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MPEG-2 Patents Have Expired

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Re: MPEG-2 Patents Have Expired

#121

Post by seer »

Solar19 wrote: post #93
amluto wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Abolish it entirely. I'm not really kidding. I think that evidence that patents are beneficial in any field is lacking. Alternatively, a few major reforms would help. For example: 1. Decrease patent terms to just a few years in most fields. 2. Make it clear that math, in any form, is not patentable. Codec patents, for example, should never have been valid. 3. Eliminate submarine patents. Specifically, require patent…

I agree with some of this, and I think most software patents are garbage and should not be legally permitted. But I'm stuck on codecs. Codecs are real, as real as a bag of apples. And they're complicated, extremely specific (and necessarily formally specified), and the result of a lot of work, sometimes brilliant work. If there's any software that has a chance of convincing me of patent worthiness, it's probably code…

OK lets say we abolish patents tomorrow, and companies do what they did before - start using trade sicrets and copyrigt law. Netflix/Google/Apple/Amazon team up to create a great new codec that can only be used as a binary blob, because its compiled obfuscated etc. - something like what the game industry uses right now to protect games.

People start poking around to figure out how it works, because hackers are curious folks like that, some code gets leaked at some point, and someone starts doing codecs as open source, for fun and fame. Said companies use that os and improve on it, crating the next generation.

Now iterate this a few dosen times and what I think companies would figure out its easier to just team up and outsource this kind of stuff. Or maybe we’ll see what happened in the game engine world - with only copyright protecting the code - devs would not be able to use “the exact same code” but could incorporate new techniques at will, limited only by their brilliance.

And then there will be paid and OS ones, but the paid ones will have reasonable terms because of strong competition from other paid or OS codecs. In any case I think it would be an improvement to the current situation.

Re: MPEG-2 Patents Have Expired

#122

Post by clouddrover »

Solar19 wrote: post #93
amluto wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Abolish it entirely. I'm not really kidding. I think that evidence that patents are beneficial in any field is lacking. Alternatively, a few major reforms would help. For example: 1. Decrease patent terms to just a few years in most fields. 2. Make it clear that math, in any form, is not patentable. Codec patents, for example, should never have been valid. 3. Eliminate submarine patents. Specifically, require patent…

I agree with some of this, and I think most software patents are garbage and should not be legally permitted. But I'm stuck on codecs. Codecs are real, as real as a bag of apples. And they're complicated, extremely specific (and necessarily formally specified), and the result of a lot of work, sometimes brilliant work. If there's any software that has a chance of convincing me of patent worthiness, it's probably code…

> Now some companies have teamed up for AV1, FOSS. I guess we'll see how good it is compared to HEVC.

Here are some comparisons between AV1, VP9, HEVC, and H.264:

http://www.streamingmedia.com/Articles/News/Online-Video-New...

Whether or not VP9 beats HEVC, its advantages are that it beats H.264, can be used without the licensing headaches of HEVC (or H.264), and has double the decoder base of HEVC:

https://ngcodec.com/news/2017/10/21/why-we-are-supporting-vp...

You can use VP9 and Opus for video today with a view to using AV1 and Opus in the future.

Re: MPEG-2 Patents Have Expired

#123

Post by akerro »

herogreen wrote: post #10

I wonder if this will affect the existence of the Raspberry Pi's binary blob ? I remember Liz Upton saying "[MPEG2 licensing] is a reason we have to keep the blob, unfortunately, or we’d be sued into a smoking hole in the ground by the MPEG LA" on this page: https://www.raspberrypi.org/blog/a-birthday-present-from-bro... Also does it mean that the Raspberry Fundation could provide the MPEG2 hardware decoder license k…

A comment from reddit where I asked the same question:

No, even if patent expired those companies won't want to surrender their income. And there's nothing preventing them for charging for their decoder if people are willing to pay for it.

And if raspberry would have to provide these keys they would have to break their security scheme which would still be like breaking DRM.

What expired patent means is that anyone else can implement their encoder/decoder legally, so perhaps future raspberry pi will have different implementation of the decoder that doesn't require keys.

This is very much the same thing as with medication, you have brand name medication which is pricy, patent expires and much cheaper versions enter the market, but even then you can still purchase the brand version and pay more. There might still be minor differences.

https://www.reddit.com/r/linux/comments/7xjqy5/mpeg2_patents...

Re: MPEG-2 Patents Have Expired

#124

Post by taeric »

astrange wrote: post #97
taeric wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My understanding from a long time ago was that the formats were actually competitive if you consider computation requirements. Size of the data was larger, but not by so much that it was scary. There a good modern comparison of the formats?

This isn't far off especially if you count on-CPU decoding. MPEG2 is sensible for the time, but can't scale to larger pixel resolutions or lower bitrates well. The generation after MPEG2 (VP7, MPEG4 ASP, Theora) though, pretty much sucked universally and there was no good reason for it… second-system effect?

This makes me realize how behind I am. The generation you mention as being bad is what I think of as latest generation. :)

Re: MPEG-2 Patents Have Expired

#125

Post by acd »

I think software patents are unfair because companies claim monopoly or a license fee. Patented software will be built on previous software work so they are not unique pieces of inventions that stand on their own shoulders.

Shortly software patents wants sole right use while building on others software work. Claiming fees for previous inventions.

Software should compete on skill of implementation and not legal departments. Thus patents can also be viewed as anti competitive. Whereas big companies with legal departments/ patent trolls can go after smaller competitors.

Re: MPEG-2 Patents Have Expired

#126

Post by clouddrover »

seer wrote: post #121
Solar19 wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree with some of this, and I think most software patents are garbage and should not be legally permitted. But I'm stuck on codecs. Codecs are real, as real as a bag of apples. And they're complicated, extremely specific (and necessarily formally specified), and the result of a lot of work, sometimes brilliant work. If there's any software that has a chance of convincing me of patent worthiness, it's probably code…

OK lets say we abolish patents tomorrow, and companies do what they did before - start using trade sicrets and copyrigt law. Netflix/Google/Apple/Amazon team up to create a great new codec that can only be used as a binary blob, because its compiled obfuscated etc. - something like what the game industry uses right now to protect games. People start poking around to figure out how it works, because hackers are curiou…

> Netflix/Google/Apple/Amazon team up to create a great new codec that can only be used as a binary blob

But the practical reality is that these companies are doing the exact opposite with AV1:

http://aomedia.org/

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AV1

The Alliance for Open Media was formed because royalty-free audio and video formats save everyone time and money, particularly in the context of the complicated licensing terms for HEVC.

Netflix, Google, Apple, and Amazon all do business on the web and the W3C's royalty-free patent policy benefits everyone:

https://www.w3.org/Consortium/Patent-Policy-20170801/

Re: MPEG-2 Patents Have Expired

#127

Post by rjplatte »

ttsda wrote: post #100
Houshalter wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Bandwidth and storage have been slowing down and stagnating for some time now. My internet isn't much faster than 10 years ago. The difference between video codecs makes a huge difference in the quality of video I get to see.

My internet is way faster compared to 2008. Probably had something like 10Mbps back then, paying less for 1Gbps fiber-to-the-home now.

You're lucky. I have 100mbps Spectrum, but I've visited a number of slightly more rural areas and been shocked by how truly horrible the network was. 5-6 mbps.

Re: MPEG-2 Patents Have Expired

#128

Post by stordoff »

digi_owl wrote: post #98
digi_owl wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And likely never will be. Newer codecs basically exist because video resolutions outpace storage space (for questionable benefits). MPEG2, much like MP3, are "good enough" for most common usage.

And people completely gloss over the "good enough" part, and head straight to arguing bitrates and resolutions. Pop quiz hotshots, why did the CD become a big hit, but the DVD-A died a quiet death? Answer, because there was no convenience to be had with upgrading! The CD was a massive improvement of convenience over the cassette tape or LP record. Now you could instantly find the one song you wanted, and skip between…

> Answer, because there was no convenience to be had with upgrading!

If anything, DVD-A was a convenience _downgrade_. People already had CD players (and upgrading to DVD-A would provide little-to-no audible upgrade anyway), plus you have copy-protection controlling acceptable output formats and preventing ripping.

Re: MPEG-2 Patents Have Expired

#129

Post by reacweb »

mmozeiko wrote: post #91
userbinator wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm actually surprised that that hasn't been cracked yet --- or at least, a quick search didn't find anything (do let me know otherwise!); as we all know too well these days, Google isn't particularly neutral in terms of what search results it wants to show anymore. That said, the RPi being the closed system it is, it's not surprising that no real hacker/cracker types would bother with it and the community remains ma…

It is cracked. Here's a simple patch: https://www.reddit.com/r/raspberry_pi/comments/5x7xbo/patch_...

Do you mean that enabling the Pi's hardware decoding of MPEG-2 and VC-1 video files without paying for a license key just requires to patch a single byte with this command ?

cd /boot ; cp start.elf start.elf_backup && perl -pne 's/\x47\xE9362H\x3C\x18/\x47\xE9362H\x3C\x1F/g' start.elf

Re: MPEG-2 Patents Have Expired

#130

Post by cornholio »

kanzure wrote: post #108
Solar19 wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why should patent holders have to show "progress"? Isn't the invention enough? Would they have to invent more or advance it further? Or do you mean commercial progress, making money, building it, etc.? The latter is called "working the patent", which is the opposite of what patent predators, née trolls do. Apparently some countries require holders to work the patent, and I'm a big supporter of fundamental patent refo…

> Your percentage of profits idea is something I liked for a while when I was thinking a lot about reform, but I now think that it would be way too hard to enforce. You could just do a general per industry tax, which I proposed here a few years ago: https://groups.google.com/d/msg/openmanufacturing/vS4ju1VqXb...

If I understand correctly, you propose a tax that everybody in the industry pays, that is shared with all relevant "inventors". I don't think it's a workable sistem since it removes the free market from the distribution and replace it with a committee driven disbursal of fees, offering little incentive to disclose valuable ideas.

I would much rather see a large patent fee with annual inflation indexing for the patent holder. If it costs you 1 million USD each year to hold a patent, then you only acquire one for major, truly revolutionary ideas that will easily recoup that money. It's a sum that can easily be fitted in the budget of any significant research and development program, yet prohibitive for most submarine, defensive, or warchest IP operations.

A large anual fee forces you to "work" the patent, either directly or by licensing it. If you are not sure if your "idea" is valuable, then you don't deserve a patent.

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