What Will Happen To xf86-video-nv In 2010?

[BlueJayofEvil]

Patents aren't something you can ignore when you work in companies, anyone who thinks they are is just stupid and i invite them to start a company and ignore them.

Just thought I'd chime in here with an article I found awhile back regarding what you just said. Here's the link.

Not saying I agree or disagree, just thought that it would add some perspective.

[yesterday]

First, this should be read (and be written) as

blah blah blah

Don't be daft.

Software Patents are currently enforced in USA, UK, Canada, Japan, EU, and Australia. Now what percentage of business would you reckon Novell/Red Hat/Mandriva etc. get from these regions?


And if you actually read the thread, you would have noticed that it was mentioned that Theora hw accell was in the pipeline... I doubt anyone would care though because I doubt there is even a single person on the this forum who has >60% of videos encoded in Theora

[yesterday]

You still seem to miss the "Most Linux users playing movie are playing dodgy legal rips of content from other sources" which is a lame excuse as there is NOTHING dodgy about playing rips in many many countries or even the process of creating them. You like to concern yourself on the codecs patents issue however there are even legal means to do that as well through end user purchasable codecs. Many distro's have been offering this for quite some time now.

No.

All rips are dodgy UNLESS they are made with a codec you specifically have a license to use for encoding. Ripping your DVDs or your TV captures with x264 is technically illegal because no one has the right to distribute x264. You cannot use ffmpeg or mplayer for the same reasons legally because legally they don't have the right to distribute any of the popular codec implementations, decoding or encoding.

Yes, Fluendo offer decoders for popular codecs, but then, like CoreAVC, Fluendo should be responsible for making them run efficiently.

[dfx.]

No company can legally distribute any software that involves the playback of any of the most popular video codecs with purchasing a license.

First, this should be read (and be written) as

No company can legally distribute any software that involves the playback of any of the most popular patented video codecs with purchasing a license on territory of USA or any other patent-slavery country which are not the whole world.

Second, there are now open, truly open video formats, so justifying poor state of common api for video acceleration by "pirate" nonsense is utterly moronic. "Period".

Third, i don't believe that Red Hat's main market is home PCs. But i do believe that in "business" with paid support customers would be glad to be able to watch videos in many formats in best quality anyway. And they (customers) even could... Pay!... for patent bullshitism if they must.

[deanjo]

I didn't miss the comment. Either you chose to simplfy the argument for the sake of your ad hominem or you have completely misunderstood why a DVD player cannot be distributed.

No company can legally distribute any software that involves the playback of any of the most popular video codecs with purchasing a license. Period. Doesn't matter if it's legal DVDs, dodgy rips, or even your own legal rips. Red Hat cannot ship a DVD player because they cannot distibute MPEG2 decoders. MPEG2 is a patented video codec licensed by the MPEG-LA. They cannot even ship a DVD player that plays unencrypted streams because they still don't have a license for the codec.

You mentioned HD streams from cameras and the like, which means you obviously are unaware of the patent issues. Most (all?) HD cameras are either using MPEG2 or MPEG4-AVC. Guess what, MPEG4-AVC is also patent encumbered. Red Hat cannot ship with MPEG4-AVC codecs without purchasing a license from MPEG-LA. Youtube? MPEG4-AVC.

Nothing to do with DRM what so ever

You still seem to miss the "Most Linux users playing movie are playing dodgy legal rips of content from other sources" which is a lame excuse as there is NOTHING dodgy about playing rips in many many countries or even the process of creating them. You like to concern yourself on the codecs patents issue however there are even legal means to do that as well through end user purchasable codecs. Many distro's have been offering this for quite some time now.

[yotambien]

In light of this, how exactly are companies like Red Hat supposed to justify spending time (money) on implementing better support for video formats they cannot even legally distribute?

Most countries have a road speed limit of about 120 Km/h. I wonder how car manufacturers justify spending billions in pushing their engines even further in the way of ilegality. Maybe because that's what their customers want, regardless of what the actual speed limits are? If Red Hat customers are not interested in vido playback--understandable given the scope of their product--it makes no sense to put much effort in it. The rest are rationalisations to justify I don't know what, really.

[yesterday]

Seems you completely missed the comment that it was in response to.

I didn't miss the comment. Either you chose to simplfy the argument for the sake of your ad hominem or you have completely misunderstood why a DVD player cannot be distributed.

No company can legally distribute any software that involves the playback of any of the most popular video codecs with purchasing a license. Period. Doesn't matter if it's legal DVDs, dodgy rips, or even your own legal rips. Red Hat cannot ship a DVD player because they cannot distibute MPEG2 decoders. MPEG2 is a patented video codec licensed by the MPEG-LA. They cannot even ship a DVD player that plays unencrypted streams because they still don't have a license for the codec.

You mentioned HD streams from cameras and the like, which means you obviously are unaware of the patent issues. Most (all?) HD cameras are either using MPEG2 or MPEG4-AVC. Guess what, MPEG4-AVC is also patent encumbered. Red Hat cannot ship with MPEG4-AVC codecs without purchasing a license from MPEG-LA. Youtube? MPEG4-AVC.

Nothing to do with DRM what so ever

[deanjo]

If you can't understand the difference between the copyrights and patents, maybe you should just keep your mouth shut about the subject. You clearly have absolutely no idea what you are talking about. DMCA??? BTW, Software patents are enforced in the U.S, Canada, the EU, Australia, and the U.K. Pretty big market don't you think...

Seems you completely missed the comment that it was in response to.

For example at Red Hat we can't ship a DVD player with our OS, so why the hell would we invest money in tearfree movie playing? Most Linux users playing movie are playing dodgy legal rips of content from other sources, its not something we get much paying customer demand for at all.

[yesterday]

Or maybe because of attitudes like that they see no point in doing anything. And ripping content itself isn't illegal. It's breaking the DRM in the process that is illegal. It is quite easy to preserve the DRM when ripping it.

Also, perhaps I record TV shows from my TV Tuner, again, VDPAU/VA-API support would still be useful.

The fact you are assuming illegal usage of such features is horrible and quite frankly, hogwash.

Great, another ignorant rant. I'll try to put you straight:

1)Using libdvdcss to decode your dvd file IS breaking DRM. Did you think DVD John paid for content key from the DVD Authoring Authority and used it in his open source code? No, he cracked the shit encryption scheme.

2) By definition it is impossible to "preserve" the encryption and still have unencrypted access to the original stream. If it was, the very basic foundations of encryption would be void. At some stage of the decoding process, the stream will need to be unencrypted

3) Aside from DRM concerns, there is still the issue of patents. Most audio and video codecs are patent encumbered. You cannot legally distribute any h.264, Xvid, Dvix, MPEG2, AAC, or Mp3 decoders/encoders without obtaining a license from the owners of the patents. So even if you had a legally purchased DVD without CSS that you could play without breaking DRM, no "real" distribution (i.e. one backed by a company) could legally distribute the codecs required to play back the DVD.

In light of this, how exactly are companies like Red Hat supposed to justify spending time (money) on implementing better support for video formats they cannot even legally distribute? As Dave said, community developers may have to step up here, or companies like NVIDIA see a direct benefit to their business interests and provide some (albeit very specific) solution.

[yesterday]

Dave is pulling the company bullshit line that is quoted on the basis that the USA is the center of the universe and the DMCA covers it all despite the fact that it isn't the center of the universe and it only applies in a anal retentive country (politics wise) that couldn't see the sunshine if they dig 6 feet to get their heads out of their ass.

They are almost as bad as Toronto residents in that respect.

If you can't understand the difference between the copyrights and patents, maybe you should just keep your mouth shut about the subject. You clearly have absolutely no idea what you are talking about. DMCA??? BTW, Software patents are enforced in the U.S, Canada, the EU, Australia, and the U.K. Pretty big market don't you think...