

H.264 will remain royalty-free until 2016 for free Internet content [pdf] - jon_dahl
http://www.mpegla.com/Lists/MPEG%20LA%20News%20List/Attachments/226/n-10-02-02.pdf

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jon_dahl
(For the PDF-adverse):

 _MPEG LA’s AVC License Will Continue Not to Charge Royalties for Internet
Video that is Free to End Users_

(DENVER, CO, US – 2 February 2010) – MPEG LA announced today that its AVC
Patent Portfolio License will continue not to charge royalties for Internet
Video that is free to end users (known as Internet Broadcast AVC Video) during
the next License term from January 1, 2011 to December 31, 2016. Products and
services other than Internet Broadcast AVC Video continue to be royalty-
bearing, and royalties to apply during the next term will be announced before
the end of 2010. MPEG LA's AVC Patent Portfolio License provides access to
essential patent rights for the AVC/H.264 (MPEG-4 Part 10) digital video
coding standard. In addition to Internet Broadcast AVC Video, MPEG LA’s AVC
Patent Portfolio License provides coverage for devices that decode and encode
AVC video, AVC video sold to end users for a fee on a title or subscription
basis and free television video services. AVC video is used in set-top boxes,
media player and other personal computer software, mobile devices including
telephones and mobile television receivers, Blu-ray DiscTM players and
recorders, Blu-ray video optical discs, game machines, personal media player
devices and still and video cameras.

For more information about MPEG LA’s AVC License or to request a copy of the
License, please visit
<http://www.mpegla.com/main/programs/AVC/Pages/Intro.aspx>

------
bensummers
Does no one remember what happened with GIF? It got so widely adopted that is
was impossible to stop using it. The other image format supported by the web
was JPEG, which wasn't suitable for non-photographic images because of it's
lossy nature and imprecise control over colour.

And then suddenly, Unisys asked for lots of money from everyone producing
software which wrote GIFs.

Those that do not learn from history are doomed to repeat it.

~~~
tedunangst
1\. Compuserve invented GIF. Not Unisys. 2\. Unisys never said "You can use
this for free" and then changed their minds.

~~~
haberman
"Unisys does not require licensing, or fees to be paid, for non-commercial,
non-profit GIF-based applications, including those for use on the on-line
services. Concerning developers of software for the Internet network, the same
principle applies. Unisys will not pursue previous inadvertent infringement by
developers producing versions of software products for the Internet prior to
1995. The company does not require licensing, or fees to be paid for non-
commercial, non-profit offerings on the Internet, including "Freeware"."

\--Unisys 1995
([http://web.archive.org/web/19981203000955/http://lpf.ai.mit....](http://web.archive.org/web/19981203000955/http://lpf.ai.mit.edu/Patents/Gif/unisys.html))

"Unisys has frequently been asked whether a Unisys license is required in
order to use LZW software obtained by downloading from the Internet or from
other sources. The answer is simple. In all cases, a written license agreement
or statement signed by an authorized Unisys representative is required from
Unisys for all use, sale or distribution of any software (including so-called
"freeware") and/or hardware providing LZW conversion capability (for example,
downloaded software used for creating/displaying GIF images)."

\--Unisys 1999
([http://web.archive.org/web/20021203075728/http://www.unisys....](http://web.archive.org/web/20021203075728/http://www.unisys.com/about__unisys/lzw/index.htm))

~~~
tedunangst
Crazy. I knew about the second version of their policy, but didn't realize
they actually did say it was free at first.

------
tvon
So no fees until it's firmly entrenched as a part of our daily lives...?

~~~
Groxx
@GrandMasterBirt: Personally, I am not now and never will touch Blu-Ray. I
don't trust Sony to have any qualms about screwing everyone over. I also think
that, before Blu-Ray gets majority market share, downloadable videos will be
widely enough accessible to completely replace my media players for 99% of my
viewing. </rant>

This assumes that nothing will come along to challenge or supersede h.264. If
nothing else, we can hope that Theora will get more developers, at which point
the whole browser-battle will resume, and the same solution will likely arise:
further delay in fees, or switching to a free codec (remember, Theora will
have improved in the meantime).

------
ZeroGravitas
It would be interesting to calculate how much Mozilla and Google's posturing
with Theora and On2 has saved Youtube in fees over the next five years. But
since the prices would have been set by an entirely opaque cartel of patent
holders, it would be mostly guesswork.

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romland
The headline looks a whole lot better than what is promised. Sorry.

Edit: Ah. Submitter is a licensee of the technology in question. :)

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jeff18
This is what's great about HTML 5. While Adobe is looking backwards and trying
to claim that HTML 5 is not a viable replacement for itself, HTML 5 is
actually rapidly accelerating. The H.264 licensing was a deal breaker for
Mozilla, and now (hopefully) it is not. In other words, if FireFox accepts
this, the criticism that Adobe published just a couple of days ago is no
longer relevant.

~~~
qjz
It's the same bomb with a longer fuse.

~~~
jeff18
Surely in six years, Ogg Theora will be just as good as H264 and computers
will have advanced to the point that converting the relevant clips will be
quite efficient?

This will force the owners of H264 to either create a fair price for the codec
in 2016, or they will become irrelevant like RealPlayer, etc.

~~~
spatulon
_Surely in six years, Ogg Theora will be just as good as H264_

Theora is a generation older than H.264. There are features in H.264 that help
compression that aren't in Theora, plus Theora has a few other problems (e.g.
motion vectors no longer than 16 pixels). So a good H.264 encoder is always
going to beat a good Theora encoder. Perhaps they'll be able to create a truly
excellent Theora encoder that will mitigate the format's deficiencies as much
as possible, and outperform the majority of H.264 encoders, but I wouldn't bet
on it. The open-source x264 encoder is already very good, and is only going to
get better. And the increasing use of H.264 for TV broadcast and Blu-ray
surely means that there's going to be strong competition amongst the vendors
of commercial H.264 encoders.

------
drawkbox
Well the whole royalty situation is making Flash video look really good. It
solved similar issues when it launched to alleviate us of player hell in
Windows Media Player, Real Player and Quicktime all breaking each other and
fighting for file extensions. Flash has On2 and can play H.264. If Flash just
could get hardware rendering support beyond full screen scaling, then they
might have a fighting chance being that there is piles of money people will
have to pay to make a content site. The window is closing on the video shakeup
and it will cost alot to run one very soon.

~~~
kevingadd
Couldn't MPEG LA easily amend the H264 licensing terms to make users of Flash
liable for royalties? It doesn't seem to me like Flash lets you avoid anything
with the exception of a decoder fee (since Adobe pays for that).

~~~
drawkbox
Flash FLV is a wrapper for a variety of codecs that are mainly proprietary
(and some standard like MPEG, H.264, H.263). On2 VP6 and Sorenson Video Codec
to name a few (which Adobe pays for), but Adobe could be extremely ruthless
and work in Theora/Ogg into their FLV wrapper as well without a huge standards
battle. So in terms of agility to change to avoid excessive fees, Flash might
actually be better situated.

Really all Flash has to do is hardware accelerate their video (easier said
than done - and not just for full screen) and it will alleviate the poor
performance perception as it is all software decoding right now.

Still though, content creators that don't want to pay fees should really pay
attention to this situation. Video could get very expensive online shortly if
we are all on the H.264 html5 <video> will save us bandwagon. It would really
suck to have to go with proprietary video just to stay cheap.

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emmett
When do the patents on H.264 expire?

~~~
russell
Googling gives 2028, which means that any short term royalty-free license is
just bait and switch.

------
aidenn0
Everyone is talking about Theora vs. H.264. What about Dirac (a.k.a.
Scrödinger)? It was developed by the BBC, and has a free license. It's only
disadvantage is a lack of defensive patents (they had some applications, but
let them lapse).

~~~
GHFigs
Dirac suffers from the same problem as Theora, in that approximately nobody
uses it. Theora at least already has several browser implementations and
Wikipedia.

