On Mon, 18 Jun 2007 11:50:28 +0800 Dax Solomon Umaming <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > I was wrong when I wrote down proprietary.. I meant restricted like > MP3 codecs.
You were right the first time: MP3 is considered a proprietary codec thanks to the fact that Fraunhofer IIS, Thomson Multimedia, and others claim to hold patents on the technology used to encode and/or decode MP3's. The patent issues surrounding the technology are a real mess that has resulted in some ugly slugfests among corporate giants such as the Alcatel-Lucent v. Microsoft case. Fortunately, the Philippines does not recognize software patents and so provided that you only distribute MP3 software such as LAME and mpg123 in the Philippines and other similar jurisdictions that do not honor software patents, or if you engage only in non-commercial distribution (as Fraunhofer/Thomson have stated that they permit royalty-free use of the MP3 format for non-commercial applications), you should be clear. -- If it was just a matter of spending money, Microsoft would deliver good products. http://stormwyrm.blogspot.com
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