H.264 / GStreamer Turned On For Firefox On Linux

[timothyja]

If you ask me, every software patent should be invalid. However, what matters is the opinion of the courts, and the invalidity of that patent has never been proclaimed there. MS is successfully extorting money from most Android hardware manufacturers in the world because of that patent. Even B&N settled with them (http://www.inquisitr.com/227573/micr...-barnes-noble/). MS wouldn't be getting all that undeserved money if their ludicrous patents were so easily invalidated.

Thankfully it is finally set to expire in 2015.

[Luke]

Mint has all codecs as it is not based in the US

Yes but for legal reasons it can't come from the official repository of the distribution. So you'll probably also need to add an extra repository. Yet more work for an unexperienced user to do such a basic task as watching YouTube, which is a problem that the HTML5 <video> tag was expected to solve.

There is a way to have HTLM5 work by default in a distro: base the distro in a place not subject to US patent law, and fight to make sure that country does not sign the TPP or TTIP trade deals. Mint is based in Ireland and simply ignores codec patents. They warn corporate users to use the "no codecs" version of the installer and advise everyone else to use the full-featured version. Want everything to just work by default? Use Mint! The other way would be to get everyone else not to use patented codecs, but we can't control them. I tried publishing audio files in .ogg in 2004, only to get complaints from potential listeners that Windoze could not play them, so I switched to mp3 encoded by liblame and that was that. If I embed .ogv video files on activist websites today, I can't just tell everyone "install Ubuntu" to play them and expect them to get played. On a library or school computer? Forget it there-often users there cannot add any software, so files must play on a default Windoze or Crapple machine.

Ubuntu claims that the location of their users, not themselves, blocks them from including the codecs, but the reality is this: almost all Ubuntu users who use the machines with video install the codecs, so the only difference by leaving them out is to protect the distro itself. If a distro is based somewhere that does not recognize patents on software, there is no need for such protection and the distro can be served up on the installer. Legality is EXACTLY the same for end users who "import" the codecs either with the installer or from another repo and could care less about the bleatings of the United States Trade Representative or the whining Hollywood crybabies.

In my opinion, no distro that attempts to comply with laws themselves should be based in a software patent country, and patent-busting codecs should then be regarded as true FOSS software. The source code is open, so they can be audited and modified. They are free to use and also to redistribute so far as the authors are concerned, so it is both free speech and free beer-and perfectly safe to use in a machine where all code must be auditable for security reasons. The death of the .gif codec due to lawsuits against web hosts along the Getty Images model years ago provides a powerful disincentive against suing anyone for having codecs on their computer (where they can't be found anyway) or on their website.

The only real threat is the TTP, the TTIP, and other proposed WTO style trade deals. Because of those we should try to strangle new patented codecs in the crib, but the H264 patent will expire in a year and make that point moot.

[deanjo]

The only real threat is the TTP, the TTIP, and other proposed WTO style trade deals. Because of those we should try to strangle new patented codecs in the crib, but the H264 patent will expire in a year and make that point moot.

H.264 is a loooooong ways from having it's patents expire.

http://scratchpad.wikia.com/wiki/MPEG_patent_lists#H.264_patents

[Luke]

Software patents should be defied here as they are globally

H.264 is a loooooong ways from having it's patents expire.

http://scratchpad.wikia.com/wiki/MPE...#H.264_patents

That list seems to be a conglomeration of all MPEG-LA patents. Someone else here had said the key H264 patents were about to expire. Barring that, so long as it is necessary to bust software patents for interoperability with the computers of those who run paid software, we should take advantage of the fact that most of the world refuses to recognize software patents. Want to use Linux in the US? Import it from your favorite distro and let the USTR cry in their unfree beer. They can't stop us let 'em try-remember that ONE patent-busting project like ffmpeg or LAME hosted in just ONE safe harbor can allow hundreds of project that can he hosted anywhere to link to it and compete with/offer input/output compatability with the users of paid software.

I do not recognize patents (royal monopolies) on social goods like free or potentially free/reproducable goods (like software) of any kind, nor on living organisms like seeds or animals, nor on necessities of life like prescription drugs. This position is not that far from that of most of the world's governments and in fact is one of the biggest issues blocking further trade deals. Agricultural and drug patents caused 20 African nations to walk out of the WTO Doha Round in 2003, and the WTO never recovered. That "deal" they just did was nothing but an agreement to keep talking. I hope to soon see the TTIP and TTP as dead as Doha and the FTAA.

Why should ANY distro bind itself to the laws of a nasty foreign country that refuses to respect anyone's privacy and whose subjects can freely use the distro in defiance of unjust local law!

[deanjo]

That list seems to be a conglomeration of all MPEG-LA patents.

That link is a list of all the patents in use with H.264 specifically. H.264 could not exist without them. In order for H.264 to be completely free of patents you will have to wait a good decade more.