTC (Thu)
by DonDiego (guest, #24141)
[Link]
http://codecism.blogspot.com/2010/01/theora-vs-x264-vs-sc...
Let me quote the result:
Conclusion
PSNR and SSIM don't perfectly correlate to perceived quality. But they're close, and if anything the conclusion that Theora needs at least twice the bitrate to match H.264 in terms of objective quality measurements understates the effect of x264's psychovisual optimizations.
Posted Jan 31, 2010 16:04 UTC (Sun)
by sandifop (guest, #63283)
[Link]
Posted Feb 3, 2010 1:34 UTC (Wed)
by DonDiego (guest, #24141)
[Link] (13 responses)
http://www.google.com/patents/about?id=Ic0CAAAAEBAJ
Posted Feb 3, 2010 20:27 UTC (Wed)
by michael_ock (guest, #63333)
[Link]
Posted Feb 4, 2010 8:02 UTC (Thu)
by silviapfeiffer (guest, #63354)
[Link] (10 responses)
Posted Feb 4, 2010 15:11 UTC (Thu)
by DonDiego (guest, #24141)
[Link] (9 responses)
Posted Feb 4, 2010 16:07 UTC (Thu)
by rahulsundaram (subscriber, #21946)
[Link] (8 responses)
Posted Feb 4, 2010 23:01 UTC (Thu)
by DonDiego (guest, #24141)
[Link] (5 responses)
Yes, it should really be done behind closed doors, just like software development and science. After that, when you have concluded your research, you tell nobody about it and just demand that everybody trust you. After all, why should they ever doubt your word.
> You need lawyers to analyze your claims
You want a lawyer to analyze whether or not Theora implements the technique described in the patent? What would qualify a lawyer to do that? Do you go see a lawyer when you feel a pain in your chest?
> and you will find that its hard to get lawyers to say anything in public about this sort of analysis in general
This is not specific to lawyers, it applies to all people that have something to hide.
Posted Feb 5, 2010 5:52 UTC (Fri)
by rahulsundaram (subscriber, #21946)
[Link] (4 responses)
The reasons for lawyers not usually willing to talk about patent claims in
Posted Feb 5, 2010 9:07 UTC (Fri)
by DonDiego (guest, #24141)
[Link] (3 responses)
If the patent analysis can be used as a weapon it's because patents are being infringed.
Posted Feb 5, 2010 16:27 UTC (Fri)
by rahulsundaram (subscriber, #21946)
[Link] (2 responses)
There are lots of people including Xiph and Mozilla which have done such
Refer http://lwn.net/Articles/373094/
Posted Feb 5, 2010 22:54 UTC (Fri)
by nix (subscriber, #2304)
[Link] (1 responses)
Posted Feb 6, 2010 5:06 UTC (Sat)
by rahulsundaram (subscriber, #21946)
[Link]
Posted Feb 5, 2010 21:21 UTC (Fri)
by paulj (subscriber, #341)
[Link] (1 responses)
Part of the problem perhaps is that the waters between licence issues due to
Posted Feb 6, 2010 5:16 UTC (Sat)
by rahulsundaram (subscriber, #21946)
[Link]
As a general case lawyers would advise their clients to never talk to the
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-4097602514885833865
Posted Feb 4, 2010 16:01 UTC (Thu)
by DonDiego (guest, #24141)
[Link] (1 responses)
Posted Feb 8, 2010 11:29 UTC (Mon)
by bawjaws (guest, #56952)
[Link]
Strangely he doesn't seem very keen on the IETF working together with Skype,
http://multimedia.cx/eggs/ietf-request-for-codec/
Possibly he's just developed a generalised dislike for hippy freeloaders from
Blizzard: HTML5 video and H.264 - what history tells us and why we're standing with the web
Blizzard: HTML5 video and H.264 - what history tells us and why we're standing with the web
it to the general public, or until a better codec exists that matches or exceeds H.264 in
performance and hardware support. Neither solution is likely to happen soon.
buying a specification is hard; en.swpat.org pages
Ogg Theora looks to be doing nicely compared to h264 and that's based off of
VP3. I wonder if VP8 might end up being released too, if Google's bid on On2 is to go through.
buying a specification is hard; en.swpat.org pages
Theora does not produce quality comparable to H.264
>>> Theora does not stack up well towards H.264, no matter what its proponents may claim. Call it a sad fact if you will, but it remains a fact.Theora does not produce quality comparable to H.264
Concerning the comparison with H264 perhaps you will find this link interesting.
Theora does not produce quality comparable to H.264
From the article :Theora does not produce quality comparable to H.264
"This is a test on anime, nothing else; it inherently biases towards video formats with smaller transform size (like H.264), so the results are not generalizable to non-animated material"
I must add that I never said that Theora produces quality better than H.264. Your comparison with evolution vs creationists is insulting. I know very well that H.264 is better than Theora...even the author of my link know that :
"Theora isn't the most efficient video codec available right now.But it is by no means bad, and it is substantially better than many other widely used options. By conventional criteria Theora is competitive. It also has the substantial advantage of being unencumbered, reasonable in computational complexity, and entirely open source".
The conclusion is that Theora is "good enough".
Theora does not produce quality comparable to H.264
Theora does not produce quality comparable to H.264
Theora does not produce quality comparable to H.264
Theora does not produce quality comparable to H.264
Theora does not produce quality comparable to H.264
> 325 vs 327kbps).
-rw-rw-r-- 1 diego staff 15009926 Jan 26 22:41 bbb.theora
Theora does not produce quality comparable to H.264
-rw-rw-r-- 1 diego staff 15009926 Jan 26 22:41 bbb.theora"
17307153 bbb_theora_486kbit.ogv
17753616 bbb_youtube_h264_499kbit.mp4
-rw-r--r-- 1 auser agroup 17307153 2010-01-26 16:40 bbb_theora_486kbit.ogv
-rw-r--r-- 1 auser agroup 17753616 2010-01-26 16:40 bbb_youtube_h264_499kbit.mp4
"With this 1.1alpha version, Theora requires somewhere around 60% more bandwidth than Mpeg-4, but Theora is being actively improved, so we'll see. The Mpeg-4 we have today is the result of years of tuning on the encoders."
Theora does not produce quality comparable to H.264
> It would also be a very big surprise if 64kbit Vorbis could beat
> 106.5kbit AAC."
> the ones from the site. What's going on here?
> > and 390kbps for H.264.
> From your link at http://www-cs-faculty.stanford.edu/~nick/theora-soccer/:
> With this 1.1alpha version, Theora requires somewhere around 60% more
> bandwidth than Mpeg-4, but Theora is being actively improved, so we'll
> see. The Mpeg-4 we have today is the result of years of tuning on the
> encoders."
Theora does not produce quality comparable to H.264
I spent time in the article explaining the role of audio. I'd appreciate if you wouldn't make it out as though I were attempting to mislead anyone.
You've missed the point.
No, I made the point I wanted to make.
No, I made the point I wanted to make.
I agree, but the container overhead is higher for Ogg, so that's another drawback for Theora. What are you trying to say?
I'm not in much of a position to speak about MP4/QT container overhead, but the container overhead of Ogg is fairly low when Ogg is used in the typical way. Ffmpeg does a rather brain-dead thing and only ever places one packet per Ogg page which enormously increases the overhead at lower bitrates, but as far as I'm aware every other tool won't do that. If you are interested in low overhead, Ogg can be as low as ~0.433% (presuming big packets, like video). Is a streamable, seekable, MP4 file in that ballpark? Better seems ... unlikely... to me, or inconsequential if it's the case.
I'm putting your comparison in perspective. You sacrifice audio quality to achieve a not-quite-on-par video quality.
If you want to argue it out, I can arrange a blind listening test on the audio. My audio will win. :) AAC-LC isn't all that hot. Really.
Also, I take issue with your putting open source video encoding in quotes. These are the people that are keeping Linux viable as a general-purpose desktop platform. They deserve thanks, not criticism.
No, I made the point I wanted to make.
I'm afraid your intuitions about container overhead are quite far off from reality. Let's see:
No, I made the point I wanted to make.
17307153 bbb_theora_486kbit.ogv
15009926 bbb_theora_486kbit.theora
2107404 bbb_theora_486kbit.vorbis
--------
189823
17753616 bbb_youtube_h264_499kbit.mp4
13898515 bbb_youtube_h264_499kbit.h264
3796188 bbb_youtube_h264_499kbit.aac
--------
58913
Can you concede that, for the purpose of this test, that the quality/bitrate is basically there?
No. My whole point is that this test is worthless because it avoids the most sticky points. You should pitch Theora against the best H.264 encoders, not against an encoding pipeline which obviously has huge room for improvement. You should also take future developments into account. 1080p should be the benchmark, not the horrible quality Youtube currently offers.
I wasn't giving you an intuition, I was giving you a format maximum: You can put about 64k of payload in an Ogg page or up to 255 packets. For that file that using maximum size pages would give an ogg overhead of 82887 bytes. Had I used larger page sizes in my comparison I would have no longer been using default settings, which was one of my goals. I'm not sure how you're writing out those files for your mp4 comparison, I'm guessing they still have some container headers, but reading the samplesizes directly from the mp4 dump brings me to 86245 bytes of container overhead, which is pretty similar.
No, I made the point I wanted to make.
not the horrible quality Youtube currently offers
Well, what can I say? I wrote a clearly described specific comparison about YT because of an outrageous goggler quote. Now you're running around the internet calling my statements fraudulent because they weren't a comparison with something else.
Without them free software desktop market share would be orders of magnitude smaller and decreasing.
I fail to see how advancing the state of the art in the best encumbered format encoders does much of anything to preserve free desktops by helping people "listen to music and watch movies". But to each his own. There are perfectly viable ways to get legally licensed encoders for your desktop even if tools like ffmpeg didn't exist, but its existence wasn't something that I was protesting.
I'll stop wondering about submarine patents the moment you guys earn my trust by publishing your findings.
You could at least get the terminology right. A "submarine patent" isn't what you should be worried about, submarine patents are an old technique for making effectively secret patents that could last for decades, scary indeed. This loophole was closed in the mid-90s. All the submarines were forced to surface.
No, I made the point I wanted to make.
Container conundrum
No, I made the point I wanted to make.
Theora DID not produce quality comparable to H.264
rick@linuxmafia.com
Theora DID not produce quality comparable to H.264
Theora does not produce quality comparable to H.264
Theora does not produce quality comparable to H.264
> 20 years or using a Free* codec that is (already) better than flash and
> likely to continuously improve, I'll take the latter every time.
Theora does not produce quality comparable to H.264
Blizzard: HTML5 video and H.264 - what history tells us and why we're standing with the web
Blizzard: HTML5 video and H.264 - what history tells us and why we're standing with the web
Blizzard: HTML5 video and H.264 - what history tells us and why we're standing with the web
Blizzard: HTML5 video and H.264 - what history tells us and why we're standing with the web
on the GPU, it just accelerates some parts like colour conversion,
deblocking and other parts of the inner loop.
driver, and part of which ends up running on the GPU.
Blizzard: HTML5 video and H.264 - what history tells us and why we're standing with the web
group. And if the GSM folks are any indication of how these sort of industry
'IP' groups operate they do everything they can to shovel as many patents
into the pool as possible.
sorts of different aspects of the codecs, and software and hardware related
to the codecs. So even if the video card folks build codecs-as-hardware they
still only likely take a some patents out of the equation and not all of
them. Meaning that even with hardware acceleration your still not going to
escape from the licensing requirements.
Blizzard: HTML5 video and H.264 - what history tells us and why we're standing with the web
> on the GPU, it just accelerates some parts like colour conversion,
> deblocking and other parts of the inner loop.
Blizzard: HTML5 video and H.264 - what history tells us and why we're standing with the web
Blizzard: HTML5 video and H.264 - what history tells us and why we're standing with the web
Blizzard: HTML5 video and H.264 - what history tells us and why we're standing with the web
Blizzard: HTML5 video and H.264 - what history tells us and why we're standing with the web
broadcasters
also have to pay non-trivial money to the patent pool, so you can't host an H.264 on your web-site without infringing. Also, those prices are scheduled to go up, so some big players (possibly including Google) have an incentive to find an alternative.how implementable Flash is
how implementable Flash is
Something about "if you use this software, you agree not to use the
gained knowledge for the purpose of writing a competing program"how implementable Flash is
It it is somewhat questionable whether a term like that in a retail end
user
license agreement would in fact be enforceable, especially if the user of
the software was not the person who installed it. Courts in the United
States
have decided both ways. If the EFF wanted to do something useful, they
would
find people with
standing to challenge the extremely dubious arguments behind retail
shrinkwrap licenses and push the counterargument based on traditional legal reasoning and
copyright law until the disingenuousness of the idea that consumers do not
own "copies" of software they buy of the shelf (and the consequent nullity
of
most end user SLAs) is obvious to every judge in the country.
If the EFF wanted to do something useful, they would find people with
standing to challenge the extremely dubious arguments behind retail
shrinkwrap licenses and push the counterargument based on traditional legal reasoning
how implementable Flash is
Blizzard: HTML5 video and H.264 - what history tells us and wihy we're standing with the web
gnash codecs
Blizzard: HTML5 video and H.264 - what history tells us and why we're standing with the web
> re-implemented in Free Software. H.264 cannot, in many parts of the world.
Blizzard: HTML5 video and H.264 - what history tells us and why we're standing with the web
This is wrong, please get a clue about patents. It is not illegal to implement a patented technique, in free or proprietary software, anywhere in the world.
http://www.uspto.gov/web/offices/pac/doc/general/index.html#patent
The right conferred by the patent grant is, in the language of the statute and of the grant itself, the right to exclude others from making, using, offering for sale, or selling the invention in the United States or importing the invention into the United States. What is granted is not the right to make, use, offer for sale, sell or import, but the right to exclude others from making, using, offering for sale, selling or importing the invention. Once a patent is issued, the patentee must enforce the patent without aid of the USPTO.
(emphasis mine)
patents and legality
Blizzard: HTML5 video and H.264 - what history tells us and why we're standing with the web
> doesn't need a patent license.
> taken the latter one as more important.
Blizzard: HTML5 video and H.264 - what history tells us and why we're standing with the web
- uses non-free codecs
- has a poor security record
- has bad accessibility
The problem is that if we take the short term near-win, over time we walk ourselves into a situation that's hard to get out of when things get bad or when we want a full win.
Blizzard: HTML5 video and H.264 - what history tells us and why we're standing with the web
Blizzard: HTML5 video and H.264 - what history tells us and why we're standing with the web
I guess the answer depends on how likely you think it is that Mozilla's
stance on Ogg Vorbis/Theora will eventually win over other browser vendors
and/or or major content publishers like Youtube.
Blizzard: HTML5 video and H.264 - what history tells us and why we're standing with the web
They won't win. At least not with the approach they are taking.
Making it difficult for users to add H.264 support is a antifeature. They
are intentionally making their program do things most people don't want it
to do in order to forward a specific political viewpoint.
I don't have a problem with political viewpoints or trying to advance a
issue through software, but to do in the manner that Firefox/Mozilla folks
are doing it is just shooting themselves in the foot.
If they use native codecs for systems they port to.. such as DirectShow,
Gstreamer, and Quicktime then the lack of H.264 support (Windows XP does
not have H.264 support) is not something that they have to burden on
themselves. Then it becomes the fact that H.264 licensing is shit, not that
Mozilla has a crusade against it.
Then in addition they can bundle encoding and decoding codecs into the
native systems for Theora.
One of the biggest hurdles for Theora Ogg is the fact that nobody has
support for it in the client. If you download and install Firefox, which
most people are doing, then bundling Theora support to get installed into
the native media framework's system will mean that a huge portion of the
audience can actually view and create content in that codec.
That is something that has not happened at all yet for any open source
codec.. whether it's Ogg Vorbis, Ogg Speex, Flac, or Ogg Theora. They can
make it simple for other applications to support it as well as
providing easy to use encoding software for popular websites uploads. Which
is something nobody does right now; since nobody wants to pay the licenses
for the software.
That way they can promote Theora by making it easy to use rather then
trying to make H.264 harder to use... which is not going to work because
Opera, Safari, Chrome, and eventually IE will make using H.264 easy.
Blizzard: HTML5 video and H.264 - what history tells us and why we're standing with the web
> are intentionally making their program do things most people don't want
> it to do in order to forward a specific political viewpoint.
> providing easy to use encoding software for popular websites uploads.
Blizzard: HTML5 video and H.264 - what history tells us and why we're standing with the web
> > They are intentionally making their program do things most people don't
> > want it to do in order to forward a specific political viewpoint.
> system codec frameworks, are features that we have chosen to not add,
> features that would require major engineering effort to create and
> support, given we need faithful adherence to the HTML5 spec.
Blizzard: HTML5 video and H.264 - what history tells us and why we're standing with the web
enormous liability for everyone involved.
possibility of a legal decoder with paid up royalties for H.264 even if in
practice it'll likely be ffmpeg that people actually use ;)
FFmpeg vs. MPEG-LA royalties
FFmpeg vs. MPEG-LA royalties
you said, they'd have to pay for the license themselves for one. Outsourcing
decoding to system APIs get's around that.
distribution rights that the MPL gives you. You would need to pay the MPEG-
LA to distribute any modified version of the Gecko engine.
FFmpeg vs. MPEG-LA royalties
> though. As you said, they'd have to pay for the license themselves for
> one. Outsourcing decoding to system APIs get's around that.
> redistribution rights that the MPL gives you. You would need to pay
> the MPEG-LA to distribute any modified version of the Gecko engine.
FFmpeg vs. MPEG-LA royalties
would make it easier for individuals to sneak around the patent restrictions
but that's exactly the sort of thing Mozilla don't want to enable. Yes they
could do this, and it doesn't seem unreasonable for them to do it. It doesn't
result in them shipping an H.264 enabled product though.
Mozilla or predict their lawyers own views. However it seems clear that
section 3.6 of the MPL provides you with redistribution rights of modified and
unmodified executables.
derivative of a Covered Work then presumably they would need to pursue a
non-standard license with the MPEG-LA. The standard license and fee
structure does not cover redistribution.
FFmpeg vs. MPEG-LA royalties
FFmpeg vs. MPEG-LA royalties
You can of course use FFmpeg and pay the MPEG-LA if you are so inclined. There are companies that do it. The MPEG-LA could not care less which implementation is used.
Mozilla could use a system FFmpeg just like Chrome does. No patent liabilities would be incurred on Mozilla.
FFmpeg vs. MPEG-LA royalties
> > inclined. There are companies that do it. The MPEG-LA could not
> > care less which implementation is used.
> whole business has significant implications for Free Software
> implementations of Web technologies.
> > liabilities would be incurred on Mozilla.
> licence covers Google, naturally, and Google's "evangelists" insist
> that they're not violating the licensing terms of FFmpeg even
> according to the spirit of those terms.
FFmpeg vs. MPEG-LA royalties
So that's the argument, is it? Just pay up?
I never said anything of the sort. I just had to counter the nonsense claim that Fluendo codecs are in any way more "legal" than those from FFmpeg.There are people who redistribute Mozilla software, you know, and the whole business has significant implications for Free Software implementations of Web technologies.
Spare me the condescending tone please.Google is violating neither the letter nor the spirit of FFmpeg's license. What gives you such weird ideas?
FFmpeg vs. MPEG-LA royalties
> > claim that Fluendo codecs are in any way more "legal" than those from
> > FFmpeg.
> software, then you more or less have to advocate that the Mozilla
> organisation pays up: they aren't going to get away with distributing
> the software as a US-based organisation without doing so. The
> alternative is that Mozilla doesn't incorporate such technologies.
> distributed software as not being "legal" and to undermine the licensing
> terms of Free Software. The ways to get around this include campaigning
> for an end to software patents and avoidance of encumbered technologies
> until the former objective is achieved.
> > > the whole business has significant implications for Free Software
> > > implementations of Web technologies.
> choice of either being pursued by an aggressive patent cartel or not
> distributing an application, all because encumbered technology was
> embedded in a Free Software application, will not choose the former
> option regardless of any insistence that the licensing fees are optional.
Then we shall have to switch to low-profile distributors for our free software then.
> > license. What gives you such weird ideas?
FFmpeg vs. MPEG-LA royalties
Why? Because you say so even though the MPEG-LA licensing terms disagree?
Avoidance is not viable when everything except "Hello World!" is patented, which is the situation we are in now...
VLC, MPlayer and FFmpeg are not high-profile distributors? It seems that
Then we shall have to switch to low-profile distributors for our free software then.
A patent license from the MPEG-LA does not in any way interact with the LGPL. How would it? If Google has an MPEG-LA license and passes along FFmpeg to you it can only do so under the full terms of the LGPL. And this is what Google is doing: Distributing FFmpeg with all the rights that we passed along to them attached, as specified by the LGPL.
Note that this is how both FFmpeg and the Software Freedom Law Center see the issue. I never felt there was anything to clarify there, but apparently people are willing to take random quotes from random people as facts just because they are reprinted at lwn.net...
FFmpeg vs. MPEG-LA royalties
> isn't clear whether that licence covers the whole spectrum of
> distribution given that Free Software doesn't distinguish between
> "personal consumer use" and "providers".
> > that Then we shall have to switch to low-profile distributors for
> > our free software then.
> projects is no guarantee that they will not be pursued in the future.
> And not only does the organisation producing a Web browser with 30% or
> so market share have to worry about this, but they also have to worry
> about the effects on those who redistribute their software under the
> much more high-profile brand that they maintain.
> would need to be sniffed out by the cartel's enforcement department, but
> one selling products with Firefox branding would be very visible indeed.
> > the LGPL. How would it? If Google has an MPEG-LA license and passes
> > along FFmpeg to you it can only do so under the full terms of the
> > LGPL. And this is what Google is doing: Distributing FFmpeg with
> > all the rights that we passed along to them attached, as specified
> > by the LGPL.
> to be permissible under those terms. But given what I've read about
> segmenting the recipients of the software (from the summary, above),
> it's quite possible that Google claim that Chrome is for "personal
> consumer use" whilst anyone else who repackages Chrome (as Chromium,
> for example) is not their responsibility. Thus, the latter group are
> burdened with dealing with the cartel when they seek to distribute,
> rather than use, the software, particularly if it turns out that the
> software is intended for "personal computer use" or for "providers".
> "insurance". No-one is being forced to buy such insurance, but in
> practical terms a set of extra obligations are being added to certain
> recipients of the software. Whether people manage to sneak around
> section 11 of LGPLv2.1 or not on this basis - and I am reminded of the
> whole Microsoft/Novell covenant scheme - the lasting impression is that
> various principles of Free Software have been undermined.
> > see the issue. I never felt there was anything to clarify there, but
> > apparently people are willing to take random quotes from random
> > people as facts just because they are reprinted at lwn.net...
> it's merely a case of sour grapes that the GStreamer people are
> publishing advice from the FSF that conveniently supports their position.
> agreement with the cartel is compatible, but as I note above, even if
> our trust is well-placed - that Google have not technically done "evil"
> - the consequences may not be so benign.
FFmpeg vs. MPEG-LA royalties
I think the main confusion stems from not differentiating between patent licensors and patent licensees. Google is just a licensee. A patent license is not theirs to hand out.
This is completely in line with what I am saying. Where do you see anything that does not support my position?
If you take a license which doesn't allow others to distribute original or modified versions of libmad practicing the same patent claims as the version you distribute, then you may not distribute at all.
FFmpeg vs. MPEG-LA royalties
> > patent licensors and patent licensees. Google is just a licensee.
> > A patent license is not theirs to hand out.
> party. Google acknowledges such obligations by obtaining a patent
> licence - you or I may refuse to do so - and it is this acknowledgement
> which acts as an admission that recipients of the very code they
> distribute may also have to obtain a patent licence. This undermines
> Free Software precisely because it opens the affected works up to
> potentially limitless claims from anyone who feels that their
> "intellectual property" is being infringed, and the copyright licence
> is then no longer the ultimate arbiter of the rights or privileges it
> describes.
Not talking about software patents does not make them any less harmful.
> > anything that does not support my position?
> or modified versions of libmad practicing the same patent claims as the
> version you distribute, then you may not distribute at all."
FFmpeg vs. MPEG-LA royalties
I would have a hard time obtaining a patent licence grant only for myself and then distributing Free Software affected by such a grant to others, but I guess my own standards of behaviour are different from those of others.
Again: no problem for us. Apparently Google is not bound by such an agreement. And if they are, it's their problem.
Which brings us back to the patent licensing controversy where Google's licence covers Google, naturally, and Google's "evangelists" insist that they're not violating the licensing terms of FFmpeg even according to the spirit of those terms.
FFmpeg vs. MPEG-LA royalties
> myself and then distributing Free Software affected by such a grant to
> others, but I guess my own standards of behaviour are different from
> those of others.
> here.
> licence covers Google, naturally, and Google's "evangelists" insist that
> they're not violating the licensing terms of FFmpeg even according to
> the spirit of those terms.
> if the FSF's legal opinion were to stand on this matter, one would have
> to reassess Google's position beyond the mere spirit of those terms.
> includes yourself,
> why would the cartel want to prevent the proliferation of software which
> is, according to them, subject to their licensing programme? It's a nice
> way of generating business.
FFmpeg vs. MPEG-LA royalties
So you want them to get a patent license valid for every person on earth? That basically means buying out all those patents. Do you think such a thing would be available at all? At a price Google would be willing and able to pay?
What do you call the "FSF's legal opinion" on the matter?
Your bitterness does FFmpeg a disservice. We're a big part of the free software computing stack, thus making Desktop Linux viable. In this day and age, computing without multimedia support is unthinkable.
FFmpeg vs. MPEG-LA royalties
FFmpeg vs. MPEG-LA royalties
Sure, you can claim that people aren't obliged to pay up to the cartel, but that's like claiming people don't have to pay their road tax or their television licence.
This is a good comparison in fact. Nobody would think about banning cars and television worldwide just because in some parts of the world you have to pay a tax to use them.FFmpeg vs. MPEG-LA royalties
be able to include it at all. Using ffmpeg directly is not a option for
them.
FFmpeg vs. MPEG-LA royalties
FFmpeg vs. MPEG-LA royalties
FFmpeg vs. MPEG-LA royalties
FFmpeg vs. MPEG-LA royalties
big difference You seem to have left out SUSE as well
FFmpeg vs. MPEG-LA royalties
> There is a big difference.
FFmpeg vs. MPEG-LA royalties
decoder.
multimedia/ffmpeg.git;a=blob_plain;f=debian/README.Debian;hb=9f02f559
4fe25fdda9e409f987841b3be2272db4
>H263, H264, MPEG2 video, MPEG4 and MS-MPEG4. No *decoders* are
>disabled in any the ffmpeg package!
FFmpeg vs. MPEG-LA royalties
> encoder not the decoder.
FFmpeg vs. MPEG-LA royalties
FFmpeg vs. MPEG-LA royalties
FFmpeg vs. MPEG-LA royalties
FFmpeg vs. MPEG-LA royalties
http://www.0xdeadbeef.com/weblog/2010/01/html5-video-and-...
FFmpeg vs. MPEG-LA royalties
FFmpeg vs. MPEG-LA royalties
FFmpeg vs. MPEG-LA royalties
> profile than VLC.
> have a patent license just because we don't "sell" Firefox. You don't
> get a license just by meeting the terms, you have to explicitly enter
> into an agreement. So I suggest you prove your point by obtaining a free
> license from the MPEG-LA to distribute a large number of units of a
> product with a price of zero. Let me know when you've got that.
> like us? You'd have us bet everything on the long-term goodwill of
> the MPEG-LA. That would be extremely foolish.
FFmpeg vs. MPEG-LA royalties
> a finger. Why would they?
> neither does FFmpeg) because you don't qualify for requiring one:
> http://www.mpegla.com/main/programs/AVC/Pages/Agreement.aspx
http://www.microsoft.com/Interop/osp/default.mspx
> sued. There is a multitude of other software patents that apply to
> Mozilla software. Why is this case in any way special?
> downloads for Firefox or offer a crippled version instead. Their loss.
FFmpeg vs. MPEG-LA royalties
> > moved a finger. Why would they?
> as soon as anyone with money wants to distribute VLC or FFmpeg, then
> they could be a target.
> > neither does FFmpeg) because you don't qualify for requiring one:
> > http://www.mpegla.com/main/programs/AVC/Pages/Agreement.aspx
> you quote specific text that implies certain distributors of codecs
> don't require a license?
> > version instead. Their loss.
> even worse, since we would have to return to our free-codec efforts
> having lost time and credibility.
> providers. Even if H.264 decoding was entirely unencumbered, having
> to pay MPEG-LA taxes to publish video on the Web is unacceptable.
FFmpeg vs. MPEG-LA royalties
> wants insurance policies and buys them, while I am not.
> apply to you, isn't that enough?
> submarine patents on Theora. What did you find? Why was the study never
> published? If you found nothing, there surely wouldn't be a reason to
> keep mum about it, don't you agree?
FFmpeg vs. MPEG-LA royalties
> > that wants insurance policies and buys them, while I am not.
> hundreds of millions of users, and you have not.
> and fighting threats to the open Web.
> > submarine patents on Theora. What did you find? Why was the study
> > never published? If you found nothing, there surely wouldn't be a
> > reason to keep mum about it, don't you agree?
> about it. All I can do is point to our actions in distributing Theora.
FFmpeg vs. MPEG-LA royalties
FFmpeg vs. MPEG-LA royalties
> > like us? You'd have us bet everything on the long-term goodwill of
> > the MPEG-LA. That would be extremely foolish.
> downloads for Firefox or offer a crippled version instead. Their loss.
> patent contraband :-)
FFmpeg vs. MPEG-LA royalties
> patent contraband :-)
> installing unauthorized software was impossible. All software would have
> to be approved by some centralized authority, who would be an easy target
> for patent litigation. In that case, distributing free software that used
> patented codecs could easily become impossible.
FFmpeg vs. MPEG-LA royalties
FFmpeg vs. MPEG-LA royalties
Blizzard: HTML5 video and H.264 - what history tells us and why we're standing with the web
system H.264 codecs
Blizzard: HTML5 video and H.264 - what history tells us and why we're standing with the web
want to do something often go and hide in. You are exploiting your position
as an expert in the community to justify your own bias to people who aren't
not intimately involved in the details.
solution that's a laudable goal but they shouldn't hide behind qualitative and
short-termist argument like how hard implementation and maintenance will
be at the same time.
quicktime into Gecko? I've not seen any developer forks with that functionality
so I suppose not.
Blizzard: HTML5 video and H.264 - what history tells us and why we're standing with the web
Has anyone even attempted to integrate gstreamer, ffmpeg, directshow or quicktime into Gecko?
Songibrd uses GStreamer on all platforms, and they spent quite a bit of time and money to make it work well on Win32/OS X.
Blizzard: HTML5 video and H.264 - what history tells us and why we're standing with the web
http://robert.accettura.com/blog/2010/01/21/youtube-html5...
http://robert.accettura.com/blog/2009/07/06/debating-ogg-...
http://weblogs.mozillazine.org/roc/archives/2009/06/direc...
https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=422540
"GStreamer backend for HTML5 video element" which seems well underway.
gstreamer decoders
> it for the gstreamer backend.
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gstreamer decoders
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> > a thing already exists and is in widespread use
> use Fluendo's codec.
> > gstreamer. In exchange for money they take away your freedom."
> you don't get sued. With software patents, you're screwed either way.
> Pretty sure Fluendo *can't* ship a Free codec; it's almost certainly
> in the MPEG-LA license terms.
> Shipping known-patented code without a license is tasteless IMHO.
> Same as selling your friend stolen goods.
> source codecs for their FAQ; we'll see if anything comes of it.
> So, really, either way your freedom is gone.
gstreamer decoders
> allowed to use or even distribute H.264 decoding software are completely
> made up. Check the MPEG-LA licensing terms yourself:
> http://www.mpegla.com/main/programs/AVC/Pages/Agreement.aspx
> They only speak of selling products, not of using or distributing software.
gstreamer decoders
> > allowed to use or even distribute H.264 decoding software are
> > completely made up. Check the MPEG-LA licensing terms yourself:
> > http://www.mpegla.com/main/programs/AVC/Pages/Agreement.aspx
> > They only speak of selling products, not of using or distributing
> > software.
> doesn't have a license.
> usage, that's too bad for you.
gstreamer decoders
> single entity that distributes technology that may infringe on their
> patents.
> circumstances.
gstreamer decoders
Sent: Tuesday, January 26, 2010 5:51 PM
To: QandA
Subject: Free and Open Source implementations of MPEG-4 Visual?
Hello.
I read through the FAQ and can't find out if Free and Open Source
developers and products need to license the MPEG-LA patents for
MPEG-4 Visual. It was alleged (http://lwn.net/Articles/370985/)
in a comment that royalties are only necessary for products sold,
not for free products. Is this correct? Could you please comment
on the licensing options for Free (e.g. GPL) and open source
implementations of MPEG-4 Visual, specifically h.264? What about
downstream users/developers/distributors of Free and open source
software?
I'll post your reply to the above comment list when I've received it.
Thank you very much,
Subject: RE: Free and Open Source implementations of MPEG-4 Visual?
Dear Joseph,
Thank you for your message. We appreciate you contacting MPEG LA
regarding our Licenses and I will be happy to assist you.
offered by MPEG LA are provided as a convenience and an alternative to
negotiating direct licenses with many individual patent owners. While
MPEG LA offers the Licenses to the marketplace, it is the patent owners
participating in our Licenses (not MPEG LA) who establish the License
terms and royalty rates.
contributing more than 900 patents that are essential for use of the
MPEG-4 Visual (Part 2) Standard. Our AVC Patent Portfolio License
includes 25 patent owners contributing more than 1,000 patents that are
essential for use of AVC/H.264 Standard ("MPEG-4 Part 10").
manufacturers to make and sell MPEG-4 Visual/AVC Products and (b) for
such MPEG-4 Visual/AVC Products to be used to deliver MPEG-4 Visual/AVC
Video content. The Licenses were set up this way so as to apportion the
royalty at points in the product/service chain where value is received,
and also to not place the full royalty burden on one party in the chain
(e.g., an encoder maker).
paid on all MPEG-4 Visual/AVC products of like functionality, and the
Licenses do not make any distinction for products offered for free
(whether open source or otherwise). But, I do note that the Licenses
addresses this issue by including annual minimum thresholds below which
no royalties are payable in order to encourage adoption and minimize the
impact on lower volume users. In addition, the Licenses also include
maximum annual royalty caps to provide more cost predictability for
larger volume users.
by End Users, anyone in the product chain has liability if an end
product is unlicensed. Therefore, a royalty paid for an end product by
the end product supplier would render the product licensed in the hands
of the End User, but where a royalty has not been paid, such a product
remains unlicensed and any downstream users/distributors would have
liability.
licensed suppliers. In that regard, we maintain lists of Licensees in
Good Standing to each of our Licenses at http://www.mpegla.com.
I hope this explanation is helpful. If you have further questions or
would like additional information, please feel free to contact me
directly.
Director, Global Licensing
MPEG LA
5425 Wisconsin Avenue
Suite 801
Chevy Chase, MD 20815
U.S.A.
Tel: (+1)-301-986-6660
Fax: (+1)-301-986-8575
Email: aharkness@mpegla.com
http://www.mpegla.com
gstreamer decoders
281. Google Inc.
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==========MY REPLY==========
Allen,
questions:
>In response to your specific question, under the Licenses royalties are
>paid on all MPEG-4 Visual/AVC products of like functionality, and the
>Licenses do not make any distinction for products offered for free
>(whether open source or otherwise). But, I do note that the Licenses
>addresses this issue by including annual minimum thresholds below which
>no royalties are payable in order to encourage adoption and minimize the
>impact on lower volume users. In addition, the Licenses also include
on whether it's monetary or downloads is more than I have now.
>larger volume users.
the source code is modifiable and re-distributable? Are downloads
from the licensee only covered?
1) A corporation has a customized (i.e. modified) build of Google's
Chrome (which includes an implmentation of ffmpeg), and then
re-distributes this modified binary to all of the workstations at
the company. Is this covered by Google's license?
these internally to its workstations. Is this covered by Google's license?
==========END REPLY==========
gstreamer decoders
> licensed method.
gstreamer decoders
the hope they'd wake up and say 'ffmpeg? what's that? stop, now!', I think
his not caring about free software goes without saying. Or, rather, given
a choice between free software and his being right, his being right would
come first every time.
is in my experience restricted to males. Generally young ones.)
gstreamer decoders
the hope they'd wake up and say 'ffmpeg? what's that? stop, now!', I think
his not caring about free software goes without saying."
gstreamer decoders
been ignored by the MPEG LA because they were beneath their notice had
proven correct, your own actions would have done nothing less than bring
another patent attack on free software. Well done.
gstreamer decoders
"
Posted Jan 26, 2010 21:32 UTC (Tue) by roc (subscriber, #30627) [Link]
I guess they're not important enough to be sued by MPEG-LA.
"
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under those circumstances. (Sanity is hard enough to maintain.)
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legal trouble
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has to religion: that is, none to speak of.
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MPEG LA not to know about it. But *if* the supposition (bandied about by
several here including IIRC Trelane) were true that ffmpeg had been
ignored because it was too ignorable or not a revenue generator or
something, then Trelane had just poked a dragon (or at least a troll) with
a stick. This is generally considered a bad idea, even if it turns out
that the dragon knows who you are and doesn't want to eat you today.
gstreamer decoders
ffmpeg for patent-reasons would be pretty much poking not the bear, but the
bee-hive of pissed of techno-geeks everywhere.
business speak, roughly the same as low-income) "in order to encourage
adoption". I would assume that for peace:s sake, MPEG LA is avoiding
confrontation to much provide the patent opposition with too much fuel for
their fire, and further de-rail wide-spread adoption.
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>is in my experience restricted to males. Generally young ones.)
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once.
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> > contributions to gstreamer years ago. They are a common and
> > garden-variety proprietary software shop now."
> isn't entirely accurate, although it's not entirely inaccurate either.
> My information was apparently out of date.
http://www.ohloh.net/p/gstreamer/contributors/14925011355589
> > beyond me, but hey..."
> and informative post. This sentence took that work and overshadowed it
> by jerkishness.
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Fluendo vs. FFmpeg
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> on whether it's monetary or downloads is more than I have now.
From http://www.mpegla.com/main/programs/avc/Documents/AVC_Ter...
units per year = no royalty"
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http://www.mpegla.com/main/programs/AVC/Pages/Licensees.aspx
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End User use of H.264
End User use of H.264
End User use of H.264
End User use of H.264
End User use of H.264
"low volume threshold" of 100.000 units, so it would be interesting to see
if there are any hidden fixed costs. Please post if you do decide to try it.
Slashdot for each and every Open-Source user to do so (nomatter whether it
will be granted or not), would probably give them a very tough week in their
sales department. ;)
gstreamer decoders
> contributing more than 900 patents that are essential for use of the
> MPEG-4 Visual (Part 2) Standard. Our AVC Patent Portfolio License
> includes 25 patent owners contributing more than 1,000 patents that are
> essential for use of AVC/H.264 Standard ("MPEG-4 Part 10").
Microsoft MPEG-2 patent infringement lawsuit
Microsoft MPEG-2 patent infringement lawsuit
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> > gstreamer. In exchange for money they take away your freedom.
> > It's tasteless."
> is forcing you to give us money. I don't see how offering an option for
> those people that want a legal properly licensed codec takes away freedom.
> It's hollow rhetoric.
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licensor, not subject court injunction), then you can
distribute just fine without compromising the free software licence on the
code. This is true regardless of whether or not the code is subject to patents,
for you are in the same position as the recipient, which is all the GPL licence
requires.
you do so because you are protecting *yourself* from legal risk - not because
the licence requires it. It is a misunderstanding to claim the licence is the
barrier, as you could happily distribute away and not violate any free software
licences, given the above.
in with my understanding of the GPL and patent issues (IANAL, etc).
must secure a blanket agreement that covers all your down stream users. If
the patent only applies in certain countries, then note that the GPL allows
code to be distributed with geographic exceptions set by the rights holder,
while (it seems, but am not certain) remaining GPL compatible.
perhaps the FSF?) have tried to raise is the question of whether patent
encumbered technologies should be resisted by promoting other, less
encumbered technologies. This is an interesting one, but it is implied per se
by licensing obstacles to distribution on the code.
gstreamer decoders
patented tech does not rest on there being any immediate licensing problems
with implementations of such software.
gstreamer decoders
gstreamer decoders
other unlicensed practitioners of patents distributing potentially patented
code.
v2 and v3 text to find the precise text that contradicts you, I find you may
well be right. I.e. I can no longer support this earlier paragraph of mine:
must secure a blanket agreement that covers all your down stream users. If
the patent only applies in certain countries, then note that the GPL allows
code to be distributed with geographic exceptions set by the rights holder,
while (it seems, but am not certain) remaining GPL compatible."
Rather it seems that, as you say, it only affects licensees who promise the
patent holder to try restrict those they distribute to. Which, it appears, is not
the case for the MPEG-LA agreement.
gstreamer decoders
> distribution of software, you need to give the same rights to your
> recipients as you have, and they need to be able to redistribute with
> the same rights as well.
> legally safe to ship ffmpeg/xine/vlc/mplayer).
> ffmpeg is illegal, or that we try to take away anyone's freedom.
> are stronger when you don't put words in the mouth of the other.
gstreamer decoders
> > distribution of software, you need to give the same rights to your
> > recipients as you have, and they need to be able to redistribute with
> > the same rights as well.
> getting the software. You received FFmpeg as (L)GPL from us, you have to
> pass it along as (L)GPL again. The (L)GPL says nothing about a contract
> with the MPEG LA.
[...]
If you cannot distribute so as to satisfy simultaneously your obligations under this License and any other pertinent obligations, then as a consequence you may not distribute the Library at all. For example, if a patent license would not permit royalty-free redistribution of the Library by all those who receive copies directly or indirectly through you, then the only way you could satisfy both it and this License would be to refrain entirely from distribution of the Library.
gstreamer decoders
you have *no* agreement with any patent licensors. This is perfectly
acceptable, at least wrt the licence.
have blanket downstream licences to all potentially applicable patents. The only
thing refusing to distribute protects against is legal risk to the *distributor*, and
a lesser risk to the recipient from the *patent holder* - not the licensor of the
GPL software!
(L)GPL vs. patents
> (quotes from GPLv2.1, but other versions have similar obligations):
> [.. continue quote from the preamble..]
> obligations under this License and any other pertinent obligations,
> then as a consequence you may not distribute the Library at all. For
> example, if a patent license would not permit royalty-free
> redistribution of the Library by all those who receive copies directly
> or indirectly through you, then the only way you could satisfy both it
> and this License would be to refrain entirely from distribution of the
> Library.
(L)GPL vs. patents
> > redistribution of the Library by all those who receive copies directly
> > or indirectly through you, then the only way you could satisfy both it
> > and this License would be to refrain entirely from distribution of the
> > Library.
>
> This just means that other contracts do not excuse you from the obligations of the LGPL. [...] Downstream recipients are not affected.
(L)GPL vs. patents
(L)GPL vs. patents
seen it
(L)GPL vs. patents
(L)GPL vs. patents
you are repeatedly going to refer to claims about SFLC's interpretation it
would be beneficial to get it in writing as well
(L)GPL vs. patents
(L)GPL vs. patents
copyright holder and I made no claims about FSF's interpretations You are
confusing me with someone else
(L)GPL vs. patents
implementing that patent even when the licence is not passed on? That
doesn't seem to in concordance with the GPL.. Though I can't tell if you're
claiming that, or if you're just talking about the rights of the downstreams.
than risk from patent holder) and able to distribute just fine, I agree with you.
(L)GPL vs. patents
(L)GPL vs. patents
Blizzard: HTML5 video and H.264 - what history tells us and why we're standing with the web
Blizzard: HTML5 video and H.264 - what history tells us and why we're standing with the web
> > are intentionally making their program do things most people don't want
> > it to do in order to forward a specific political viewpoint.
> system codec frameworks, are features that we have chosen to not add,
> features that would require major engineering effort to create and
> support, given we need faithful adherence to the HTML5 spec. If you don't
> believe this, you can take the Firefox source and show us how easy it is.
Blizzard: HTML5 video and H.264 - what history tells us and why we're standing with the web
embedding technology, HTML5 vs Flash. In the other dimension you have the
video codec, H.264 v Ogg Theora.
win, regardless of the codec dimension?
supports H.264, whereas it does not support Ogg Theora. The video codecs
which Flash is deemed to support is determined solely by one
vendor, for all practical purposes[1]. So in a world where Flash is the dominant
video embedding technology you will struggle to get the codec changed.
Whereas with HTML5 you have a greater number of vendors who can offer
more codec support, including a very well established open-source effort.
of codec, you will get more freedom to change the world in the other
dimension (the codec dimension).
-> HTML5 + H.264
-> HTML5 + H.264 + Ogg Theora
-> HTML5 + Ogg Theora
HTML5, as that just keeps Flash in place, which keeps the codec dimensions
'stuck' to the H.264 pole.
name of the free video codec it uses - VP3?)
kept well behind.
Ogg vs. Theora
> know the name of the free video codec it uses - VP3?)
Ogg vs. Theora
above with "Avi Theora"?
Ogg vs. Theora
even any DirectShow filters other than ffmpeg that support it and even that
has trouble keeping the audio in sync.
Ogg vs. Theora
Ogg vs. Theora
Ogg vs. Theora
Ogg vs. Theora
much (any) pirated video, that I've never actually seen anything in a
Matroska container? (At least, not knowingly. I've never encountered an
odd-looking video file and run file(1) or similar tool on it and been
told, hey, this is Matroska.)
Ogg vs. Theora
Blizzard: HTML5 video and H.264 - what history tells us and why we're standing with the web
plugin, Java plugin or HTML5 video."
as far as I can tell video-capable Silverlight just is not playable on Linux
(Moonlight doesn't get to implement those closed codecs). Netflix is the
major user of Silverlight video, but I've run into a couple others in the
wild too.
Blizzard: HTML5 video and H.264 - what history tells us and why we're standing with the web
http://weblogs.mozillazine.org/roc/archives/2010/01/activ...
Blizzard: HTML5 video and H.264 - what history tells us and why we're standing with the web
Blizzard: HTML5 video and H.264 - what history tells us and why we're standing with the web
Blizzard: HTML5 video and H.264 - what history tells us and why we're standing with the web
Dirac
Dirac
Software patents don't exist in most of the world
Software patents don't exist in most of the world
Remember back in the bad old days when another kind of math was illegal in some countries, back then there were "international" versions of many packages with all the crypto features and restricted versions for the US.
Software patents don't exist in most of the world
http://weblogs.mozillazine.org/bz/archives/020400.html
Software patents don't exist in most of the world
MPEG LA AVC/H.264 patent license text
MPEG-4 VISUAL PATENT PORTFOLIO LICENSE
MPEG LA AVC/H.264 patent license text
MPEG LA AVC/H.264 patent license text
Pretty much backs up the assertion above that it's based on units, not sales for codecs.
MPEG LA AVC/H.264 patent license text
MPEG LA AVC/H.264 patent license text
H.264 vs. Theora vs. Dirac comparison
Blizzard: HTML5 video and H.264 - what history tells us and why we're standing with the web
Theora patents
http://www.google.com/patents/about?id=ieIVAAAAEBAJ
http://www.google.com/patents/about?id=zGWBAAAAEBAJ
Theora patents
Theora patents
Theora patents
Theora patents
your claims and you will find that its hard to get lawyers to say anything
in public about this sort of analysis in general
Theora patents
Theora patents
is no analysis at all other than a bunch of links) either I would not trust
anyone not trained to do the work to get good results and your try if it was
actually one is ample proof of that If you want anyone to take you seriously
substantiate why these links mean anything at all or get someone like SFLC to
verify your claims
specific details in public is because their analysis can be used as a weapon
against the case they are trying to make and I am sure you will find out more
when you try and get SFLC to publish their interpretations if it is actually
specific
Theora patents
Theora patents
unsubstantiated FUD Anybody can throw such links and if you make a claim
that a technology is patent encumbered the burden of proof is on you and not
on anyone else
analysis and their actions on distributing the codec is enough to show their
decision and your claim that the only reason not to publish it because there
is infringement is plain wrong and shows zero understanding of the issues
involved
Theora patents
involved', only alluding to them. (Also, your . key has apparently failed
in the last few days. Sentences are much easier to read with the
occasional one in.)
Theora patents
for now a few important keys are not working The issues involved were
described in the link and you could read that without having me repeat it
Theora patents
an opinion could publish it, no?
patents risks and patent risks to distributors are not quite clear (it seems from
this discussion anyway). E.g. a possible issue here, I wonder, is that publishing
such legal opinion might help clarify risk generally, but not be helpful to the risks
faced by the publishing organisation?
Theora patents
opinions especially when the issue is patents If the other party knows the
arguments you are making then you are putting all your cards on the table
and they can make their counter arguments much more stronger and sometimes
twist your arguments against you
police as well and it is not because you have something to hide
I cannot help but post Mike Melanson's take on
HTML 5 Video, the codecs used therein and how it competes with Flash. Humorous quote:
Mike Melanson on HTML 5 video
Another aspect I have to appreciate about the debate surrounding HTML5 video is the way that it brings out the positive spirit in people. Online discussions are normally overwhelmingly negative. But advocates of the HTML5/Xiph approach truly believe this could all work out: If Apple decides to adopt the Xiph stack, and if some benevolent hardware company would churn out custom ASICs for decoding Xiph codecs, and if those ASICs were adopted in next quarters array of mobile computing devices and netbooks, and if Google transcodes their zillobytes of YouTube videos to the Xiph stack, and if Google throws the switch and forces the 60% of IE-using stragglers to either change browsers or go without YouTube, and if Google thereby forgoes many opportunities to monetize their videos, then absolutely! HTML5 video could totally unseat Flash video.
Ironically Mike is both the main person working on the Linux port of Adobe Flash and the original author of the VP3 spec on which Theora was based. He always had a weak spot in his heart for fringe multimedia formats, but he surely had no idea what kind of genie he was letting out of the bottle there...
Mike Melanson on HTML 5 video
was based on an no good, brain-dead format that On2 only open sourced
because no-one would pay money for it, they're actually insulting the main guy
doing Flash on Linux. Funny how these thing go.
Broadcom and Xiph to create a royalty-free audio codec standard for internet
applications either:
his experiences developing Flash for Linux?
