[whatwg] Codecs (was Re: Apple Proposal for Timed Media Elements)

[Gareth Hay]

Not in the EU, no such thing as a software patent.

On 23 Mar 2007, at 04:55, Ian Hickson wrote:

> On Fri, 23 Mar 2007, Robert Sayre wrote:
>>
>> MPEG-4 is proprietary, because it is covered by patents.
>
> I hate to be the one to break this to you, but CSS is covered by  
> patents,
> HTML is covered by patents, the DOM is covered by patents,  
> JavaScript is
> covered by patents, and so forth. Proprietary technologies are  
> those that
> are under the control of a single vendor. MPEG-4 is not proprietary.
>
> It's not available under royalty free licensing. But it is not  
> under the
> control of a single vendor. That is the important difference, not  
> whether
> the technology is patented or not.
>
> -- 
> Ian Hickson               U+1047E                ) 
> \._.,--....,'``.    fL
> http://ln.hixie.ch/       U+263A                /,   _.. \   _ 
> \  ;`._ ,.
> Things that are impossible just take longer.   `._.-(,_..'-- 
> (,_..'`-.;.'