[Xiph-Advocacy] Will Ogg Vorbis, Ogg Theora and FLAC become free and open standards soon?

[xiphmont at xiph.org]

On Tue, Jul 14, 2009 at 10:13 AM, Petter Reinholdtsen<pere at hungry.com> wrote:
> Hi.  Here in Norway, a common attack on the Ogg family of audio and
> video formats is that neither are open standards as defined by EU in
> <URL:http://europa.eu.int/idabc/servlets/Doc?id=19529> (page 9)

This link is a 404.

> or
> Digistan in <URL:http://www.digistan.org/open-standard:definition>.

I'm a bit confused.  All of our offerings meet this criteria.

I suspect what the critics mean is 'we're not the IETF or ITU'.

> Are there any plans to standardize Ogg Vorbis, Ogg Theora and FLAC in
> a way that make it match these definitions?

We meet these definitions.  We even have paperwork on file with the
Norwegian government saying so (at their request). Also, the Nowegian
government has formally proposed the Xiph codecs for goverment use as
complying with these standards:

http://www.regjeringen.no/nb/dep/fad/pressesenter/pressemeldinger/2009/forslag-om-standarder-for-lyd--og-videoi.html?id=541949

http://media.hiof.no/diverse/fad/rapport_4.pdf

> I notice the Ogg
> container format is standardized in IETF as RFC 3533, and it would be
> great if Vorbis, Theora and FLAC would be standardized in IETF as
> well.

Ah yes.  We're a standards body, but not the standards body people want :-)

For the record, we've been trying to standardize through the IETF for
nearly ten years and have been blocked for three reasons:

1) The IETF does not standardize codecs.  They did so once (iLBC)
despite alot of internal opposition and the result was something of a
failure.  They are loathe to try again.

2) The IETF is absolutely chock brimming full of ITU members.  The ITU
does codecs.  Expensive, lucrative codecs.  The ITU wants the IETF
nowhere near its home turf.  See the IETF's AVT, dispatch and codec
mailing list archives for the past month if you don't believe this.

3) Many people within the IETF say "You're a standards body, we're a
standards body.  Why do you need us?  Don't waste our time with this
redundancy."

...and so the IETF keeps saying no.  Despite this, we're still trying;
there will be a royalty-free codecs BoF and WG vote (something of a
first f its kind) at IETF75 in a week.  We expect our opponents to be
out in force.  They've already tried rather hard to get this whole
proposal scuttled.

Monty