[Ffmpeg-devel] When is planned to add ogg Theora output in ffmpeg?

[Måns Rullgård]

Patrick Aljord said:
> On 4/7/06, M?ns Rullg?rd <mru at inprovide.com> wrote:
>>
>> Patrick Aljord said:
>> > On 4/7/06, M?ns Rullg?rd <mru at inprovide.com> wrote:
>> >> It's not planned.  Basically, theora sucks, and ogg sucks more.
>> >> Patches to support ogg/theora muxing are still welcome, of course.
>> > first of all remember that theora is still alpha stuff but it's
>> > getting there.
>>
>> If by "there" you mean where other codecs were a decade ago, sure.
>>
>> > I'm sure once it's 1.0 stable it will kick other codecs ass :)
>>
>> Impossible, at least not without replacing everything but the name.
>>
>> > just like they did with vorbis.
>>
>> Vorbis is good, but by no means unique.  It shines when compared to mp3,
>> just like AAC and all other modern audio codecs also do.
>>
>> > Remember that vp6 (which is better than mpeg4)
>>
>> MPEG4 is generally considered a failed experiment.
>>
>> > is just an improved version of vp3 just like theora
>> > so there is hope. (plus mpeg4 is just an improved mpeg2 :) )
>>
>> The problem is that pretty much anything you can imagine doing by way of
>> video encoding is patented.
> this doesn't take away the fact that vp6 is a very good codec based on
> vp3, so there is chance that theora becomes great too. Plus saying
> that theora sucks  and that it needs to be rewritten shows that you
> might have a personal distate for it and that I can't argue with :).
> Theora is already usable rtp and streaming or anything, it just needs
> to mature a bit.

I don't have a personal grudge against theora or anything.  It's just that,
at any given bit rate, the visual quality it delivers is comparable to that
of MPEG1.  If that is good enough for you, fine.  It's not good enough for
me.

> As for patents, remember that vp3 (and newer) is totally mpeg code and

I don't understand what you're trying to say there.

> patent free otherwise I guess they would have sued  on2 ass a while
> ago (of course you might say that they are waiting for it become
> popular before suing but on2 has made it clear this isn't the case),
> remember that people were saying the same about vorbis but it was all
> FUD, vorbis doesn't use any mp3 patent and neither does theora . Vp3
> does use some patent, but on2 gave the right for everybody to use em.

Yes, On2 has given permission to use the vp3 related patents that it holds.
Doing anything more advanced is highly likely to infringe on some patent.
I don't like it that way at all, but a fundamentally altering the US patent
system isn't going to happen any time soon.

Besides, this patent talk is irrelevant when talking about pure visual
quality delivered by a codec.

-- 
M?ns Rullg?rd
mru at inprovide.com