mpeg video legal loophole - can't be used for pro work

[deepvisual]

ALL modern video cameras and camcorders that shoot in h.264 or mpeg2, come with a license agreement that says that you can only use that camera to shoot video for "personal use and non-commercial" purposes (http://www.osnews.com/story/23236/Why_Our_Civilization_s_Video_Art_and_Culture_is_Th reatened_by_the_MPEG-LA)

The article states that all dDSLRs and professional video cameras that use the mpeg codec are not licensed for professional use .........
you can only use your professional camera for non-commercial purposes. For any other purpose, you must get a license from MPEG-LA and pay them royalties for each copy sold.

[john01]

I'd say that is something for the company that made the cameras to sort out with the people that developed the codec.

I just checked the documentation on a camera I have which uses H264 and I can find no disclaimer

These people are shooting themselves in the foot.

[mowgli]

I just have to laugh at this.

[john01]

maybe they want to be the Monsanto (http://www.organicconsumers.org/monlink.cfm) of the digital world

[john01]

wheels within wheels

Microsoft's Internet Explorer 9 shuns open video (http://www.theregister.co.uk/2010/04/30/internet_explorer_9_closed_video/)

Empire strikes back with H.264

In a Friday blog post, Internet Explorer general manager Dean Hachamovitch said that the forthcoming Internet Explorer 9 will only play HTML5 video using the H.264 codec.

[SilentEclipse]

this is from the vegas manual
'MPEG Layer-3 audio coding technology licensed from Fraunhofer IIS and Thomson.
Supply of this product does not convey a license nor imply any right to distribute content created with this product in revenue generating broadcast systems (terrestrial, satellite, cable and/or other distribution channels), streaming applications (via internet, intranets and/or other networks), other content distribution systems (pay-audio or audio on demand applications and the like) or on physical media (compact discs, digital versatile discs, semiconductor chips, hard drives, memory cards and the like). An independent license for such use is required. For details, please visit: http:// mp3licensing.com.'

[rolin]

Interesting article on Engadget…

“…First off, we've directly asked MPEG-LA whether or not using an H.264 camera simply to shoot video for a commercial purpose requires a license, and the answer is no.…” — Nilay Patel, Engadget

http://www.engadget.com/2010/05/04/know-your-rights-h-264-patent-licensing-and-you/

[makemassair]

Interesting article on Engadget…

“…First off, we've directly asked MPEG-LA whether or not using an H.264 camera simply to shoot video for a commercial purpose requires a license, and the answer is no.…” — Nilay Patel, Engadget

http://www.engadget.com/2010/05/04/know-your-rights-h-264-patent-licensing-and-you/

Nice spot.

[Liquidmetro]

I'm already annoyed that WMP and QT have had their MPEG-2 playback stripped away as they are free apps and MPEG LA wanted some money.
http://store.apple.com/uk/product/D2187Z/A?mco=MTY3ODQ5OTY
http://www.microsoft.com/windows/windowsmedia/player/plugins.aspx

We're gonna have the same with H.264 soon then.....once everyone has started to migrate from flash and is stuck with it.

Thanks.

Rant over.

[asterix]

Pretty much. There is a syndicate that owns h264 which includes apple (interesting reference to their backlash on flash) and I believe microsoft has a finger in teh pie also. Basically they want adobes .flv and theora out of the market so they can dominate and impose license fee's firstly on software/hardware that uses their compression.

I doubt they'll go as far as suing users for using either h264 or mp4 without a license. I mean you'll end up post producing it and recompressing using software which will probably have appropriate licensing. And I'm not sure the mp4 wrapper lets you determine whether it came from a licensed source or not. In that sense it will be very hard for them to persue a case against anyone.

The question is - will governments, adobe or theora persue microsoft and apple in court. By intentionally withdrawing support for alternative platforms they breach 'anti competitive' laws in most western nations. IE has already been pulled up on this in the past and had their arses sued (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_litigation#United_States) on several occassions (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/European_Union_Microsoft_competition_case).

Interesting find though.

[rolin]

Interesting but a lot to read (there's an overall verdict and a “Summary for the lazy” in the addendum)…

“VP8, as a spec, should be a bit better than H.264 Baseline Profile and VC-1. It’s not even close to competitive with H.264 Main or High Profile. …”

“The first in-depth technical analysis of VP8” (http://x264dev.multimedia.cx/?p=377#more-377) —Jason Garrett-Glaser, Diary Of An x264 Developer