Hi, On 08/17/2009 11:36 PM, Raj Mathur wrote: > On Monday 17 Aug 2009, steve wrote: >> [snip] >> Since Fedora sticks to free software and freedom principle, you might >> find some 'basic' features missing -- such as support for mp3 and >> other patent encumbered media formats > > Nothing to do with Fedora per se, but aren't patent-ridden softwares > like MP3 decoders only a problem in countries that have software > patents?
True. > Perhaps it's time to start telling the distributors to have a > "US-only" distribution that excludes patent-ridden software, and provide > all software by default to the "Rest of the World". A question like, > "Do you live in a backward country that has software patents?" at the > start of the install would go a long way in establishing what people are > missing ;) > Yes, that would be great to do as far as appearances go, but AFAICT, the problem is since Fedora Project is a US based organization and has to play by the rules. They cannot distribute such software nor even support any project that would distribute such software (so for instance, they can't even have such a question on their website with a link to a non-US based server where people can go to). Any other non-US based distro, like for instance Omega which i mentioned can do such a thing though. > BTW, I was pleasantly surprised the other day to find MP3 players, etc. > in the main Debian repositories, from where they had been missing > earlier: > > # apt-cache policy mpg123 > mpg123: > Version table: > 1.7.2-3 0 > 990 http://ftp.XX.debian.org testing/main Packages > # apt-cache policy mplayer > mplayer: > Version table: > 1.0~rc3+svn20090405-1 0 > 990 http://ftp.XX.debian.org testing/main Packages > > Surprised because earlier Debian also had a no-MP3 policy and you had to > go to debian-multimedia.org to get MP3-related packages. It changed > sometime in the past 6 months or so, perhaps some Debian contributor can > tell us when and why. > Hmm, interesting. I too am curious about this. cheers, - steve -- random non tech spiel: http://lonetwin.blogspot.com/ tech randomness: http://lonehacks.blogspot.com/ what i'm stumbling into: http://lonetwin.stumbleupon.com/ -- http://mm.glug-bom.org/mailman/listinfo/linuxers
