“Addressing a call by Free Software Foundation Europe to use the open-source codec for plugin-free video, Jobs warned that it may infringe on patents and could face a lawsuit, though not necessarily from Apple,” Electronista reports. “He suggested that H.264 fit the definition of an open standard and admitted it wasn’t necessarily what open-source advocates would expect.”
Electronista reports, “‘All video codecs are covered by patents,’ Jobs wrote from his iPad. ‘A patent pool is being assembled to go after Theora and other ‘open source’ codecs now. Unfortunately, just because something is open source, it doesn’t mean or guarantee that it doesn’t infringe on others patents. An open standard is different from being royalty free or open source.'”
Full article here.
what is an open latter?
I can’t tell what an open latter is either,
but it has a nice rung to it.
The opposite of an open former.
People are screaming…. The doors have opened.
@T
An Open Latter is obviously an Ogg Letter.
http://webkit.sed.hu/blog/20100427/what-are-javascript-and-svg-good-built-flash-engine
Steve Jobs is king of the World.
http://wiki.github.com/tobeytailor/gordon/
Of course, Apple critics are still insisting that “Thoughts on Flash” is, in fact, a closed letter from Steve Jobs – not an “open” one.
I’m gonna open another beer.
H.264, MPEG-4, Theora, Vorbis, Speex, FLAC, Dirac codec and Ogg, Matroska containers.
“Of course, developers can rely on the H.264 codec and hardware acceleration support of the underlying operating system, like Windows 7, without paying any additional royalty.”
But they will need to purchase a licence to encode their content for commercial uses, esp. after the grace period (2016).
Patent Pool Being Assembled To Go After Theora
Well, this certainly explains a whole lot. Both Apple and Microsoft have stated that the legality of Theora is highly debatable, and as it turns out, they knew more than we do – most likely courtesy of their close involvement with the MPEG-LA. Responding to an email from Free Software Foundation Europe activist Hugo Roy, Steve Jobs has stated that a patent pool is being assembled to go after Theora.
@ T, Monger, ChrissyOne, iQuack et al
An open letter is one which is published openly rather than sent directly to the recipient as a private communiqué.
Here are two examples:
One from Steve to the World at large
And one from Hugo Roy to Steve
Authors tend to use open letters in an inclusive way to encourage a response to a topical issue by invoking a debate in the public gaze, rather than a private approach which may be ignored by the recipient.
@Sir Gill Bates: make mine a Boddingtons!
Adobe Implement H264 Acceleration for Flash on Mac OS X
I think it’s about time we got an Adobe category. Apple recently made public an API to allow OS X software access to hardware H.264 acceleration (albeit such acceleration is only available on chipsets since the Nvidia 9400M–early 2008) and Adobe have already baked this in to a beta preview of Flash 10.1 “Gala”! Update: Steve Jobs himself weighs in on Flash (via Engadget): “New open standards created in the mobile era, such as HTML5, will win on mobile devices (and PCs too). Perhaps Adobe should focus more on creating great HTML5 tools for the future, and less on criticizing Apple for leaving the past behind.”
We’ve talked about this on OSNews in quite some detail already. H264 is no better than Flash. This video codec is proprietary and patented up the wazzoo, and therefore, wholly incompatible with the very concept of an open standard. To make matters much, much worse, the licensing body that oversees H264, the MPEG-LA, has stated in no uncertain terms that they will not hesitate to sue ordinary users for using the video codec.
C1
I saw the Doors in September 1968 in San Diego. It was groovy! But it was the Chambers Brothers opening the show.
Well, this was about as inevitable as Apple not losing a super-secret iPhone prototype: Google and Adobe have pretty much formed an alliance against the iPhone, in true the-enemy-of-my-enemy-is-my-friend style. The agreement between the two companies is clearly a big middle finger towards Apple and the iPhone. Update: Apple has finally added a framework to Mac OS X that will enable accelerated Flash video content – something Adobe has been asking for. This should enable Adobe to greatly improve Flash video performance on Mac OS
Never walk under an Open Latter!
@ting. Sure I know what an open letter is but what is an open latter.
Adobe is using Theora H.264 in the Flash container… for Gala – and Google Android.
Go get them – Steve – they bad – ain’t they….
Flash video most often these days is a container that contains h.264 video. Saying that h.264 is no better than Flash, is like saying Shell gas is no better than a BMW gas tank. One has nothing to do with each other. Now if you said Flash vs say a HTML5/Javascript player i mplementation I might understand (but still disagree).
@ Ting,
Had to look it up on Wikipedia; sounds interesting. If it’s as good as Guinness I’m sure I’d enjoy it.
omg:
I don’t know what was discussed at OSNews, but what you are saying is simply NOT true. Adobe is the sole owner of the proprietary Flash technology. It is them, and only them (i.e. one SINGLE company) who decides who gets to use Flash and who doesn’t. Mac users have many years of frustration as proof how well this works; ever since Adobe went Windows, Mac became neglected and disregarded, and products were never on par. Meanwhile, MPEG-LA is a company that manages patent pools for MPEG standards. These are NOT property of any ONE company; these are OPEN standards, and MPEG-LA handles licensing for patented components. The company’s motivation is to provide license to EVERYONE who requests it.
Open-source proponents often (deliberately?) confuse terms ‘open standard’ and ‘open-source’. Open source generally means that no fee can be charged for a license to use the technology, while open standard allows using patented technologies. The open standards are different from proprietary standards in that open standards are accessible to anyone who is willing to pay for the necessary license, while proprietary (closed) standards are a property of a single company, which chooses what to do and whether to license the technology or not. Big difference.
@ Predrag
Should copy and paste that response on text edit. Simply because they will bring up the same point over and over and over again. Until it finally sinks in, if ever.