Interoperability of web media content is a far far more important issue than the third party distribution of Firefox. H.264 has proven to be the superior codec technology. This is just all ideology for Mozilla.
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Originally Posted by lfmorrison
But the problem remains that if Firefox purchased a patent license for H.264, it would likely only cover copies of Firefox obtained directly from Mozilla. Third-party redistribution would not include conveyance of the necessary patent license (because Mozilla would not have permission to convey it) and therefore anybody who made use of a 3rd-party redistributed copy of Firefox would be in possession of the unlicensed H.264 codec contained therein. The copyright license (provided by Mozilla) really doesn't have anything to do with the patent license (provided by the MPEG-LA).
How, exactly, isn't it an issue? It their starting point is promoting openness, and this patent prevents them from achieving openness, then that seems like a pretty fundamental roadblock to me.
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How, exactly, isn't it an issue? It their starting point is their ideology, and this patent prevents them from being ideologically pure, then that seems like a pretty fundamental roadblock to me.
That's actually been Mozilla's chiefs' argument all along, notwithstanding all the noise that had been generated from outside sources.
The trouble is, Mozilla is committed to using its own internally-managed decoding software for all <video> tag content. They justify this on a couple of grounds:
1) Ensure the behaviour is consistent across all platforms that run Firefox, without needing to depend on the trustworthiness or consistency of the 3rd party video decoder software/hardware that happens to be installed in certain systems ("codec hell" as a parallel to the infamous Windows "DLL hell").
2) Ensure that the content will play back even on older (but still-supported) operating systems (such as Windows XP), which may not have the necessary video codecs installed at all.
Therefore, if Firefox was to support H.264 video, then it would have to ship a software codec implementing H.264 along with each copy of the browser, regardless of whether or not the target OS/platform already had built-in H.264 support. And they would have to purchase a license for each copy of such codec.
(This, by the way, is one of the reasons why Google allows anybody to download Chrome directly from Google's servers, but users are prohibited from sharing the Chrome binary amongst themselves -- Google has taken the same strategy as Firefox regarding embedding the <video> tage codec software inside the browser itself, and Google has purchased a license for that codec... But the license Google purchased doesn't cover 3rd party redistribution of the codec. The open-source "Chromium" browser from which Chrome is derived, has the source code for H.264 video disabled by default.)
Thanks for the info.
Is there no effort to create a plug-in (or hack) that allows Firefox to play AVC in the browser, and use the HW decoder so prominent among machines these days?
I love the clever wordplay Apple's been able to get so much traction with in the lay press. By stating over and over again that h.264 has no "royalty fees", they manage to keep the discussion away from the other fees that continue to exist for its use that are simply applied under other names.
According to one source who's looked into it, that fee-that-isn't-called-a-royalty-fee is US$5,000,000.00:
I love the clever wordplay Apple's been able to get so much traction with in the lay press. By stating over and over again that h.264 has no "royalty fees", they manage to keep the discussion away from the other fees that continue to exist for its use that are simply applied under other names.
According to one source who's looked into it, that fee-that-isn't-called-a-royalty-fee is US$5,000,000.00:
Drop in the bucket in Mozilla's budget. (Until Google eventually cuts off funding, of course.) This has nothing to do with money for them, it's all about ideology, which you would know if you were reading the ecclesiastical press.
If HTML5 is going to take over Flash for video content delivery by the big media companies, it needs to have DRM. We all don't like DRM, but the content creators do. There are other choices, but Flash isn't going anywhere anytime soon.
At one point I think HTML5 is going to be (or already is?) advanced enough to be able to handle custom developed encryption.
Trouble is, an open source distribution where a core feature is proprietary is really no different than a proprietary distribution -- anybody who tried to exercise their right of redistribution would be left without access to the proprietary core feature.
Then you download the proprietary h.264 plugin from Mozilla's site just like you do for a gazillion other useful plugins for firefox.
IE9 will use whatever codecs are installed in the operating system to render its HTML5 video. If you install a WebM codec in your operating system, then IE9 will use the WebM codec to render HTML5 content as necessary.
The assertion was that MS was going to drag its heels on supporting H.264.
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And its copyright distribution license is open source. In other news, the sky is blue. So what?
Exactly, so what? The point is that the IP for webkit is based on copyright protection so the fact that WebKit is open source doesn't really support his position all that much vis a vis patent protections.
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The free patent grant is for content distribution only. Ie, it grants permission for people to use the codec to non-commercially distribute content that happens to be compressed using H.264 technology.
True. The major browser makers may/will have to pay a fee. On the other hand, unless Google will indemnify you from patent suits then VP8 is probably more risky an alternative. Note that while Google will claim it's unencumbered it isn't offering indemnity unless I missed something recently.
This make no sense. If it changes so quickly then the inventions in the patents must become obsolete just as quickly so the term is irrelevant.
Patents have always been an attempt to strike a balance between giving an incentive to invent and making good inventions available to the general public.
A patent, by design, prevents competitors from profiting from an invention, even if it is an improvement to the original. The patent holder must be compensated, which adds to the cost and even the ability of the newer invention to reach the market.
What I'm saying is that 20 years for the world to wait for Sony's Trinitron TV technology was one thing, but the idea that Amazon's One-Click or Adobe Photoshop palettes warrant the same wait is ridiculous. Locking out software improvements for that long is excessive and counter-productive.
Then you download the proprietary h.264 plugin from Mozilla's site just like you do for a gazillion other useful plugins for firefox.
Indeed, don't you have to download a Flash plugin? That certainly isn't open source either.
And I must say Firefox is my least used browser, it gets quite annoying, in fact I only open it to encode Ogg video so I can put html5 video on the websites I create. I usually use Safari and sometimes Chrome. But Firefox has fallen off my browser list and I tell my clients to use Chrome if they are on Windows instead of Firefox. That is a shame, I don't like Google, but their browser is much better than Firefox.
This is such a non-issue, blown into an issue, just to justify Mozilla's ideology. Ideology is fine, but when it takes over the controls, you know you're in big trouble. The only one that's going to get burned by this ideological pureness is Mozilla, and that giant sucking sound you hear is Google vacuuming off Mozilla's user base.
isn't <<< 264 >>> a stop gap > go between solution until some fantastic brand new worldwide video playback 3d coding is created ??? that will also kill off flash for ever ??
Exactly, so what? The point is that the IP for webkit is based on copyright protection so the fact that WebKit is open source doesn't really support his position all that much vis a vis patent protections.
WebKit itself doesn't decode <video> tags on its own, so the video patent licenses don't come into play at all. It passes it down to another layer.
In Safari, it passes <video> tags down to QuickTime. In Google Chrome, it passes <video> tags down to a private copy of ffmpeg statically compiled into the browser binary. In the open-source alternative Google Chromium, it also passes <video> tags down to ffmgeg, but by default it filters out H.264 content and discards it to avoid incurring patent trouble.
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True. The major browser makers may/will have to pay a fee. On the other hand, unless Google will indemnify you from patent suits then VP8 is probably more risky an alternative. Note that while Google will claim it's unencumbered it isn't offering indemnity unless I missed something recently.
They have an interesting strategy -- if anybody files suit against anybody else for the use of patented technology within VP8, then Google will revoke that person's license to use any other related, Google-owned patents. I said a while ago that I was curious whether or not Google owned any patents that could be related to both VP8 and H.264 -- if they do, then they could use that as ammunition.
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Then you download the proprietary h.264 plugin from Mozilla's site just like you do for a gazillion other useful plugins for firefox.
Mozilla seems to be of the opinion that, because the <video> tag is pure HTML5 markup, it should be possible to render it in-browser without the aid of any external code. They view the need to load plugins to display video as a "bad thing", and therefore they consider this <video> tag to be a good opportunity to start the process of getting rid of such plug-ins.
Personally, I think there's nothing wrong with the idea of providing an extensible library of video codecs, with the ability for the user to add on extra codecs as time goes by, such as MS will be doing in IE9, provided proper provisions can be put in place ensure consistent compatibility and behaviour. (Hint: Apple, do the same with Safari!!!) But there should still be a base implementation that is guaranteed to work in any browser regardless of the presence or absence of 3rd party plugins. And it oughn't be patent-encumbered.
Comments
Interoperability of web media content is a far far more important issue than the third party distribution of Firefox. H.264 has proven to be the superior codec technology. This is just all ideology for Mozilla.
But the problem remains that if Firefox purchased a patent license for H.264, it would likely only cover copies of Firefox obtained directly from Mozilla. Third-party redistribution would not include conveyance of the necessary patent license (because Mozilla would not have permission to convey it) and therefore anybody who made use of a 3rd-party redistributed copy of Firefox would be in possession of the unlicensed H.264 codec contained therein. The copyright license (provided by Mozilla) really doesn't have anything to do with the patent license (provided by the MPEG-LA).
How, exactly, isn't it an issue? It their starting point is promoting openness, and this patent prevents them from achieving openness, then that seems like a pretty fundamental roadblock to me.
Translation:
How, exactly, isn't it an issue? It their starting point is their ideology, and this patent prevents them from being ideologically pure, then that seems like a pretty fundamental roadblock to me.
Yes, yes it is.
That's actually been Mozilla's chiefs' argument all along, notwithstanding all the noise that had been generated from outside sources.
The trouble is, Mozilla is committed to using its own internally-managed decoding software for all <video> tag content. They justify this on a couple of grounds:
1) Ensure the behaviour is consistent across all platforms that run Firefox, without needing to depend on the trustworthiness or consistency of the 3rd party video decoder software/hardware that happens to be installed in certain systems ("codec hell" as a parallel to the infamous Windows "DLL hell").
2) Ensure that the content will play back even on older (but still-supported) operating systems (such as Windows XP), which may not have the necessary video codecs installed at all.
Therefore, if Firefox was to support H.264 video, then it would have to ship a software codec implementing H.264 along with each copy of the browser, regardless of whether or not the target OS/platform already had built-in H.264 support. And they would have to purchase a license for each copy of such codec.
(This, by the way, is one of the reasons why Google allows anybody to download Chrome directly from Google's servers, but users are prohibited from sharing the Chrome binary amongst themselves -- Google has taken the same strategy as Firefox regarding embedding the <video> tage codec software inside the browser itself, and Google has purchased a license for that codec... But the license Google purchased doesn't cover 3rd party redistribution of the codec. The open-source "Chromium" browser from which Chrome is derived, has the source code for H.264 video disabled by default.)
Thanks for the info.
Is there no effort to create a plug-in (or hack) that allows Firefox to play AVC in the browser, and use the HW decoder so prominent among machines these days?
According to one source who's looked into it, that fee-that-isn't-called-a-royalty-fee is US$5,000,000.00:
http://www.osnews.com/story/22787/Mo...t_License_h264
I love the clever wordplay Apple's been able to get so much traction with in the lay press. By stating over and over again that h.264 has no "royalty fees", they manage to keep the discussion away from the other fees that continue to exist for its use that are simply applied under other names.
According to one source who's looked into it, that fee-that-isn't-called-a-royalty-fee is US$5,000,000.00:
http://www.osnews.com/story/22787/Mo...t_License_h264
Drop in the bucket in Mozilla's budget. (Until Google eventually cuts off funding, of course.) This has nothing to do with money for them, it's all about ideology, which you would know if you were reading the ecclesiastical press.
If HTML5 is going to take over Flash for video content delivery by the big media companies, it needs to have DRM. We all don't like DRM, but the content creators do. There are other choices, but Flash isn't going anywhere anytime soon.
At one point I think HTML5 is going to be (or already is?) advanced enough to be able to handle custom developed encryption.
Trouble is, an open source distribution where a core feature is proprietary is really no different than a proprietary distribution -- anybody who tried to exercise their right of redistribution would be left without access to the proprietary core feature.
Then you download the proprietary h.264 plugin from Mozilla's site just like you do for a gazillion other useful plugins for firefox.
IE9 will use whatever codecs are installed in the operating system to render its HTML5 video. If you install a WebM codec in your operating system, then IE9 will use the WebM codec to render HTML5 content as necessary.
The assertion was that MS was going to drag its heels on supporting H.264.
And its copyright distribution license is open source. In other news, the sky is blue. So what?
Exactly, so what? The point is that the IP for webkit is based on copyright protection so the fact that WebKit is open source doesn't really support his position all that much vis a vis patent protections.
The free patent grant is for content distribution only. Ie, it grants permission for people to use the codec to non-commercially distribute content that happens to be compressed using H.264 technology.
True. The major browser makers may/will have to pay a fee. On the other hand, unless Google will indemnify you from patent suits then VP8 is probably more risky an alternative. Note that while Google will claim it's unencumbered it isn't offering indemnity unless I missed something recently.
This is interesting reading.
http://x264dev.multimedia.cx/?p=377#more-377
I'm not totally opposed to software patents.
But given the rate of change in the software game, software patents should only last five years.
This make no sense. If it changes so quickly then the inventions in the patents must become obsolete just as quickly so the term is irrelevant.
This make no sense. If it changes so quickly then the inventions in the patents must become obsolete just as quickly so the term is irrelevant.
Patents have always been an attempt to strike a balance between giving an incentive to invent and making good inventions available to the general public.
A patent, by design, prevents competitors from profiting from an invention, even if it is an improvement to the original. The patent holder must be compensated, which adds to the cost and even the ability of the newer invention to reach the market.
What I'm saying is that 20 years for the world to wait for Sony's Trinitron TV technology was one thing, but the idea that Amazon's One-Click or Adobe Photoshop palettes warrant the same wait is ridiculous. Locking out software improvements for that long is excessive and counter-productive.
Then you download the proprietary h.264 plugin from Mozilla's site just like you do for a gazillion other useful plugins for firefox.
Indeed, don't you have to download a Flash plugin? That certainly isn't open source either.
And I must say Firefox is my least used browser, it gets quite annoying, in fact I only open it to encode Ogg video so I can put html5 video on the websites I create. I usually use Safari and sometimes Chrome. But Firefox has fallen off my browser list and I tell my clients to use Chrome if they are on Windows instead of Firefox. That is a shame, I don't like Google, but their browser is much better than Firefox.
This is such a non-issue, blown into an issue, just to justify Mozilla's ideology. Ideology is fine, but when it takes over the controls, you know you're in big trouble. The only one that's going to get burned by this ideological pureness is Mozilla, and that giant sucking sound you hear is Google vacuuming off Mozilla's user base.
isn't <<< 264 >>> a stop gap > go between solution until some fantastic brand new worldwide video playback 3d coding is created ??? that will also kill off flash for ever ??
9
9
Exactly, so what? The point is that the IP for webkit is based on copyright protection so the fact that WebKit is open source doesn't really support his position all that much vis a vis patent protections.
WebKit itself doesn't decode <video> tags on its own, so the video patent licenses don't come into play at all. It passes it down to another layer.
In Safari, it passes <video> tags down to QuickTime. In Google Chrome, it passes <video> tags down to a private copy of ffmpeg statically compiled into the browser binary. In the open-source alternative Google Chromium, it also passes <video> tags down to ffmgeg, but by default it filters out H.264 content and discards it to avoid incurring patent trouble.
True. The major browser makers may/will have to pay a fee. On the other hand, unless Google will indemnify you from patent suits then VP8 is probably more risky an alternative. Note that while Google will claim it's unencumbered it isn't offering indemnity unless I missed something recently.
They have an interesting strategy -- if anybody files suit against anybody else for the use of patented technology within VP8, then Google will revoke that person's license to use any other related, Google-owned patents. I said a while ago that I was curious whether or not Google owned any patents that could be related to both VP8 and H.264 -- if they do, then they could use that as ammunition.
Then you download the proprietary h.264 plugin from Mozilla's site just like you do for a gazillion other useful plugins for firefox.
Mozilla seems to be of the opinion that, because the <video> tag is pure HTML5 markup, it should be possible to render it in-browser without the aid of any external code. They view the need to load plugins to display video as a "bad thing", and therefore they consider this <video> tag to be a good opportunity to start the process of getting rid of such plug-ins.
Personally, I think there's nothing wrong with the idea of providing an extensible library of video codecs, with the ability for the user to add on extra codecs as time goes by, such as MS will be doing in IE9, provided proper provisions can be put in place ensure consistent compatibility and behaviour. (Hint: Apple, do the same with Safari!!!) But there should still be a base implementation that is guaranteed to work in any browser regardless of the presence or absence of 3rd party plugins. And it oughn't be patent-encumbered.