MPEG LA Announces Call for Patents Essential to VP8 Video Codec

Posted Feb 13, 2011 2:23 UTC (Sun) by njs (subscriber, #40338)
In reply to: MPEG LA Announces Call for Patents Essential to VP8 Video Codec by gmaxwell
Parent article: MPEG LA Announces Call for Patents Essential to VP8 Video Codec

> Prior to engaging in this business MPEG-LA requested a review of their business plan by the DOJ, their letter outlined quite a few operating conditions which they appear to have since ignored, and the DOJ outlined a number of constraints which MPEG-LA has subsequently violated

I didn't know about that history, and it's fascinating, thank you. However, I'm not sure what operating constraints you're referring to -- all I saw in that letter was a bunch of "well, this kind of thing could be a problem, but you are awesome and wrote your license not to do that, so, yay". Probably I'm just not familiar enough with their history. (Obviously the statements you refer to are questionable, but I don't see what they have to do with the contents of that letter.)

> Even if they believe the risk to be small, taking it still requires an expenditure of resources to assess the risk and benefits, supporting my speculation that they are actually concerned about this, which was really the point that I was making.

Totally agreed.

If only someone would tell the people who keep popping up to explain how anyone who takes WebM seriously is an idiot...