On Tuesday 18 August 2009, Raj Mathur wrote: > On Tuesday 18 Aug 2009, steve wrote: > > [snip] > > The reason Fedora doesn't support another distro, or for that matter > > non-US repos with mp3 support, is less to do with legal restrictions > > (of which there are some[1]) and more to do with the principle of the > > matter. > > > > They /too/ are opposed to the principle of software patents. They do > > not want to become hypocrites by opposing it on one hand and then > > just make it easy for anyone to ignore the matter by themselves > > providing an way to do so. > > > > More here: > > http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Multimedia/MP3 > > Afarid I'm going to be nitpicking here, but we really need a formal > opinion on whether use of MP3 is illegal in India or not.
It is not. Software patents are not recognised here, UNLESS linked with some specialised hardware. So if i bundle let say debian with hardware and mp3 encoder (afaik the decoder is allowed for freebeer distribution), i risk being sued and a tiny risk of losing. The risk is tiny because a PC can be proved to be a general purpose reprogramable machine. However a mp3 player or a cd/dvd player might be proven to be a special purpose machine. > The Fedora > page says, ``The MP3 patents are protected by United States law and > international treaties, and the Fedora Project will honor the applicable > laws and treaties.''. However there is no treaty that enforces US > software patents in India to the best of my knowledge. Of course, the > fact that India does not have software patents at all could have > something to do with that :) > > Further, if you see where MP3 is patented, it works out to a rather > small list of 18-20 countries. Should 90% of the countries in the world > be penalised because 10% have taken an ill-considered step towards > restricting their citizens' rights? I doubt if any reasonable person > could agree to those terms! again, there have been several changes to US and international law including seizure of goods passing thru signatory countries (but not destined or originating in any signatory countries). Thus I can ship all sorts of patented software from India to USSR, but run the risk of seizure in S'pore if the ship/flight docks there. And If i happen to be registered in US, I can be sued there. To get a handle on this I can setup an Independent subsidiary (like SCO) and have fun. Debian being a not for profit would be much harder to stop. At best a US based server could be blocked by court action. -- Rgds JTD -- http://mm.glug-bom.org/mailman/listinfo/linuxers
