As for his patent remarks: he simply remarked that VP8’s algorithms are very similar to H.264 and that he would be afraid of that. Well, that’s because he’s no lawyer and misses the fact that it’s enough to make a small change to side-step a patent.

You’ll notice that he remarks on these small differences and can’t make technical sense of them. That’s because they serve LEGAL purpose, not technical one.

See another (much more sensible than yours) take: http://blog.flameeyes.eu/2010/05/22/some-personal-comments-about-google-s-webm

Finally, I wouldn’t worry about MPEG-LA. They were claiming the same thing about Theora for years, but could never find a single patent worth a lawsuit.

The horrible irony is that even those fighting against software patents can hardly escape re-producing the exact same FUD from which the patent-trolls and proponents of software patents thrive and profit. I am not surprised that so many people have come out voicing FUD- after all the FUD campaign has been quite sucessfull.

So many people have a vested (personal/financial:x264 non-olet) interest in maintaining this FUD that it gets damned near impossible to figure out what is really going on. But it is a different issue when those who are seeking to rid ourselves of software patents, themselves, get sucked into the vortex of FUD.

Perhaps it was out of place quoting Florain on this blog site. Perhaps I violated a certain netiquette. If so simply say so and I apologize in advance. I merely did this to illustrate what I perceive is exactly what J5 is talking about. Since posting this Florian has responded to my post, and I to his follow up- we do not see eye to eye, but I still respect his work against software patents in europe.

“The assembly code is much worse, with staggering levels of copy-paste coding, some completely useless instructions that do nothing at all, unaligned loads/stores to what-should-be aligned data structures, and a few functions that are simply written in unfathomably roundabout (and slower) ways. While the C code isn’t half bad, the assembly is clearly written by retarded monkeys.”

So the assembly is slow, slow, stupid and slow. Got that? I wonder how much faster it’ll get when rewritten by someone with a clue?

“the current one seems to be reasonably well-optimized and has SIMD assembly code for almost all major DSP functions, so I doubt it will get that much faster.”

Oh, I see, written by “retarded monkeys” yet they’ve left absolutely no room for optimization as they’ve squeezed ever last bit of performance out of the processor. Seems like VP8 can’t really win in this review. And yet if you cut through the hyperbole, he actually seems to think VP8 has a solid foundation. Should be interesting to see how this develops.

“I try to avoid “See I Told Ya So” types of posts, but in this case SCNR: WebM/VP8 patent risk for software developers” [slashdot.org] (and I previously made that suggestion on my blog in this post on video codecs [blogspot.com])

I’m all for open-sourcing useful program code but the question here is whether it’s fair for Google to expose an entire community, including the commercial adopters of open source, to this kind of risk. The situation surrounding Android serves as a warning. Google is unfortunately in favor of software patents and doesn’t do anything against the problem. They’re entitled to their patent strategy. But it’s important that third parties don’t run into patent problems in reliance upon Google’s vague promises.

If Google really believed that WebM/VP8 was safe from a patent perspective, then why in the world don’t its WebM license terms contain a hold-harmless clause or at least some basic indemnification (less value than holding harmless but better than nothing) in favor of developers adopting it?

People should think twice (at least!) before relying on any vague promises and they should also consider that Google isn’t the patent powerhouse that could start a “pissing contest” with the major contributors to the MPEG LA pool. I explained Google’s limits in that regard in this recent slashdot comment, The idea of Google countersuing isn’t realistic [slashdot.org].”

This is my response:

Listen you can’t speak out of both sides of your mouth at once. You cannot claim to be against software patents and vilify some group for failing to provide patent indemnification in the same breath. Providing patent indemnification is nothing other than racketeering, those purporting to do so are rackets(ie. MPEG-LA). I applaud the work of those who fight against software patents. But when you argue that Google should be providing patent indemnification you are actively undermining any strategy to rid the world of software patents. Shy of getting the laws regarding software patents changed(ie prohibiting them in the first place), the kind of patent provisions provided in Googles new license for webm *is* the most effective way of fighting software patents. Because of the shitty patent system in place whole industries have arisen which produce nothing other than Fear Uncertainty and Doubt.

In fact, it is hard to speak about patents *at all* without engaging in the same FUD-because FUD is the medium of the existence of patent speculator industry(of which Larry Horn, CEO of MPEG-LA, is a known patent-troll par-excellence). One aspect of the fight against software patents is the desire to protect the *users* from being sued into oblivion by patent holding entities(either patent-trolls or companies engaging in patent-trolling). Yet claiming that *users* should be indemnified *is* the raison-d’etre of patent racketeering industry. So if you argue that Google is failing to protect *users* you are, in stating such, proving, providing, and furthering the self-justification that such patent rackets(MPEG-LA) use themselves. And in so doing your words of caution and concern are nothing more than additional weapons in the arsenals of thepatent rackets ideological propaganda. The laws concerning patents(what is patentable, the terms of patents etc.) will only change once the patent situation in general has been sufficiently defused so as to limit the actual perceived value of patents. By insisting that *uers* should be indemnified one is ratcheting up the perceived patent threat, artificially inflating the value of said patents, which directly works against the goal of eliminating software patents. As long as everyone is terrified of potential patent suits those who support software patents already have their case(ie. why we supposedly need software patents) made for them by the very perceived fear. We must break this cycle. Googles new license goes an awful long way towards defusing the actual FUD atmosphere.

Stating that Google is exposing the community to patent litigation is literally the exact opposite of what is really happening. By getting extremely broad industry support for webm within hours of launching webm and coupling this support with patent provisions in the license which state that any filing of patent litigation against webm(vp8) will result in termination of the usage rights envisioned by license, they have dramatically reduced the likelihood of any kind of patent litigation. The effect of this is unequivocally, a *defusing* of the already existing FUD-bases patent insanity. As of this writing those who promote software patents will have more difficulty justifying why we need such patents and the patent rackets are struggling to find some kind of rhetorical self-justification with which they can continue to sell their poisonous FUD.

Flo I really do respect your work. But you are wrong on this one. And not only are you wrong, but you are dangerously close to speaking out of both sides of your mouth. Choose which side you are on. If you raise FUD be aware of what master you are serving.

I wasn’t saying we should ignore the issues. I was saying we *ARE* ignoring the issues. The MPEG-LA licensing is not all that different from the GPL. The fact that it’s a patented proprietary codec we’re talking about is what has everyone up in arms. If the license was exactly the same as it is now, but the codec was in fact more liberal itself (but still required the viral distribution), we wouldn’t be seeing all these complaints. People would in general just ignore the problem until they started being sued (if they ever actually did get sued).

In fact, most if not all of the content on YouTube is violating the MPEG-LA license for h.264 content, since they’re not distributing it in h.264 in the majority of cases. And fighting the viral license piece is going to present a much larger problem for the FSF, if anyone does in fact do so, and succeed. Because, if the viral licensing is challenged in court, and found to be invalid, it means that the viral licensing scheme of the GPL will also likely be invalidated. That would be a very interesting court case, though.

Take a look at it from a cynical Google lawyer’s perspective. Right now, Google already pays MPEG-LA to license h.264, they have that cost on their books, and the arrangement exists.

Things can go one of two ways. Either way, Google benefits.

1: MPEG-LA somehow doesn’t manage to sue someone for using VP8. Result? Google lauded as saviour of free world, Google-owned VP8 codec goes global, Google saves a bit of pocket change (the h.264 license fee).

2: MPEG-LA does successfully demonstrate that VP8 infringes its patents. Result? Google gets some good press (”plucky Google tries to save world from patent trolls, but is brought down by evil MPEG”), and gets a license from MPEG-LA to go right on using VP8 wherever it wants. Probably they’d barely have to pay an extra penny, I doubt MPEG-LA would be able to screw much more money out of them when they’re already licensing all the same patents for h.264 use.

So, sure, Google is talking a good fight about VP8 being patent-free. But if it turns out it hasn’t, what’s Google lost? Just about nothing. I doubt anyone at Google would lose much sleep if it turns out their public position on VP8’s patentedness turns out to be incorrect.

*Any* video compression technique may be covered by a previous invention or patent. It’s not nebulous – it’s likely. There are only so many known video compression techniques. Pretending that the threat of infringement is nonexistent isn’t a solution. I don’t like the MPEG license agreements, but they were created as a *solution* for businesses to minimize their patent risk with video technologies.

And some major businesses do want to buy in the patent pool protection model. Is the MPEG Group selling snake oil? Considering the American intellectual landscape, maybe not. The fears are not unfounded.

It’s not about the codecs, it’s about the intellectual status of video compression itself. MPEG isn’t the enemy. MPEG is shades of grey. The real adversary is video patents, and a brand new codec that still uses old video compression techniques might not be the answer.

Had to remove the other post which had a comment on it from Scott Dowdle:

Just a clarification. I think in many instances above, you refer to “x264″ when you really mean “H.264″. x264 *IS* free software licensed under the GPL.

While the license may be GPL it does not make it free to use due to known patent concerns. This makes it explicitly non-free. e.g. it is not in the spirit of the GPL and as such is not shipped by Debian or Fedora by default.