[Gllug] [Fwd: [piksel] Outrageous disaster: Ogg/Vorbis spec taken out of HTML-5]

[Richard Huxton]

salsaman at xs4all.nl wrote:
> On Tue, December 18, 2007 21:00, Richard Huxton wrote:
>> salsaman at xs4all.nl wrote:
>>> Because they are supposedly helping to create the HTML standard, a
>>> standard which exists for the benefit of the world, not for the benefit
>>> of
>>> one or two software companies.
>> And they're providing their viewpoint, which (presumably) differs from
>> yours. The HTML standards are there to help interoperability rather than
>> benefit the world (we're not talking about keeping Aids drugs expensive
>> here). They're building browsers and I'm not, which is why they get a
>> vote.
> 
> I'm also building browsers (at least in the sense that I help with the
> Mozilla project), unfortunately I don't get a vote.

The Mozilla project presumably does though.

> I fail to see how pushing a patented technology helps interopability - a
> world without Free browsers is not exactly what I would term
> "interoperable".

What percentage of people browsing the web can't play Flash / MP3 content?

>> The problem is that you and I can see the value in free codecs, but if
>> you round down to the nearest 1% then there are *no* users of
>> Ogg/Vorbis.
> 
> At one point, there were a very few percent using Netscape, then Netscape
> freed the code and it was transformed slowly into Firefox/Mozilla.

The value in Firefox/Mozilla is primarily that it is an alternative, 
rather than being open-source. It's good that you can contribute to the 
code-base, but I certainly lack the time even if I had the skills. Some 
99% of the users don't have the skills.

In any case, that's an application not a codec.

>> There are no compelling technical advantages of the format
>> over (already implemented, supported and widely used) rivals. There is
>> no guarantee that that format is patent-free, and per-unit it costs
>> these companies next to nothing to licence MP3 (which would be the
>> logical audio standard).
> 
> There is no guarantee that any codec is free of unknown (i.e. submarine)
> patents. At least the vorbis/theora formats have been under scrutiny
> worldwide for several years, and there has yet to be found one case of
> patent infringement.

And who would you sue at the moment? And how much would you make?

>> So what would Apple and Nokia gain by implementing, supporting (and
>> possibly defending in court) these codecs?
> 
> Again, it's not about what they would gain. These companies sit on the
> board of the w3c, a comittee whose aim is to design standards for the
> entire world.

And whose members will reflect their own interests. If I could 
demonstrate that more people would benefit from switching to a 
closed-source would you then vote against open-source?

> Just suppose h264 becomes an HTML standard, then what would happen ?

I believe the situation is that *nothing* will be marked as a standard 
media format. The same as there isn't a standard image format, just very 
common ones.

> 1) Many browsers would not be able to support this due to the patents on
> it. Thus they would not be able to be compliant with the standard.

Well: IE, Opera, Safari would all be fine, they'd negotiate a blanket 
fee. Presumably the Mozilla project would have to negotiate a blanket 
fee same as everyone else.

Of course, if *you* wanted to release "salsabrowser" you'd have problems 
supporting video. And Debian would drop support for video.

> 2) The license holders could shut down any browser implementing the
> standard, simply by witholding the license or charging a huge fee. No more
> free (as in beer) browsers. You gotta pay the licensing fee. Of course,
> Microsoft could add it in as part of the price of Windows - IE would be
> free, but you'd have to pay for Firefox.

And if it looked even vaguely likely then no-one would bother 
implementing the standard. If CSS isn't a high priority then something 
that costs money won't be.

And at the point that they charge huge amounts two things happen:
1. *Then* there is some point in Vorbis/Theora etc. and people will 
start using it.
2. Someone with a submarine patent on h64 sues those patent-holders for 
a share of their bags of money.

> 3) The license holders are planning to charge websites to host video
> content in h264 standard (it's part of the licensing terms). Thus they
> could shut down any non-commercial video hosting site (no more youtubes).

YouTube is a commercial video-hosting site.

> You may not care about this, but I certainly do.

Nobody is suggesting *you* don't care, I'm just not seeing anything that 
matters to Apple/Nokia.

-- 
   Richard Huxton
   Archonet Ltd
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