rvernout said:
You need to get your eyes checked. We're talking about software patent here, which is a new thing. Software patent does no more than preventing competition and preventing interoperability. That is a bad thing.
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VLC Patent Issues?
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You need to get your eyes checked. We're talking about software patent here, which is a new thing. Software patent does no more than preventing competition and preventing interoperability. That is a bad thing.
sluxx said:I have an idea: a chemical/organic compound that can be taken either internally or externally by human to cure AIDS. Now if I can get the patent office to patent this idea, anyone that's working on cures for AIDS will be infringing on my patent!
Sorry, but the Piror-Art-O-Matic already lists an AIDS Cure as "a blow-up doll that's biodegradable and can be used by several people at once."
Looks like someone (no one) beat you to the (every) punch.
Don't worry, if Smucker's gets their patent on peanut butter and jelly sandwiches you won't be eating them again unless you get one of theirs.SpaceMagic said:
You wouldn't want to infringe on their valid US Patent.
---
So it all depends on how silly the patent is, those process patents are stupid. Since they block reasonable people from developing the same ideas, which happens anyways -- but is now too expensive to fight, and takes too long.
This is a very bad thing to lose such a good app, makes me angry to think that those Bloody euro politicos spend most of their time and our money (another reason to declare myself to be a Briton and not a european) witch hunting something that is useful to the general public, who are they trying to protect ? it certainly isn't me (big corporations maybe), Quicktime sucks when it encounters .avi or something labeled as an mpeg file but doesn't work using QT, VLC allows multi region DVD on the Mac (VLC is my default app) and if you want to be up with the Jones's in terms of swapping files between us and the "dark side" it's another nail in the coffin for media exchange between different platforms, sorry for rambling but it's late and I hate the european onion, haven't they got something better to do, like world (even european) peace
dferrara said:
first part you wrote is correct.
second part you wrote is incorrect.
Small programmers won't be able to make any software without risking breaking a patent. (remember, big companies may have portefolios of more than 100 000 patents. Many which noone know about yet, because they're pending.)
So if small programmers break a patent (they will), they get sued. And either have to give away their software or go bankrupt.. :/
I wish quicktime would play everything. Not only so I would need just one player on my mac but also because you could then use all those different formats in programs that use quicktime in the background like final cut pro.
SpaceMagic said:
So you're saying fast user switching in Mac OS X should be removed because it's patented by Microsoft. But neither of the companies are the first to have fast user switching.
how on earth it is a GoodThing(tm) when microsoft gets beaten by EU patent law, but suddenly a BadThing(tm) when somebody else gets in trouble? i'm just confused.
JFreak said:
Um, when has Microsoft ever had a problem with EU patent law? You may be being confused with monopoly law, which is a completely different thing.
There have been things like the Eolas patent case in the US, where members of the open source community and such organisations as the EFF have done their best to help Microsoft defend their case; this doesn't sound like people thinking it's a Good Thing, does it?
I think some of the people in this thread need to seriously sit back and think "do I know what software patents are, or am I just babbling nonsense?" before posting...
The site asks you to contact your MEP (i think that's who they're talking about anyway), but doesn't tell you how to find out who yours is. So here's a link that'll tell you who yours are if you live in the UK -
http://www.europarl.org.uk/uk_meps/MembersMain.htm
It also includes their contact details.
http://www.europarl.org.uk/uk_meps/MembersMain.htm
It also includes their contact details.
Trivial Patents
1) Software patents are not the problem. As a few people wrote before: trivial patens are the problem (like Amazons 1-click,...). The purpose of these patents is just to ripe of money.
2) Some argued that patents allow "the little hobby programmer to make a living". I don't think that a hobby programmer has enough cash to deal with lawyers, patents and stuff like that.
1) Software patents are not the problem. As a few people wrote before: trivial patens are the problem (like Amazons 1-click,...). The purpose of these patents is just to ripe of money.
2) Some argued that patents allow "the little hobby programmer to make a living". I don't think that a hobby programmer has enough cash to deal with lawyers, patents and stuff like that.
This is serious
Re VLC:
It doesn't matter whether you quickly download a copy now, and store it - to be on the safe side. This will not help you! You are not safe.
If it turns out that VLC becomes illegal, then [insert big company name here] has the right to request from Apple to insert code in the OS which will actively break all old versions of VLC. Or otherwise Apple could be seen as 'assisting' in breaking the patents VLC broke.
This will work in a similar way as it is now impossible to copy still images from Apple's DVD player. Ever asked why you can't do a screen copy of a DVD with DVD Player? That all you get is a green image?
Answer: Apple, being part of the DVD consortium, is required legally to ensure you cannot do this.
Same will happen if VLC becomes illegal. All your old copies will be worth naught. Well, unless you stick to OS X 10.3.8 forever...
However, patents are about ideas, that's different. Say, someone patents a new way of representing images or movies, a new codec.
With the current situation you can develop your own program to implement that codec either from published specifications or from reverse-engineering the codec and can then use it in your own software program.
If that codec became a patent, you're screwed. It no longer matters that you programmed your own implementation because now you are using the idea behind that codec, i.e. the codec itself. In effect you infringe on its patent. In effect you're not going to be able to use it - unless you pay for the privilege. If that's possible at all. The codec could be proprietary and not up for licensing.
Now with a new codec you might argue, rightly so. I don't mind, whoever invented it should have the exclusive rights to use it.
But any software idea could be patented, it no longer matters to compare code for code, it merely matters how things are done. In effect [insert name of big software company with lots of patent lawyers] only needs to claim that you did something in a way that infringed on any of their patented ideas. Trivial patent or not. It is now up to you to prove you didn't!
Now, suddenly you're faced with the fact that you need to prove you did not infringe on any of the patents.
- Who has many lawyers at their hand and who doesn't?
- Who has the money and time to start a lengthy court case?
- Who is likely to just give up?
That is exactly what [insert big software company name] is banking on! And that is why they want software to be patented. Because if software can be patented this will only favor them.
And best thing is: they don't even have to be right at all! Their patents might not even be close to what you did. They will merely win because you don't have the time nor money to counter their legal proceedings.
That is why software patents are bad in general. No matter whether they are trivial or not.
If software can be patented what will happen in the long run is this:
Existing big companies will become the only software companies left. It will be impossible for smaller startups to even attempt to release software as likely any software can be claimed to infringe on some of the patents the big companies have. And none of the smaller companies has the money to fight the legal claims.
In effect every programmer will only be able to work for one of the few big software companies. No one will dare to start a new small software company.
Not good.
Re VLC:
It doesn't matter whether you quickly download a copy now, and store it - to be on the safe side. This will not help you! You are not safe.
If it turns out that VLC becomes illegal, then [insert big company name here] has the right to request from Apple to insert code in the OS which will actively break all old versions of VLC. Or otherwise Apple could be seen as 'assisting' in breaking the patents VLC broke.
This will work in a similar way as it is now impossible to copy still images from Apple's DVD player. Ever asked why you can't do a screen copy of a DVD with DVD Player? That all you get is a green image?
Answer: Apple, being part of the DVD consortium, is required legally to ensure you cannot do this.
Same will happen if VLC becomes illegal. All your old copies will be worth naught. Well, unless you stick to OS X 10.3.8 forever...
Software patents are the problem. No matter how trivial or not. Code is secured by copyright law already, so no one can copy your code 1:1.michaellehn said:
However, patents are about ideas, that's different. Say, someone patents a new way of representing images or movies, a new codec.
With the current situation you can develop your own program to implement that codec either from published specifications or from reverse-engineering the codec and can then use it in your own software program.
If that codec became a patent, you're screwed. It no longer matters that you programmed your own implementation because now you are using the idea behind that codec, i.e. the codec itself. In effect you infringe on its patent. In effect you're not going to be able to use it - unless you pay for the privilege. If that's possible at all. The codec could be proprietary and not up for licensing.
Now with a new codec you might argue, rightly so. I don't mind, whoever invented it should have the exclusive rights to use it.
But any software idea could be patented, it no longer matters to compare code for code, it merely matters how things are done. In effect [insert name of big software company with lots of patent lawyers] only needs to claim that you did something in a way that infringed on any of their patented ideas. Trivial patent or not. It is now up to you to prove you didn't!
Now, suddenly you're faced with the fact that you need to prove you did not infringe on any of the patents.
- Who has many lawyers at their hand and who doesn't?
- Who has the money and time to start a lengthy court case?
- Who is likely to just give up?
That is exactly what [insert big software company name] is banking on! And that is why they want software to be patented. Because if software can be patented this will only favor them.
And best thing is: they don't even have to be right at all! Their patents might not even be close to what you did. They will merely win because you don't have the time nor money to counter their legal proceedings.
That is why software patents are bad in general. No matter whether they are trivial or not.
If software can be patented what will happen in the long run is this:
Existing big companies will become the only software companies left. It will be impossible for smaller startups to even attempt to release software as likely any software can be claimed to infringe on some of the patents the big companies have. And none of the smaller companies has the money to fight the legal claims.
In effect every programmer will only be able to work for one of the few big software companies. No one will dare to start a new small software company.
Not good.
I don't get why English people are so vitriolic to the EU
Don't blame the EU for this, blame Ireland. Most countries so far have voted in a neutral or Anti-patent way, but it was Ireland that started this whole cheating way of introducing the law without it going through the EU parliament. The way Ireland introduced the law means it can be put into effect even without a real democratic majority vote.
Also to note is that on the day of Irelands announcement of this patent law, Microsoft and Dell became the Fianna Fails biggest sponsors (FF are the majority Irish party).
Ireland is a filthy, undemocratic and corrupt state. And Fianna Fail are the most corrupt of the Irish parties. It's a literal crime that this patent law has gotten as far as it has.
I apologise on behalf of my country.
HydroMan said:This is a very bad thing to lose such a good app, makes me angry to think that those Bloody euro politicos spend most of their time and our money (another reason to declare myself to be a Briton and not a european) witch hunting something that is useful to the general public, who are they trying to protect ? it certainly isn't me (big corporations maybe), Quicktime sucks when it encounters .avi or something labeled as an mpeg file but doesn't work using QT, VLC allows multi region DVD on the Mac (VLC is my default app) and if you want to be up with the Jones's in terms of swapping files between us and the "dark side" it's another nail in the coffin for media exchange between different platforms, sorry for rambling but it's late and I hate the european onion, haven't they got something better to do, like world (even european) peace
Don't blame the EU for this, blame Ireland. Most countries so far have voted in a neutral or Anti-patent way, but it was Ireland that started this whole cheating way of introducing the law without it going through the EU parliament. The way Ireland introduced the law means it can be put into effect even without a real democratic majority vote.
Also to note is that on the day of Irelands announcement of this patent law, Microsoft and Dell became the Fianna Fails biggest sponsors (FF are the majority Irish party).
Ireland is a filthy, undemocratic and corrupt state. And Fianna Fail are the most corrupt of the Irish parties. It's a literal crime that this patent law has gotten as far as it has.
I apologise on behalf of my country.
There will be no licence. Some of the codecs they reverse-engineered are not up for licensing. No matter how much they would be willing to pay (and make you pay in return).Chappers said:
You will have a choice of either:
- a very crippled VLC supporting a lot less codecs, likely only very old ones
- or no VLC at all
Likely the latter.
You can save your money. There won't be a VLC. Or you will likely not want it.
longofest said:
You REALLY have no idea what you are talking about? Programmers seemed to be doing just fine without patents. Their work was protected by copyright, and it did the job just fine. With patents, the advantage shifts to big corporations. Small-time developers have no resources to patent new stuff. They would need lawyers for that. Corporations have no problems patenting everything, they have the resources.
Software-patents are relatively new phenomena. They didn't exists back when Apple was created. But if they were, Xerox could have blocked Apple from using a GUI, since they would have patented it. As Bill gates said in 1991:
"If people had understood how patents would be granted when most of today's ideas were invented and had taken out patents, the industry would be at a complete standstill today. ... The solution is patenting as much as we can. A future startup with no patents of its own will be forced to pay whatever price the giants choose to impose. That price might be high. Established companies have an interest in excluding future competitors."
Read it. Then read it again. If in doubt, read it three times. Think what it means.
Software patents are more or less the same if some author patented the use of knife as a murder-weapon in a book. Software has been protected by copyright since the beginning. Applying patents to software is a BAD idea! It gives zero benefit to individual developer, while it gives big corporations even bigger stranglehold on the industry!
rvernout said:
Patents? Yes. Software-patents? Hell no! Software-patents are a relatively recent phenomena.
So, Xerox would have patented the mouse, and denied Apple from using it. Same thing with GUI. Where would Apple be today?
So long open-source software! Thanks for Samba, GCC, FreeBSD and the like! Too bad that those violate on patents, so.... But anyway, who the hell uses that open-source crap anyway? *cough*apple*cough*
adzoox said:
And that's protected by copyright. With software-patents, it's like no-one would be allowed to write a book where someone is murdered with a knife (since it would be patented). Or you couldn't have made Matrix with "bullet-time"-effects, since it was patented by the makers of "Blade". Or you couldn't make a movie that has weird space-aliens since that would be patented as well.
the list goes on.
Get the latest source, not the release
http://developers.videolan.org/svn.html
It explains how to get the latest up-to date version.
Getting the source will ensure the work of all the developpers may be reusable when osXX comes out and carbon/cocoa is a thing of the past...
http://developers.videolan.org/svn.html
It explains how to get the latest up-to date version.
Getting the source will ensure the work of all the developpers may be reusable when osXX comes out and carbon/cocoa is a thing of the past...
No chance of it being done right
You just can't patent a software idea. Why should you be able to get a patent on an idea as simple as a window that fades away when you click the exit button? Its crazy. Sorry, but once you put something out there, everyone else should have the ability to use the same idea as long as they don't use your code to do it.
Software patents didn't exist until the 80's. Before that, software was considered to be nothing more than mathematical concepts and the courts have said you can't patent mathematical concepts.
nagromme said:I had a weird thought... maybe between the extremes posted here there's a rational middle ground
Maybe inventors of software solutions SHOULD be protected just like any other inventors. Otherwise they have no incentive to invent.
But maybe WHAT gets patented, in the case of software, needs to be very carefully looked at.
Maybe the middle ground is that software patent law can be done right.
I hope we get there.
You just can't patent a software idea. Why should you be able to get a patent on an idea as simple as a window that fades away when you click the exit button? Its crazy. Sorry, but once you put something out there, everyone else should have the ability to use the same idea as long as they don't use your code to do it.
Software patents didn't exist until the 80's. Before that, software was considered to be nothing more than mathematical concepts and the courts have said you can't patent mathematical concepts.
Without software patents, I'm a busy and successful software developer.
With software patents, I would be sweeping floors at the local childrens' daycare center.
I have a small one-man company and software patents would kill my chances of growing into a serious business in the software market.
Here's a good example why:
A great example of a software patent is the XOR patent. For those who don't know what it is, it's an operation that all your macs are doing billions of times per day. It's an operation that's only slightly more complex than adding or subtracting two numbers and is very simple to use. A twelve year old can learn it in ten minutes. All modern microprocessors such as the G5 do it in hardware. It's a very fundamental logical operation for most computers.
In 1985, creators of AutoCAD, AutoDesk had to pay $25000 dollars to the XOR patent holder in licensing fees in order to use the XOR operation in their programs. I'm pretty sure they were upset with this.
Now read the patent:
http://www.freepatentsonline.com/4197590.html
That's lawyer language for describing an XOR operation. I'm kind of amazed that it's possible to describe such a simple operation with such complexity. No sane software developer would have any time to read such complete nonsense. There are many more examples like this. The patent is of course no longer being protected, but it was a real problem back in the 80's where many companies were building various graphical display devices.
It cheats a lot of people, especially investors, who see these patent applications and they look amazingly complex, even if they are nothing of the sort. That makes it a dangerous instrument of persuasion, since they are made to attract investors, but the information is not worth the paper it's printed on.
Software patents do not work.
I wouldn't worry too much about it.
Corporations will scream and it might be harder to get, but you will still be able to get it, just as people still download music and do all sorts of other illegal things.
Governments like to pretend they have the power to stop things like this, but they don't. Once a sizeable number of people start doing something illegal, the costs of prosecuting it quickly become ridiculous if they are to be effective.
It's like the war on drugs, in the end the authorities are next to powerless to prevent a large number people who really want something from getting what they want.
It's the new reality -- they just have to deal with it.
Corporations will scream and it might be harder to get, but you will still be able to get it, just as people still download music and do all sorts of other illegal things.
Governments like to pretend they have the power to stop things like this, but they don't. Once a sizeable number of people start doing something illegal, the costs of prosecuting it quickly become ridiculous if they are to be effective.
It's like the war on drugs, in the end the authorities are next to powerless to prevent a large number people who really want something from getting what they want.
It's the new reality -- they just have to deal with it.