
How Patents Are Ruining the Adoption of HTML5 Video - vu0tran
http://blog.framebase.io/post/51231726236/how-patents-are-ruining-the-adoption-html5-video
======
shmerl
_The third format is OGG as Linux does not support H.264 nor VP8 out of the
box._

That's a wrong claim. VP8 support on Linux is commonplace. As well as H.264
support (if we are talking about system frameworks like gstreamer and etc.).

Browsers is another matter, and they ship with their own decoders. Mozilla
provides an option to use gstreamer for Firefox, but it's not built by
default. Mozilla can't use built in H.264 decoders simply because it will
require licensing and will make it non redistributable.

Also, OGG is not a codec, it's a container. The author probably meant Theora.

~~~
anonymous
I wonder why it's not on by default. It can't be illegal to ship a browser
that uses gstreamer, right? Users can purchase and install fluendo's codec
pack to decode h.264 videos, or use the hw decoders in their graphics cards.

~~~
wmf
The main reason was Mozilla's openness martyrdom, but they've relaxed that
position somewhat. There are still problems with pluggable codecs (of while
GStreamer is one form): different users will have different codecs installed,
leading to poor interoperability and trojan "codec packs" have been a vector
for malware.

------
shmerl
Google recently made an agreement with MPEG-LA, though it can be incompatible
with open source licensing:

[http://www.h-online.com/news/item/VP8-WebM-cross-licence-
inc...](http://www.h-online.com/news/item/VP8-WebM-cross-licence-incompatible-
with-open-source-1867383.html)

Then there are also attacks on VPx by Nokia, which became a patent troll
serving MS interests lately:

[http://www.h-online.com/open/news/item/Nokia-lines-up-
patent...](http://www.h-online.com/open/news/item/Nokia-lines-up-patents-
against-VP8-video-codec-1829299.html)

[http://www.h-online.com/open/news/item/Third-Nokia-patent-
ta...](http://www.h-online.com/open/news/item/Third-Nokia-patent-takes-the-
field-against-VP8-1871391.html)

See also: <https://datatracker.ietf.org/ipr/2035/>

There is hope that Nokia is just FUDing, and these patents can be invalidated
or shown to be irrelevant to VP8. (That's the story with Opus audio codec
being attacked by various patent trolls). But all this takes time and these
trolls naturally hate the idea of open HTML5 video.

~~~
DannyBee
It's not incompatible with anything, Simon is saying if it _was_ an open
source license it would be incompatible. But it's not an open source license,
it's a separate agreement with no bearing on either VP8 or the existing patent
grant.

You can sign the cross license, and still be able to release/reuse/whatever
any open source versions you like.

~~~
shmerl
Sure, this agreement doesn't really affect any encumbrance or non encumbrance
of VP8 by any patents. One can ignore this agreement altogether. The reason
Google made it was to reduce FUD, but Simon Phipps suggests that it might not
reduce, but actually increase it.

------
ernesth
Is this post coming from the past? It cites a table from diveintohtml that was
made in 2011. Figures of h264 penetration also dating from 2011. Things have
changed since then: firefox has announced it would support h264. Opera has had
versions supporting h264 but no longer does. Also, it fails to mention
Google's agreement with MPEG-LA.

Finally, more than not giving anything new, it contains mistakes and
confusions, the paragraph on Linux is terrible as it confuses containers and
codecs, claims wrongfully that linux does not support h264 nor vp8 on the
browser out of the box (all graphical linux browsers do support h264 or vp8,
most support both). The only good thing to keep from this article is its title
(oh and the update about firefox nightly).

~~~
kevingadd
Keep in mind that Firefox's H264 support is still dependent on your OS coming
with a licensed H264 encoder (licensed as in patent license fees)

Mozilla still can't ship a H264 decoder of their own.

~~~
J_Darnley
They don't have to. Ship a crippled version of libavcodec so I can replace it.
Or in the glorious linux case: link to a system version of libavcodec.

Or just get some balls and ship like you are Videolan.

~~~
fpgeek
Unlike VideoLAN, Mozilla has a big, obvious income stream for H.264 patent-
holders to go after. Mozilla, quite reasonably, thinks they should spend that
income advancing their mission rather than paying off patent holders (in a way
that undermines it). They're also, again unlike VideoLAN, headquartered in a
very, very software-patent-friendly jurisdiction.

Mozilla isn't refusing to ship H.264 because they lack "balls". They're
refusing because there are serious practical constraints that get in the way.

------
9999
I was under the impression that Mozilla has already moved to support h.264 by
using the host OS support for h.264:

[http://www.webmonkey.com/2013/01/mozilla-brings-
native-h-264...](http://www.webmonkey.com/2013/01/mozilla-brings-
native-h-264-to-firefox-nightly/)

~~~
anon1385
Their opposition to H264 and MP3 was always more about political grandstanding
than anything to do with them having to pay money.

They gave in on the MP3 issue too: <http://stackoverflow.com/a/12203792>

_Update October 2012: Wooohooo! Brendan Eich just announced on his blog that
work for MP3 and H264 support in Firefox is underway. You can track the work
on BugZilla: Support H.264/AAC/MP3 video/audio playback on desktop Firefox_

 _Update February 2013: After much heavy lifting from Firefox developer Chris
Pearce, this patch flips the switch to enable MP3, MP4, H.264, and AAC
playback by default in HTML5 <audio> and <video> elements when running on
Windows 7 and later. We should see some native web MP3 support in the next
stable FF release._

 _Update April 2013: Woohooo! The latest stable Firefox has experimental
support for MP3. To turn it on, type about:config in Firefox, find
media.windows-media-foundation.enabled and set it to true. Restart Firefox,
and you're all set; go to a site with HTML5 audio (e.g. my radio site) and
you'll see Firefox is indeed playing the native MP3 and not resorting to a
Flash fallback._

 _Update May 2013: At last! Firefox 21 was released today, and it includes
native HTML5 MP3 support on Windows. I just verified it supports native MP3
audio out-of-the-box, provided your operating system supports it. I tested on
Windows 8, but I believe this will automatically work on Windows 7 and Vista._

~~~
shmerl
Such opposition is reasonable. Someone has to fight against closed codecs. But
fighting alone is hard. Google pretended to be the "white knight" when they
promised that they'll drop H.264 support from Chrome, but they deserted the
battle and didn't keep the promise. They could really influence the industry
by dropping H.264 support from Youtube, but they don't have guts to do it
since it's quite disruptive.

See also [https://hacks.mozilla.org/2012/03/video-mobile-and-the-
open-...](https://hacks.mozilla.org/2012/03/video-mobile-and-the-open-web/)

~~~
0x09
I'm positive that anyone who misuses the word "closed" to refer to patent
encumbrance has never had to suffer through working with actual by-definition
closed codecs.

~~~
shmerl
You should have enough information from the context, to distinguish closed as
"no known specs", from closed as "not free to use". May be the term non free /
free (as liberated) codec is more descriptive, but closed/open will do as
well.

------
josephlord
H.264 / MPEG4 part 10 / AVC

Yes it is patented which is a definite disadvantage compared with a
theoretical[4] patent free codec but it has some real advantages.

1) The standard is controlled and defined by a collective industry group under
the auspices of ISO. [1]

2) Most of the major players in video technology at the time took part in the
standardisation so are committed to FRAND patent licensing terms. [2]

3) In almost all cases and commercial business models (that do not involve
Free software) the MPEG-LA H.264 patent license is really very reasonable and
unlikely to cause problems to an otherwise healthy business. Note that the
license Google has to the MPEG-LA pool of patents while free is NOT compatible
with Free software.

4) Any companies not in the MPEG-LA pool that popped up now with demands
really would trolls in the original sense that they have sat under the bridge
for a long time waiting for a juicy opportunity rather than being upfront
earlier. I don't think that this would help them in a legal case although
there is no guarantee that they don't exist. [3]

5) H.264 is really quite good although the latest codecs are showing what can
be done with further development and processing power.

6) H.264 decoding (and often encoding) is cooked into a massive amount of
existing and deployed devices in ways that cannot be adapted to VP8/VP9 by a
software update.

For now H.264 is the no brainer option for any commercial system although
multi codec support may be worthwhile in some cases. If you want patent free I
recommend MPEG1 as I believe any patents on it should now be expired or at
least expiring very soon if they were granted a long time after filing. I'm
glad that Firefox has backed down and will now use the OS codecs to allow
playback of H.264.

[1] The OOXML case shows that this isn't foolproof but in my view it is a
better option than the standard being controlled by a single company even if
the controlling company publishes the source code. This applied to Microsoft
when they offered VC-1 as a free alternative to H.264 (there is now an MPEG-LA
pool) and to Google now with VP8 and VP9 now. Google is the new Microsoft and
has fully learnt the lessons of "Embrace, extend and extinguish".

[2] Not Free software compatible but better than nothing. And even Google's
license to the VP8 patents from the MPEG-LA pool does not seem to grant Free
software compatible rights.

[3] There is a greater risk of people popping up with claims against VP8 or
VP9 as they are newer and less prominent. The MPEG-LA's call for a pool of
patents has helped draw out those patent owners and many have joined the pool
and reached terms with Google (although Nokia and maybe others haven't.

[4] Realistically for patent free greater than 20 years old is the answer so
it probably needs to be MPEG1.

~~~
shmerl
Whether it's better or not in some aspects, in practice patent encumbrance
makes such decoders non redistributable, therefore open source browsers can
never normally adapt such codecs, and it makes sense for W3C/IETF to choose
mandatory codecs only from explicitly open (i.e. free and non patent
encumbered). The best course of action is not to bow to codec cartels like
MPEG-LA, but to fight against current closed codecs domination and to advance
open ones by improving and creating new better codecs.

 _There is a greater risk of people popping up with claims against VP8 or VP9
as they are newer and less prominent. The MPEG-LA's call for a pool of patents
has helped draw out those patent owners and many have joined the pool and
reached terms with Google (although Nokia and maybe others haven't._

This is common FUD. Whatever was in that "pool" - the end result no one
attempted to attack VP8 with patent claims, except for Nokia. The strange
counterexample to the claim that "prominence" guarantees safety is Google, who
used H.264 against Microsoft themselves. Nothing is protected against sudden
patent attacks. But if there are no known patents - then paranoia won't help
anything.

~~~
josephlord
I don't claim that W3C or IETF should standardise on H.264. I think it is
perfectly sensible for them to hold the line but the practical reality for
implementers is that H.264 is a commercial requirement.

Note that I said "greater risk" not that there was no risk for H.264 or that
it is a massive showstopper for VP8. I stand by my statement although this
really isn't critical EXCEPT for the fact that due to FRAND commitments
potential claims are limited (as the Motorola/Google case is showing). If you
have made no FRAND commitments you can get injunctions or ask for outrageous
(hundreds of millions of dollars or even billions) licensing fees but if FRAND
commitments have been made you cannot do this as the courts are educating
Google/Motorola.

The obvious baseline for W3C to adopt would in my view be MPEG1 allowing a
fallback to a safe free codec and modern non free codecs to be used otherwise.

~~~
shmerl
Quality is important. Using poor quality common denominator is a bad idea.
Once Nokia attack is cleared, VPx would be good to use again as a base
available open codec. FRAND or non FRAND can affect damages, but as I said
above it doesn't change the non redistributable nature of anything that
depends on it.

~~~
josephlord
I'm not convinced Nokia will lose.

Even if Nokia lose and no-one else comes forward the Google licence is non-
redistributable anyway so for many purposes is no better than the AVC one.

Freedom, zero cost, quality, low legal risk. Choose two.

~~~
shmerl
Anything can happen, but On2 was diligent in evaluating public patents related
to video. So it looks like Nokia is spoofing things up. Time will tell of
course. One of the benefits of the IETF process is the requirement to disclose
all the patents, so they can be evaluated and refuted if possible. I'm sure
WebM project is busy with reviewing this.

 _Freedom, zero cost, quality, low legal risk._

Where did you find freedom and zero cost there? Low legal risk is a myth in
the land of patent minefields.

 _the Google license is non-redistributable anyway_

Again wrong. VPx content as well as encoders and decoders are redistributable
under the current license which is fully open source compatible.

~~~
josephlord
>> Freedom, zero cost, quality, low legal risk.

> Where did you find freedom and zero cost there? Low legal risk is a myth in
> the land of patent minefields.

I made it up, couldn't narrow it down to three. MPEG1 is low risk, free and
Free now. AVC is low risk now it has been a juicy target for long enough to
draw out trolls and it is high quality. VP8 is high quality and zero cost.

The license that Google has from the MPEG-LA doesn't seem to allow for those
who accept the license to sub license. If this is incorrect please send a
reference.

You seem to be of the view that the pool contents are either invalid or non-
essential. Until I see a detailed study of them that indicates this with claim
by claim explanations I will assume that at least some may be valid. Now
Google has taken the license it is highly unlikely they will challenge the
pool patents (and they may be contractually obliged not to). This means there
is no big player likely to fight the patents and make the status clearly open
source compatible.

~~~
shmerl
Ah, I see, I thought you meant all 3 as related to H.264.

 _> The license that Google has from the MPEG-LA doesn't seem to allow for
those who accept the license to sub license. _

The license is a FUD reduction tool. You can simply ignore it in the context
of the open source license of the codec itself - it's not part of that license
at all.

 _> You seem to be of the view that the pool contents are either invalid or
non-essential. Until I see a detailed study of them that indicates this with
claim by claim explanations I will assume that at least some may be valid. Now
Google has taken the license it is highly unlikely they will challenge the
pool patents (and they may be contractually obliged not to). This means there
is no big player likely to fight the patents and make the status clearly open
source compatible._

I'm not sure what you are talking about - patents that MPEG-LA supposedly has
against VP8, or the patents that Nokia presented against it?

If the former, those contents can as well be simply non existent and their
potential existence used as a tool to spread FUD. Until anything is publicly
presented (like Nokia did), there is no reason to pay attention to that
"pool". Note that Google didn't license any patents that are known to be
affecting VP8. Nothing like that. They just licensed "something", so that
MPEG-LA would stop making statements like "what a good codec you have here, a
pity if something would happen to it _if and when_ we find some patents
against it". I.e. Google bribed them to stop spreading FUD. In no way does it
demonstrate that MPEG-LA has any actual patents against VP8.

If the later - the list is published, and now in the process of being reviewed
/ refuted. Let's see how that works out.

~~~
josephlord
I listed four features and suggested that only two were available from each of
the current codecs.

You are also free to use open source AVC implementations and ignore that MPEG-
LA license too. Depending on who you are and what you are doing with AVC the
probability of action by a patent holder could be very low.

I meant the patents under the MPEG-LA from the eleven companies (some of whom
I would take seriously) and including at least two of the biggest Android
manufacturers rather than Google's enemies:

CIF Licensing LLC

France Telecom

Fraunhofer-Gesellschaft zur Foerderung der angewandten Forschung e.V.

Fujitsu Limited

Koninklijke Philips Electronics N.V.

LG Electronics Inc.

Mitsubishi Electric Corporation

MPEG LA, LLC

NTT DOCOMO, INC.

Panasonic Corporation

Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd.

Siemens Corporation

You are right that the patent list does not seem to be published which is
unfortunate. If the patents in the AVC pool owned by these companies were
checked against VP8 by someone credible and preferably independent it would
give quite a good degree of assurance about them.

Do note though that Google claimed to have bought On2's patents and they too
only seem to be offered under the same non-FOSS compatible licence as the
MPEG-KA ones.

As for the Nokia patents I don't think that they would have been brought to
courts if Nokia didn't think victory was a realistic outcome. However the drop
out rate for claims is very high in all the patent disputes although it seems
very hard to predict at the start what will stand up and what will fall so it
is entirely possible that they will fail. From my perspective this seems a bad
sign for the consistency and predictability of patent law which needs major
reform rather than proof that Nokia is claiming rights that IT doesn't believe
it has.

~~~
shmerl
Patents related to VP8 which Google bought from On2 are freely licensed, see
<http://www.webmproject.org/license/bitstream/>

The list of companies doesn't impress me. Many manufacturers are engaged in
patent racket. It's Google refusal to play the same game that caused their ire
and fear mongering. As I said, until they actually publish what's supposedly
exists in that pool - there is no point to pay any attention to their claims.

~~~
josephlord
Still not FOSS compatible as the patent grant is only for implementations of
the specification. It is still a pretty generous grant without other caveats
though.

The patent "racket" is the system enshrined in the current laws which I agree
need fixing but our wishes for that to happen don't make it so and the patents
won't disappear unless it does or until they expire.

------
jamespollack
HLS (http adaptive streaming) is non-existant in Chrome, except for on the
Google TV. So I end up having to develop in Safari, which is painful.
Especially when I'm making apps for the Google TV (and other SmartTV
Platforms).

::le sigh::

