[Advocacy] persuading mobile phone manufacturers to implement Vorbis support

[Aaron Whitehouse]

Hello,

> As I asked in my first response to this discussion: Is it necessary at
> all to mention all the negative sides about MP3 (and even exaggerate a
> bit) to promote Vorbis?

>From the Free Software Foundation perspective, I suspect that the
answer would be "yes". As Matthew pointed out, a number of users use
Vorbis because of the negatives of patent-encumbered alternatives,
rather than the virtues of Vorbis. The FSF is likely to be even more
concerned about those negatives.

Patents are always a difficult area. As I understand things, patents
are tested very lightly at the application stage and only heavily
tested if somebody challenges them. This results in the problems that
you describe; a large number of invalid patents on the register. The
economic problems with this are vast and mean that those without the
means to test patents often avoid them or pay any royalty demanded.

If someone alleges that a patent has been breached, the defendant can
argue that it hasn't been or they can argue that the patent is
invalid. As has been pointed out, there are a lot of organisations
that would help fight such cases.

I have not read the patents myself, but I would expect them to cover
the methods to "manufacture" an mp3 file. The distinction from
patenting the mp3 format itself is probably a legal fiction that is
more important from a legal history perspective than a practical one,
as it is probably nearly impossible to create an mp3 without
infringing the patents.

Regardless of what the owners of mp3 currently charge, they have the
right to charge any time that a patent is infringed. I believe that
the exceptions on their website could change at any time. The current
wording of playogg is misleading. It is true, however, that any time
the patent is infringed (in the creation of mp3 files for free or paid
"broadcast", or in mp3 software/hardware) the permission of the owners
is required. The fact that the owners currently exempt some
organisation is not overly relevant; as I understand it their stance
on open source encoders changed in 1998.

Ultimately, the patent issues are not very unclear. The mp3licensing
group have successfully received money for their patents on mp3 for
years. A company would be unlikely to use mp3 technology and not have
to pay a license or obtain permission of some kind. Vorbis, on the
other hand, appears to be patent-free. The fact that companies have
been known to appear and claim patents exist should not be a reason to
stop advertising Oggs as being patent-free. If anything, it will
encourage anybody with a valid patent to come forward and then the
infringing portion of the reference encoder can be rewritten. A patent
search by Xiph further encourages this reliance.

Considering that there is a large list of patents allegedly covering mp3:
http://www.tunequest.org/a-big-list-of-mp3-patents/20070226/
I would have thought that using Ogg Vorbis would put you in at least
as good a position as using mp3 and paying Thomson.

I have limited knowledge of the US patent system and know nothing
about the technical coverage of any of the involved patents, so take
my comments with a grain of salt.

Aaron