[Gllug] EU council streaming petition

[salsaman at xs4all.nl]

> Martin A. Brooks schrieb:
>
>> Kindly cease this bollocks. There's _nothing_ stopping you watching the
>> stream with many Linux media players. I'm watching some _right now_
>> using VLC for example.
>
> Being just a calm lurker on this list but also one who already signed
> this petition, just my €0.02 on that: Indeed, technically it works. But
> it doesn't legally work, because (for what I have seen so far) the
> stream uses a proprietary codec. This, in itself, is bad, both given the
> fact that Microsoft still are under EC fire because of the
> anti-competition thing, and because whatever happens there is paid with
> money brought up by European citizen. And maybe just because of that,
> bringing up a solution saying "We only support MS-Windows / Macintosh"
> to me simply is not acceptable. There are "free" codecs and technologies
> available for that, and building the whole streaming thing using
> non-discriminatory technology would definitely be possible. In "theory",
> every European citizen should be capable of accessing this content, no
> matter which operating system, which player, ... (s)he is running. What
> about accessing these sources from *BSD? Or OpenSolaris? Or HP-UX, for
> that matters?
>
> I am almost sure this petition will not have any meaningful effect, but
> I think it's worth at least trying.
>
>
> Cheers,
> Kris
>


Indeed. Or what about people using 64 bit Linux ? Or what about when M$
create the next version of .wmv, and start suing people for decoding it ?


Saying they "cannot legally support Linux" is quite simply a lie.

They can support Linux, and indeed any platform, simply by using an open
codec.

And remember, these are the same people who tried to sneak through
Software Patents during the Agriculture and Fisheries meeting. Is there
something they don't want us to see ?



Regards,
Gabriel.
http://lives.sourceforge.net


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