Licensing for the MP3 Format Used on Original iPod is Officially 'Terminated' as Patents Expire

[MacRumors]

Licensing for MP3, the digital audio coding format that Apple used for music downloads on the original iPod, has officially ended. The announcement comes from The Fraunhofer Institute for Integrated Circuits (via NPR).

The Fraunhofer Institute owns the patent rights related to selling encoders and decoders of the format to developers, and recently announced that its "mp3 licensing program for certain mp3 related patents and software of Technicolor and Fraunhofer IIS has been terminated." This means that developer use of MP3 won't require a licensing patent anymore.

According to the Germany-based Fraunhofer Institute, this is because more modern digital audio coding formats have emerged, namely "Advanced Audio Coding," or AAC.

In an email to NPR, Fraunhofer director Bernhard Grill said that AAC is now the "de facto standard for music download and videos on mobile phones," because it's "more efficient than MP3 and offers a lot more functionality."

We thank all of our licensees for their great support in making mp3 the defacto audio codec in the world, during the past two decades.

The development of mp3 started in the late 80s at Fraunhofer IIS, based on previous development results at the University Erlangen-Nuremberg. Although there are more efficient audio codecs with advanced features available today, mp3 is still very popular amongst consumers. However, most state-of-the-art media services such as streaming or TV and radio broadcasting use modern ISO-MPEG codecs such as the AAC family or in the future MPEG-H. Those can deliver more features and a higher audio quality at much lower bitrates compared to mp3.

Today AAC is the format that Apple uses for music downloading on both iOS and macOS devices, after originally helping popularize the MP3 format with the first-generation iPod in 2001, which could store up to 1,000 songs that were encoded using MP3. The Fraunhofer Institute noted that MP3 is "still very popular amongst consumers" and is expected to stick around on legacy devices for a few more years.

This article was edited to note that the patents related to MP3 have expired, not the format itself.

Article Link: Licensing for the MP3 Format Used on Original iPod is Officially 'Terminated' as Patents Expire

 

[SkippyThorson]

Wow - I always thought of this as the audio standard. Will be weird to see it fade away...

In another 20 years.

Time to upgrade the library! I was looking for an excuse.

 

[geoff5093]

"and is expected to stick around on legacy devices for a few more years."

If they think MP3 is only going to be around for a few more years, they are seriously out of touch with reality.

 

[Blackstick]

Consumers wouldn't know the difference anyway. My mom really doesn't spend much time wondering if her Beatles albums are in AAC or MP3 format. More people like my mom out there than geeks in here.

 

[riverfreak]

so does this mean that purely software decoders -- not those tied to hardware -- won't be able to play MP3s in the near future? What about conversion to other formats? Doesn't that also require the ability to decode the format?

Seems like if they are going to EOL this, they should just open it up.

 

[sammich]

Another example of a poorly-phrased article title on MR.

 

[jblagden]

The MP3 format has not been terminated. Actually, quite the opposite. The Fraunhofer Institute ended licensing on the MP3 format because the patent ran out. They no longer have the ability to license it because they no longer own the patent on it. MP3 is now public domain.

 

[cmsj]

Let's be clear here, MP3 isn't terminated at all. The format is still available for anyone to use - what's changed is that the last of its patents has just expired, so there is no need for Fraunhofer to have a licensing program anymore.

 

[zorinlynx]

Licensing has been terminated because the patents expired. Anyone can implement and use the MP3 format now for free, without having to pay anyone anywhere. This is the case for hardware or software decoding. Not many people use hardware decoding for MP3 these days, though, because the computation requirements are so low.

This is GOOD news, not bad.

 

[jblagden]

Another example of a poorly-phrased article title on MR.

Yeah, it should have title titled as “The Patent for the MP3 Format Used on the Original iPod has Expired"

 

[SkippyThorson]

The MP3 format has not been terminated. Actually, quite the opposite. The Fraunhofer Institute ended licensing on the MP3 format because the patent ran out. They no longer have the ability to license it because they no longer own the patent on it. MP3 is now public domain.

A much better explanation - in stark contrast to the misleading article title.

 

[Mascots]

So now the patents are up right? Meaning no requirement to pay them to use?

 

[jblagden]

A much better explanation.

Thanks SkippyThorson!

I actually heard about this two weeks ago on Linux Weekly Daily Wednesday:

 

[Glassed Silver]

The MP3 format has not been terminated. Actually, quite the opposite. The Fraunhofer Institute ended licensing on the MP3 format because the patent ran out. They no longer have the ability to license it because they no longer own the patent on it. MP3 is now public domain.

Well, that post might be a lot more valuable than the entire article then, but if you think about it it makes sense I guess...

Glassed Silver:mac

 

[imicca]

Sadly, we need to move on. After experiencing AAC and FLAC format audio, I really can hear the difference.
This transition, however, will take at least 5 years.

 

[macduke]

RIP MP3. I remember downloading songs from unsecured FTP sites over a 33.6K modem in the late 90s and playing them with WinAmp (or some ugly, early player) because I was like 12 and didn't know any better. When I got a 56K modem and figured out how to encode them to WAV and burn them onto a CD I felt like a genius. My grandpa was a DoD engineer running a multimillion dollar research lab so he had a pretty tricked out home PC for the time, and it had a really early CD burner before they had buffer underrun (B.U.R.N.) protection, so he started getting upset at how many coasters I was making! It was getting to the point that just buying the CDs would be cheaper. Those pre-Napster years were so innocent, lol.

I'm so glad Apple came along and saved me from this horrid UI (and made buying digital music easy and affordable):

 

[KALLT]

Of course Fraunhofer would want to move on to AAC, they share a patent for that format too and receive licence fees from device manufacturers and codec vendors.

 

[lazyrighteye]

RIP MP3.

 

[longofest]

The original iPod also supports AAC.

 

[earthTOmitchel]

The MP3 format has not been terminated. Actually, quite the opposite. The Fraunhofer Institute ended licensing on the MP3 format because the patent ran out. They no longer have the ability to license it because they no longer own the patent on it. MP3 is now public domain.

I updated the article to reflect this. Thanks to everyone who pointed it out

 

[PinkyMacGodess]

Licensing has been terminated because the patents expired. Anyone can implement and use the MP3 format now for free, without having to pay anyone anywhere. This is the case for hardware or software decoding. Not many people use hardware decoding for MP3 these days, though, because the computation requirements are so low.

This is GOOD news, not bad.

Yet I can see what Fox News will say about this. Everyone must immediately change their format for music, because some faceless corporation needs more money to buy more commercials pushing their gloom and doom to cause the rubes to buy more crap to provide those corporations more money to buy more commercials to push more gloom and doom.

Oh, and buy gold, and horde 'provisions' in case of the apocalypse.


[doublepost=1494856056][/doublepost]So all of the corporations they sued for not licensing can come back now?

If anything, MP3 could explode and be even bigger than it ever has been!

 

[LIVEFRMNYC]

RIP MP3. I remember downloading songs from unsecured FTP sites over a 33.6K modem in the late 90s and playing them with WinAmp (or some ugly, early player) because I was like 12 and didn't know any better. When I got a 56K modem and figured out how to encode them to WAV and burn them onto a CD I felt like a genius. My grandpa was a DoD engineer running a multimillion dollar research lab so he had a pretty tricked out home PC for the time, and it had a really early CD burner before they had buffer underrun (B.U.R.N.) protection, so he started getting upset at how many coasters I was making! It was getting to the point that just buying the CDs would be cheaper. Those pre-Napster years were so innocent, lol.

I'm so glad Apple came along and saved me from this horrid UI (and made buying digital music easy and affordable):

Winamp..... it really whips the llama's ass!!!

 

[coolfactor]

Wow - I always thought of this as the audio standard. Will be weird to see it fade away...

In another 20 years.

Time to upgrade the library! I was looking for an excuse.

Welcome to 2010.

 

[GadgetDon]

MP3 is like the QWERTY keyboard. It's good enough for people to use, so it's going to last forever. And anyone who had to make a business decision "We can't afford to add an MP3 encoder to our software" now can. MP3 just got stronger, not weaker.

 

[JMacHack]

MP3 is so outdated now it's better to just use FLAC or AAC.