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Google’s YouTube Uses FFmpeg

multimedia.cx

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Re: Google’s YouTube Uses FFmpeg

#11

Post by nikcub »

wcoenen wrote: post #6

To me this illustrates that if you want to ensure that improvements to your code are shared back, you'd better use the AGPL license ( http://www.gnu.org/licenses/agpl.html ) instead of GPL. Quote from the AGPL preamble: It requires the operator of a network server to provide the source code of the modified version running there to the users of that server. Therefore, public use of a modified version, on a publicly ac…

Google won't touch or integrate anything that is GPL licensed into their own products - especially AGPL. the linux kernel in android is the only GPL code you will find from Google, and even then they got a lot of criticism from FSF folks for deciding to license modules under a more liberal license

So if you are a developer and want to see your own library and code used by corporates such as Google and many others, a more liberal license is the only way to go.

If it is a javascript library or a web application, again, a more liberal license is the way to go since the FSF insist that a script include means your entire app must be GPL.

Using copyright law to force corporations and developers to become contributors and active participants in your software project is, to me, a ridiculous notion.

Re: Google’s YouTube Uses FFmpeg

#12

Post by joelthelion »

jforman wrote: post #9
wcoenen wrote: post #6

To me this illustrates that if you want to ensure that improvements to your code are shared back, you'd better use the AGPL license ( http://www.gnu.org/licenses/agpl.html ) instead of GPL. Quote from the AGPL preamble: It requires the operator of a network server to provide the source code of the modified version running there to the users of that server. Therefore, public use of a modified version, on a publicly ac…

On the other hand, many companies avoid using AGPL code altogether. Code that isn't used can't be improved.

If they avoid it, it's because they are not ready to share the code. Thus their using the code is pretty much useless in the first place...

Re: Google’s YouTube Uses FFmpeg

#13

Post by robterrell »

I don't want to be snarky in response to an ffmpeg developer, because I love ffmpeg and respect his contributions, but still, this is not exactly news. The explosion of the entire category of "video sharing sites based on Flash" happened right after ffmpeg added FLV support.

That was the missing piece -- before that, you could only convert videos to FLV using Adobe's proprietary (and expensive and crappy and GUI-based, not command-line) tools. ffmpeg provided the missing chunk of the pipeline, and a lot of people had the exact same "aha!" moment, and within a short time a bunch of sites like launched (or converted to a Flash video player from a crappy "Click here for WMV, Click here for QT, now wait a good long time" experience).

ffmpeg didn't just help YouTube, it helped make the entire category of video-sharing websites go big.

Re: Google’s YouTube Uses FFmpeg

#14

Post by hyperbovine »

rbanffy wrote: post #10

Well... I also use FFmpeg to encode all the video that's presented on th iG (a large Brazilian portal+ISP) channel in Sony and LG internet-enabled TVs. It works really well. If any FFmpeg developer is reading this, thank you for making our product possible. If you ever come to Brazil, the beer is on us.

I recommend Skol.

Re: Google’s YouTube Uses FFmpeg

#15

Post by pornel »

barkingcat wrote: post #5
samarudge wrote: post #3

I was under the impression (though I may be wrong) most standard video types are converted by some in-house closed source software developed by Google, but then if it's an odd/obscure format their software can't process they fall back on FFMPEG. Even if they do use FFMPEG I'd guess it's heavily modified to suit their needs/infastructure

Why would google want to reengineer and build closed sourced video converters? Especially when you need to pay multimillion dollar licensing fees to mpegla et al to even try to do such a thing.

If you touch a patented codec (in a country where software patents apply), you need to pay for patent license regardless whether you wrote the code yourself or not. Google must be paying for H.264 encoding already.

> Why would google want to reengineer and build closed sourced video converters?

To adapt them for their infrastructure and trade-offs. They are transcoding a lot of video. Zencoder for example modified their transcoders to encode multiple formats from a single decoded stream (I presume with ffmpeg you'd end up decoding same video multiple time during transcode into multiple formats).

Re: Google’s YouTube Uses FFmpeg

#16

Post by _delirium »

nikcub wrote: post #11
wcoenen wrote: post #6

To me this illustrates that if you want to ensure that improvements to your code are shared back, you'd better use the AGPL license ( http://www.gnu.org/licenses/agpl.html ) instead of GPL. Quote from the AGPL preamble: It requires the operator of a network server to provide the source code of the modified version running there to the users of that server. Therefore, public use of a modified version, on a publicly ac…

Google won't touch or integrate anything that is GPL licensed into their own products - especially AGPL. the linux kernel in android is the only GPL code you will find from Google, and even then they got a lot of criticism from FSF folks for deciding to license modules under a more liberal license So if you are a developer and want to see your own library and code used by corporates such as Google and many others, a…

It seems like a personal choice to me. If you want companies to use your code internally, and are okay with the fact that they might make improvements that they don't release back (or think that voluntary releases will be sufficient), then GPL or BSD/MIT is fine. If you don't want to allow for proprietary forks of stuff used in webapp backends, then AGPL is a better choice. If you have a different set of preferences about how people use your code than either of those, you can keep it proprietary and just negotiate custom licenses with potential users.

AGPL seems like a particularly reasonable choice if you're running a SaaS and want to release your code, but also want to make sure no competitor can use your code as a starting point from which to leapfrog you without releasing the improvements back for your own use. That's the approach gitorious takes, for example. Of course, the other way to keep competitors from leapfrogging you with your own code is not to release it at all, or release it with a proprietary license--- the approach github and Dropbox and many other SaaS take. From that perspective, AGPL is at least more liberal a license than the "no code release" license.

Re: Google’s YouTube Uses FFmpeg

#17

Post by MrJagil »

VLC is able to playback RoQ as well apparently. It was not able to skip through the video though. Also the film is 27 seconds but VLC displayed it as 1:46.

In any case, VLC can handle stuff like RoQ and that is why I love it.

Re: Google’s YouTube Uses FFmpeg

#18

Post by mseebach »

joelthelion wrote: post #12
jforman wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

On the other hand, many companies avoid using AGPL code altogether. Code that isn't used can't be improved.

If they avoid it, it's because they are not ready to share the code. Thus their using the code is pretty much useless in the first place...

There are two kinds of enhancements to consider: Enhancements that are specific to your product and enhancements that are general to the library you're incorporating.

If Rails had been AGPL, every single webapp based on Rails would have to have its source code released. Now, Rails is not AGPL, does that mean that anybody using Rails (and not making their entire project open source) are "useless"? The vibrancy of the Rails community seems to disagree with that assessment.

Re: Google’s YouTube Uses FFmpeg

#19

Post by wcoenen »

nikcub wrote: post #11
wcoenen wrote: post #6

To me this illustrates that if you want to ensure that improvements to your code are shared back, you'd better use the AGPL license ( http://www.gnu.org/licenses/agpl.html ) instead of GPL. Quote from the AGPL preamble: It requires the operator of a network server to provide the source code of the modified version running there to the users of that server. Therefore, public use of a modified version, on a publicly ac…

Google won't touch or integrate anything that is GPL licensed into their own products - especially AGPL. the linux kernel in android is the only GPL code you will find from Google, and even then they got a lot of criticism from FSF folks for deciding to license modules under a more liberal license So if you are a developer and want to see your own library and code used by corporates such as Google and many others, a…

> Google won't touch or integrate anything that is GPL licensed into their own products

ffmpeg is GPL, and it is being used in youtube. Isn't that the story here?

> Using copyright law to force corporations and developers to become contributors and active participants in your software project is, to me, a ridiculous notion.

So the fact that so many companies contribute to the Linux kernel has nothing to do with its GPL license?

Without the GPL there would be a "tragedy of the commons" situation: it would be best for the common good to share and avoid duplicated efforts, but it would be advantageous for individual companies to use the code but not share their improvements. The GPL fixes that by enforcing cooperation.

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