RE: MP4 Player Available for Download

>MPEG-4 might eventually reach the point where licensing isn't difficult
>for those who have money to pay lawyers and purchase licenses. That still 
>leaves free software developers out of the picture.  

This is the wrong perception. Patent pools are established so that anybody
can get a license without paying a fortune to lawyers. The existing MPEG-2
patent pool charges 4 dollars (I am told) for an MPEG-2 decoder and 5
dollars (again, I am told) for an MPEG-2 encoder. No question asked if not
that there should be a fair mechanism to count the pieces.

>how many more weights does this thing need until it sinks of its own
accord?

The ship is advancing full steam, no iceberg is sight

Leonardo Chiariglione


-----Original Message-----
From: Keith Moore [mailto:moore@cs.utk.edu]
Sent: 2001 aprile domenica 16:09
To: Chiariglione Leonardo
Cc: 'Rob Lanphier'; discuss@apps.ietf.org
Subject: Re: MP4 Player Available for Download


I think the point is that it's much easier to make a standard accessible
to everyone if the standard is *designed* to minimize reliance on 
encumbered IPR.  If ISO cannot do that, that's quite unfortunate.
IETF's rules are slightly different - the organization cannot make
a determiniation about the validity of IPR, but individuals within 
IETF are free to discuss such things and make their own decisions
to contribute (or not) to a consensus based on such things.

MPEG-4 might eventually reach the point where licensing isn't difficult
for those who have money to pay lawyers and purchase licenses.  That still 
leaves free software developers out of the picture.  Experience shows that 
free software developers have often been a major force in deploying a new 
technology on the network - thus creating a market for commercial
developers, 
while providing near-zero-cost implementations to those who cannot or 
prefer not to pay for them.  Cutting out the free software developers 
therefore makes it much less likely that MPEG-4 will be widely deployed.

Of course, nobody can use MPEG-4 until the licensing issues are worked out.
Making lawyers part of the critical path for deployment of MPEG-4 doesn't 
seem wise either.

how many more weights does this thing need until it sinks of its own accord?

Keith

Received on Sunday, 1 April 2001 15:03:19 UTC