
The last patent on AC-3 (Dolby Digital) expires at midnight - robbiet480
https://ac3freedomday.org/
======
coin
We in North America have been paying the Dolby AC-3 tax for the last 20 years.
Dolby successfully weaseled AC-3 as the multi-channel audio encoding standard
for MPEG-2 DVDs. This is despite the fact that MPEG-2 already has a multi-
channel audio encoding (AAC). DVDs in Europe utilize AAC audio.

Thus every DVD and DVD player sold in N. America has to license AC-3 from
Dolby.

The best way to steal from people is to do it without their knowledge.

~~~
torrent-of-ions
I've not seen a single PAL DVD with a multi-channel MPEG-2 soundtrack. Even a
stereo AAC soundtrack is rare. DTS is much more likely to be found, in fact.

The really interesting thing about AC-3 is how it is stored on a film reel.
Back when it was developed, multi-channel audio was becoming a thing. For
large format film (70mm), the solution was simple: 6 magnetic soundtracks.
This actually far exceeds the quality of most cinema audio systems even today.
But film companies wanted to get it on to 35mm film which the vast majority of
cinemas could actually use. 35mm already has two optical soundtracks, and they
didn't want to remove these and force cinemas to change their equipment.

One solution was to have the soundtrack stored on some other medium and synch
it together with the film. This the approach used by DTS. But Dolby developed
a technique to print the soundtrack between the perforations on the side of
the film, thus producing a film that is completely backwards compatible and
even has an analogue backup which can be automatically switched in case the
AC-3 got damaged. As is often the case with technology, it wasn't the highest
quality format that won, it was the one that could be practically used at the
time.

~~~
neckro23
Wikipedia has a great visual aid for this. No part of the film was untouched:
[https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:35mm_film_audio_macr...](https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:35mm_film_audio_macro.jpg)

------
Keverw
20 years just seems way too long for a patent, especially as fast that the
tech industry moves nowadays. Even 3 or 5 years would be better if we're going
to keep having government granted monopolies.

~~~
dave_sullivan
Honestly, I don't think there is a good argument for patents at this point. If
your thing is truly groundbreaking, keep it secret. The reward for having
great ideas and successfully productizing them is lots of money; why do there
need to be patents (and effective monopoly protections) on top of that?

There's a decent argument for drug patents (drugs cost a fortune to develop;
makers only recoup losses if they can mark up the cost of drugs massively;
competition gets in the way of that), but I'd argue this is a better argument
against the whole industry and an argument for more public funding of drug
research.

If you can't make your business work without patents, I think that's a bad
sign.

I don't think it's feasible to get rid of patents, but I think they could (and
should) be made easier to challenge and invalidate, and there should be some
restrictions to discourage patent trolls (what restrictions exactly is
debatable).

~~~
srtjstjsj
> why do there need to be patents (and effective monopoly protections) on top
> of that?

It's explained here:

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Copyright_Clause](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Copyright_Clause)

"To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited
Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective
Writings and Discoveries."

It's to avoid free-riders copying an invention after someone else researches
the related dead ends.

~~~
dave_sullivan
I understand the argument, I just don't think it "promotes the Progress of
Science and useful Arts". If you were to remove patent protections, the
progress of science and useful art would not suddenly take a nose dive. In
fact, I'd go as far as to say that patents stifle progress in art and science.

Also there's a big distinction between copyright and patents. You don't hear
about copyright trolls as often; it's not as crippled of a system.

~~~
taneq
You'd get a short term boost, with a flurry of activity around the suddenly
freed patents, leading to a lot of incremental work.

You'd then get a longer term slump, as all companies stop investing in basic
research and long-term R&D, since they can just wait and copy someone else's
research instead. When building real physical products, being second to market
by a few weeks costs far less than the years of R&D required to build a truly
revolutionary product, not to mention you can use that R&D money to either (a)
polish the your product more than the inventor's original product, or (b)
splurge on marketing.

~~~
dave_sullivan
> being second to market by a few weeks costs far less than the years of R&D
> required to build a truly revolutionary product

Can you point to a time where this has turned out to be true by your
estimation? An example of a product where there was a tremendous amount of R&D
required and the only thing saving the company from being destroyed by
competitors beating them to the market 2 weeks later was a strong patent
portfolio?

Even in the original iPhone presentation, there's a point where Steve is like,
"Oh, and you bet we patented it, lol." But was that why the iphone succeeded?
Was that why it could exist in the first place? Were it not for those patents,
would Apple have been crushed by competitors mimicking them?

The pro-patent arguments are always expressed as hypotheticals, whereas there
are numerous specific examples of patents hurting smaller companies unable to
afford the cost of defending themselves. I'd be very interested in situations
where the upshot is, "Oh boy, good thing for science and art that those
patents existed."

~~~
Cyph0n
A huge company like Apple is a bad example. The best example of patents
working well are when they are used by startups formed from university
research groups.

You have a group of people that has performed basic research with minimum
funding and decides to commercialize an idea. Since the group's work is
already published in conferences and/or journals[1], it is extremely easy for
a huge company to just throw some money at the idea and come out with a
commercial implementation. But with patents in hand, the research group and
the university can decide to either sell the patents to the highest bidder, or
continue developing the product if they see the potential. And since the idea
is protected by the law, no amount of money can kill the company.

I actually believe that the US patent system is one reason behind the success
of advanced tech startups here.

[1]: Publication of results is a requirement for virtually all types of
research funding. In other words, if you don't patent the outcome of your
research, it's essentially in the public domain.

~~~
dave_sullivan
That sounds pretty reasonable, but what's a specific example of this
happening? One that comes to mind is CRISPR, and the patent dispute over that
has literally held the field back. CRISPR is the thing that's going to cure
cancer, and it's being held back because of patent nonsense. I can't prove it,
but if patents didn't exist, I'm pretty sure CRISPR (and the specific nuances
at the heart of the actual patent dispute) would nonetheless have been
discovered.

Meanwhile compare to something like deep learning, which is uniquely
unencumbered by patents for several reasons. Yet somehow corporations seem to
be interested and the pace of progress is rapid.

~~~
scott00
The massive data required for machine learning presents an opportunity to
create a moat around those businesses. Releasing the algo but not the data
doesn't help competitors much. There's also often a first-mover advantage in
data collection: operating a service can give you a unique opportunity to
collect relevant data, making it very hard for competitors to catch up. The
canonical example is Google search: a competitor can scrape the web (at great
cost), but they can't get Google's result click data until they're competitive
with Google. And without the data it's damn hard to be competitive.

------
Animats
The MPEG-2 patents also ran out recently. Even MPEG-4, as used online, may be
out of patent. The newer patents in the MPEG-LA portfolio for MPEG-4 are
mostly for things nobody uses online, such as interlace and 5-channel audio.
It's about time for someone to take a hard look at the remaining MPEG-LA
patents.

~~~
MBCook
Are H.264 and MPEG 4 the same thing? I can never remember the relationship.

Does this mean that the WebM fight is closer to being moot?

~~~
niftich
H.264 in context of MPEG is _MPEG-4 Part 10 "Advanced Video Coding"_,
published in 2003. It's probably what OP is referring to, since pretty much no
one on the web uses the _other_ MPEG-4 video coding (anymore), MPEG-4 Part 2,
which dates to 1999.

MPEG-4 Part 2 was made famous by the encoders DivX and Xvid, but didn't see
the magnitude of professional usage as either its predecessors MPEG-2 Part 2
(also known as H.262) and H.263 (which was a teleconferencing codec to which
the widely-deployed Sorenson Spark, used in Flash 6 and 7, was fairly close
to) or its successor H.264.

That being said, the MPEG LA maintains a (very, very long) list of patents [1]
in the H.264 patent pool, with recently expiring patents (sometimes?) notated
for convenience. Submarine and unlisted/uncovered patents notwithstanding, an
interested party should be able to start with this list and research if they
are truly necessary to implement decoding and encoding of H.264 as used on the
web today.

[1]
[http://www.mpegla.com/main/programs/AVC/Pages/PatentList.asp...](http://www.mpegla.com/main/programs/AVC/Pages/PatentList.aspx)

~~~
ksec
I could not understand this, >>Submarine and unlisted/uncovered patents
notwithstanding

How could a standard that is alive and used widely for nearly a decade now
still has Submarine patents. I wish there is a rule if anyone dont come fourth
within say 5 - 8 years when the standard is formed and used they could no
longer claim these patents against the standard.

~~~
kobeya
Patents cover detail of the implementation, not just the details in the
standard. Is the software you are using to encode/decode also 20 years old? If
not, more recent changes might be patented.

------
emptybits
> "You have probably paid many AC-3 license fees over the years. AC-3 license
> fees are part of the cost of TVs, game consoles, and other AV equipment sold
> in the last 25 years."

I'm curious ... what's the ballpark end-user license cost the public has been
paying for the ability to decode AC-3 on their TVs and receivers and consoles
and other devices?

~~~
H4CK3RM4N
This forum post is the closest I can find, although it only relates to the
producer's costs. It looks like it ranges from next to nothing for small-
budget releases to 10k for cinema releases.

[http://www.reduser.net/forum/showthread.php?39633-Licensing-...](http://www.reduser.net/forum/showthread.php?39633-Licensing-
Cost-for-Dolby-5-1-80k)

The replies to that post include a link to an application page, which also
includes options for products which decode the audio. Maybe someone could
troll the page, assuming it's automated.

[https://www.dolby.com/us/en/professional/licensing.html](https://www.dolby.com/us/en/professional/licensing.html)

------
CalChris
When Japan opened up to the West, Korekiyo Takahashi visited the US in 1886.
"We said, 'What is it that makes the United States such a great nation?' And
we investigated and we found that it was patents, and we will have patents."

[http://www.iphalloffame.com/korekiyo_takahashi/](http://www.iphalloffame.com/korekiyo_takahashi/)

You need to reward innovators or you won't have innovation.

~~~
ue_
>You need to reward innovators or you won't have innovation.

It's unfortunate that the "reward" needs to come in the form of a monopoly
over an _idea_. The fact that ideas themselves are valuable is such a
capitalistic thing.

I don't believe copyright or patents are justified enough; the idea that
someone can force you not to implement a particular algorithm or not to share
some data with your neighbor, I find it ridiculous.

I have no respect for "IP", and no respect for private property. Down with the
monopolies over what we can say and make and share, and down with the state
that protects it.

~~~
rlanday
Do you not believe that ideas are inherently valuable? You think they only
have value in a capitalist society?

If you find a copyrighted work valuable enough to use or share with your
neighbor but you don't think you should have to pay to support its creation,
you're a freeloader. If everyone acted in this way, no one would be funding
the development of such works and they wouldn't exist for you to share. I know
most of us skirt the rules in various circumstances but at the end of the day,
someone has to be paying for these works or they wouldn't get created in the
first place.

~~~
greglindahl
I'm typing this comment using close to 100% free software that I did not pay
for.

~~~
rlanday
Free as in freedom, free as in beer, but not free to develop. Someone's paying
for the development of those works.

~~~
greglindahl
Yes. There are a variety of business models in free software, just like there
are a variety of business models in producing copyright content.

So, now that we know that, why are you calling basically everyone on the
planet a freeloader? e.g. why am I freeloading if I read articles in the
'free' newspaper (advertising supported, of course.)

------
LeoPanthera
This makes Laserdisc a completely open format!

~~~
TD-Linux
And DRM-free! I'm watching one tonight in celebration.

Sadly, there's practically no documentation online about the Laserdisc
physical format.

------
johnhattan
What's the practical upshot of this? Are there some apps that are waiting for
this bit to expire so they can finally make things work the way they should?

For example, Audacity for Windows doesn't install with MP3 support. You have
to download a plugin from Germany before Audacity will read/write MP3. Which I
presume is because patents.

~~~
loeg
> For example, Audacity for Windows doesn't install with MP3 support. You have
> to download a plugin from Germany before Audacity will read/write MP3. Which
> I presume is because patents.

Presumably, yes. Although, coincidentally enough, mp3's patent expired
recently as well. So you may not have to anymore.

~~~
cJ0th
> Although, coincidentally enough, mp3's patent expired recently as well. So
> you may not have to anymore.

Are you sure? According to wikipedia it ends at the end of 2017 (in the US)
[0] Also, [http://www.mp3licensing.com/](http://www.mp3licensing.com/) is
still up and running.

[0]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MP3#Licensing.2C_ownership_and...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MP3#Licensing.2C_ownership_and_legislation)

~~~
loeg
I guess decoding expired a while ago:
[https://lists.fedoraproject.org/archives/list/legal@lists.fe...](https://lists.fedoraproject.org/archives/list/legal@lists.fedoraproject.org/message/34NPNTJITRHRP2FRKKYGL2YMEUU4BDYF/)

Encoding is still encumbered for a little while.

------
ksec
This makes, possibly, one of the most Widely used and Hardware compatible
codec patent free. ( All MP3's patent will expire in Dec 2017 )

And AC-3 offer lossless mode, which means you now have a Free, Lossloess codec
that can be played on a very wide range of media player.

My previous experience ( that was properly more then 10 years ago already )was
that AC-3 sounded a lot better then Mp3 at high bitrate / 256Kbps.

Not sure how it fares with AAC.

~~~
TD-Linux
AC-3 does not offer lossless mode, only the extension TrueHD, which is still
covered by patents.

As mentioned in the article, AC-3 is pretty horrific by modern standards. Use
Opus or FLAC instead.

------
shmerl
Why would they still use old codec when there are modern and free ones like
Opus?

~~~
Veratyr
AC-3 is a part of many current standards (i.e. is a hard requirement) and has
wide hardware support.

Opus lacks both hardware and software support on many platforms (notably iOS)
and ultimately, doesn't perform that much better than existing, supported
codecs like AAC, which already have to be licensed for other reasons.

I love Opus and it's used by some big players like YouTube but ultimately I
don't see it taking the place of MP3/AAC for music or AC-3/DTS for premium
video anytime soon.

~~~
shmerl
AAC is patent encumbered, so it's not a suitable option for _replacing
standards_. That's what I'm talking about. Standards aren't supposed to be
forever stuck with old tech. I see no reason why Opus couldn't be part of more
standards (it's already part of WebRTC), besides of course Apple which can't
stand free codecs.

------
magila
Is there a similar status page somewhere for DTS/DCA? I think that's the last
of the first generation multichannel audio codecs which is still both widely
used and patent encumbered.

~~~
suethemessenger
The remaining patents on DTS Core expired last year.

[http://dts.com/patents/bd-dvd-players](http://dts.com/patents/bd-dvd-players)
lists 4 patents, all expired.

(DTS-HD is still patent-encumbered, but DTS-HD content is backward-compatible
with DTS Core.)

------
bubblethink
Good news for Fedora ? With native mp3 and ac-3 decoding in 2017, who knows
what this new world holds in store for us. /s

~~~
johnny22
fedora finally ships an mp3 decoder, but won't ship the encoder until then.

~~~
bubblethink
Yeah, it was over the news when they announced that. There's also some effort
to get H264 through cisco's openh264, but that's also very basic and doesn't
do most of the useful stuff

------
jsnell
I happened to open this link with about 5 minutes left on the countdown, so I
totally watched it tick down all the way to 0. Unfortunately no fireworks at
the end, just the clock starting to show the time the patents had now been
expired :)

~~~
cooper12
Yep, all it does is update the countdown message:
[http://web.archive.org/web/20170319195114/https://ac3freedom...](http://web.archive.org/web/20170319195114/https://ac3freedomday.org/index.js)
and it uses jquery-countdown. Sounds to me like we need jquery-fireworks:
[https://codepen.io/P3R0/pen/yyqdxR](https://codepen.io/P3R0/pen/yyqdxR).

------
kozak
I have an AVCHD camcorder that is excellent in all respects, except for the
fact that it uses AC-3 at something like 256 kbps for its stereo sound:
compression artifacts are quite noticeable.

------
tehabe
I think the last MP3 patent will expire by the end of the year, I always
thought AC-3 is younger than MP3 but well. (Almost the same age) MP3 is also
an example of prolonged patent validity, it was approved in 1991, published in
1993 but the last patent expires in 2017.

------
hoschicz
Does that mean that VLC on iOS will be able to play AC-3? Now, one can't play
a movie on an iOS. device, you have to transcode it first.

------
jlebrech
does audio still have that much innovation, isn't it now a good idea for dolby
to look elsewhere for patents?

