[MPlayer-dev-eng] HW for open standard video and audio formats

[Luca Barbato]

Timothy B. Terriberry wrote:
> 
> I'm sorry, I'm going to have to be the one to ask you to stop spreading
> blatant lies.
I was quite sure vorbis was patent free till somebody don't ask me to do
some research and that ended up was some vague patent claims from mp3
people and the fact MDCT is patented. If you think that isn't true or
doesn't cover vorbis please tell me how, maybe I searched the wrong
places or I got wrong information, I'm NOT a lawyer just a concerned
developer.

> 
> I don't know nearly as much about the Vorbis side of things, but I do
> know that Real sponsored a patent search against the MPEG patent lists,
> done by actual patent attorneys, and found that Vorbis did not infringe.
> 

Could you please point me a paper about that? Something I could use if
somebody like DTS inc come up against my university if I start some
projects about vorbis?

> Does this mean that there is no chance Vorbis infringes on any patents?
> Absolutely not. I fully agree with you that the current US patent system
> makes such a determination impossible. However, numerous major game
> companies ship games using Vorbis (including Microsoft), as well a
> number of consumer electronic manufacturers. Anyone else using Vorbis is
> at no more risk of being sued than they are. The same cannot be said of
> formats which not only have patents specifically designed to cover
> aspects of their algorithms, but a licensing authority set up for the
> express purpose of collecting royalties for use of that codec.
> 

I know that those patents are VAGUE and won't hold on scrutiny, but you
need money to have that, so is quite easy that somebody with enough
money and/or a large patent portfolio can ignore the potential issue,
isn't the same for small staff/groups.

I'm just a guy that likes vorbis and got afraid after some days of research.


> On the Theora side: Theora does _not_ use the exact same algorithms as
> MPEG1/2. It does use DCT+MC like MPEG1/2 does, but so does H.264, and no
> one in their right mind would claim those algorithms are "exactly the
> same". Half-pel motion interpolation is done differently, coded block
> flags and macro block modes are done differently, DCT coefficients are
> quantized differently, and tokenized in a completely different manner,
> and stored in the bitstream differently as well.

Basically same VAGUE patents that cover mpeg cover theora, isn't it?
Again, it won't hold in court but courts cost money not many people has.

> 
> VP3, on which Theora is largely based, _is_ in fact covered by patents.
> It was distributed as a commercial product by On2 Technologies before
> they donated to Xiph. However, it comes with an irrevocable license to
> any patents On2 might hold that cover it. So again, you assume no more
> risk of liability than On2 ever did.
> 

The main concern here is about non On2 owned patents. Again, is there a
document that assures that theora and vp3 are royalty free since all
patents that cover them are provided my the holders?

> So, to address your specific claims:
> 
> The MP3 patents were reviewed by an actual patent lawyer, who gave us an
> opinion that Vorbis was not infringing. Feel free to fund your own legal
> opinion if this is not good enough for you.

Point me some documents, please, those would help me a bit to keep
vorbis in my project (I'm still pushing for adding it on tecnical merit
of vorbis, having a document that would more reliably keep the patent
ghost away would be a boon).

> 
> I'd question if you even read the 6,882,685 patent. It covers the very
> specific 4x4 multiplierless DCT used in H.264, and was authored by the
> people who proposed the algorithm to the JVT. What relation this has to
> Theora, I have not the slightest idea.

That wasn't related to theora but to other video codecs that come in the
list... My point was, and still is, that you can't be surely free and
there are plenty of patents on algorithm that you may think to you in
your projects or wide and vague enough to cover the last 10 years of
development in that field. Please don't get me wrong, I'm not focused on
xiph products, I'm afraid about everything that could be threated by
vague and void patents...

> 
> In any case, none of this has anything to do with mplayer development.
> It has all been discussed before and in more detail on the xiph.org
> mailing lists. Please search them if you have further questsions, and
> please stop spreading baseless FUD. I now consider this portion of the
> conversation closed, and will not respond further on the subject.
> 

That's ok, you are more or less telling me that at least for vorbis and
theora got investigated enough to ensure some major player can adopt it
w/out fear. I hope that is enough to cover the little research team too.

lu

-- 

Luca Barbato

Gentoo/linux Developer		Gentoo/PPC Operational Manager
http://dev.gentoo.org/~lu_zero