If I remember correctly the gif format was developed and owned by
Compuserve. They encouraged people to use it in various ways and it
became a standard format. They retained copyright to it. Sometime after
Compuserve was sold to AOL the new owners decided to remind people that
gif was still copyrighted and that they owned it.
I don't know if they've attempted to actually enforce the copyright
in practice or whether anyone has had to pay them any money.
I hear howls of complaint concerning the idea that gif's are
proprietary, but it hasn't seemed to affect their almost universal
use on web sites.
On Sun, 04 Feb 2001 16:35:05 +0000, Samuel W. Heywood wrote:
> On Sun, 4 Feb 2001 15:11:14 -0500 (EST), Steve <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>> Then you have to decide proprietary/licensed graphics format
>> vs. free/open graphics format. I choose open. True, at this
>> moment in time, more browsers support the proprietary gif formats
>> than support png, but png is philosophically more acceptable to
>> me because anyone at all may create a png graphic, while gifs are
>> only legally able to be created by license.
> Hello Steve:
> I also have heard that gifs may be created legally only by license.
> If that were so, then why are there so many publicly available freeware
> programs out there that are capable of producing gifs? If the
> purported licensing authority did in fact have the power to do anything
> about this situation, then we would be seeing the authors of these
> programs being dragged into court and their download sites being closed
> down. Anyone can claim the legal authority to require you to buy a
> license from him to do anything. You can flagrantly challenge his claims
> to authority. Whether he has the power to back up his claims to such
> authority is another question. Authority cannot exist without support
> from the powers that be. The powers that be will be kicked out or forced
> to step down or turned around unless they have the support of the people.
> I realize of course that in many cases it might take a long time for the
> people to eventually get their way, especially in totalitarian regimes
> where the citizens are denied the right to bear arms.
> Sam
> -- This mail was written by user of The Arachne Browser - http://arachne.cz/
Sam Ewalt
Croswell, Michigan
USA
-- Arachne V1.70;rev.3, NON-COMMERCIAL copy, http://arachne.cz/
