Recognizing this adds legitimacy to software patents. Don't. There have been free and open source MP3 decoders for many years now.
The licensing program for MP3-related patents has been terminated
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Re: The licensing program for MP3-related patents has been terminated
#12Recognizing this adds legitimacy to software patents. Don't. There have been free and open source MP3 decoders for many years now.
So you don't believe in software patents?
Re: The licensing program for MP3-related patents has been terminated
#13I'm curious about what advantages and benefits, if any, the patents brought to Fraunhofer. Other than making mp3 slightly more difficult to work with especially on Linux, did it benefit them in any way? Did them benefit society?
Coming at this from an "this is a real-life example of software patents being {good|bad}".
Re: The licensing program for MP3-related patents has been terminated
#14Recognizing this adds legitimacy to software patents. Don't. There have been free and open source MP3 decoders for many years now.
So you don't believe in software patents?
Software patents historically have been awarded for incredibly vague, "could-apply-to-nearly-anything" systems. As a result, there have been a lot of abuses of software patents by companies, both big and small.
Re: The licensing program for MP3-related patents has been terminated
#15I'm curious about what advantages and benefits, if any, the patents brought to Fraunhofer. Other than making mp3 slightly more difficult to work with especially on Linux, did it benefit them in any way? Did them benefit society? Coming at this from an "this is a real-life example of software patents being {good|bad}".
It made them a lot of money.
Re: The licensing program for MP3-related patents has been terminated
#16I'm curious about what advantages and benefits, if any, the patents brought to Fraunhofer. Other than making mp3 slightly more difficult to work with especially on Linux, did it benefit them in any way? Did them benefit society? Coming at this from an "this is a real-life example of software patents being {good|bad}".
Money, of course. All kind of companies (including megacorps) paid for it.
Even some private individuals like me (I think the company was called Fluendo?)
Re: The licensing program for MP3-related patents has been terminated
#17Does this mean that there should be no more need for Audacity to download the MP3 encoder from sourceforge?
Re: The licensing program for MP3-related patents has been terminated
#18I'm curious about what advantages and benefits, if any, the patents brought to Fraunhofer. Other than making mp3 slightly more difficult to work with especially on Linux, did it benefit them in any way? Did them benefit society? Coming at this from an "this is a real-life example of software patents being {good|bad}".
It made them a lot of money.
Were they involved in the creation of MP3?
Re: The licensing program for MP3-related patents has been terminated
#19Recognizing this adds legitimacy to software patents. Don't. There have been free and open source MP3 decoders for many years now.
So you don't believe in software patents?
All software can be reduced to mathematical formulae, which cannot be patented, so no. There should be no such thing as a software patent.
Re: The licensing program for MP3-related patents has been terminated
#20Recognizing this adds legitimacy to software patents. Don't. There have been free and open source MP3 decoders for many years now.
So you don't believe in software patents?
Software patents are bullshit.
A patent on an invention that many people would easily develop independently of one another should not, it is argued, be granted since this impedes development. [1]
1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Software_patent#Obviousness