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Topic: Vorbis development, status & patent issues (Read 65460 times) previous topic - next topic
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Vorbis development, status & patent issues

Reply #50
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what would it take to convince you that Vorbis is patent-free?

Proof! Factual data. HA is all about it. If you come here claiming something and don't provide any kind of hard data, you can't expect the readers to take it for granted.

Could you be a bit more specific? Factual data of what?

Given the premise that the patent opinion can not be disclosed, I am being put into an impossible position here. It's like asking me to prove that there are no pink elephants by finding every elephant on the planet and pointing out that it is, indeed, not pink. And even then you could claim that there are pink elephants if I just looked hard enough.

It is a FACT that there was a patent search done by Xiph, and Xiph continued development on Ogg Vorbis. It is a FACT that AOL did the same, and deemed Ogg Vorbis suitable for inclusion in WinAmp. Unfortunately, that's not proof, otherwise this debate wouldn't be necessary.

So, please, which facts would you like to see as proof?

Vorbis development, status & patent issues

Reply #51
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I can say his press releases were beyond over-the-top as far as cliches and marketing non-sense is concerned.



Don't forget he also fell for the paranoia (spread by Slashdot) about Thompson starting charging fees for every MP3 decoder implementation, free or not.

Vorbis development, status & patent issues

Reply #52
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So, please, which facts would you like to see as proof?

Well, for starters an explanation why patent# US5214742 about windows switching doesn't apply to Vorbis.
Juha Laaksonheimo

Vorbis development, status & patent issues

Reply #53
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Given the premise that the patent opinion can not be disclosed

That's something I don't understand. Why can't it be disclosed? To prevent the lawyer getting screwed if patents are actually found in vorbis code?

Vorbis development, status & patent issues

Reply #54
Sometimes you could even get the impression that Xiph.org is not interested in Vorbis development/tuning at all, considering that Garf's excellent tuning haven't yet been merged into the main source tree.
"To understand me, you'll have to swallow a world." Or maybe your words.

Vorbis development, status & patent issues

Reply #55
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So, the question is, is Xiph's advertizing Vorbis as patent free correct or not. This is probably the most important Vorbis related question there is, since being patent free is the single most important claimed feature of Vorbis.

The answer is simple: Yes. An accused person is innocent until proven guilty. A technology is patent free until proven to be infringing in a court of law. Since Vorbis has not been proven to be infringing on any patents (in fact, it has as yet not even been credibly accused of doing so), it is justified to say it's patent free.

Consider the following analogy: A friend of yours has been smoking for most of his life, and he decides to give up smoking. So he says that he quit smoking. You ask him to prove it. Of course, he can't prove that he's quit smoking for good, because that would require looking into the future. All he can prove to a reasonable degree is that he is not smoking anymore. Only on the day he dies after not having smoked for the rest of his life can he prove that he actually quit smoking.

So, the ex-smoker can claim to have quit smoking until events transpire that prove otherwise. And by the same token, Vorbis can claim that it is patent free until somebody proves otherwise.

Edit: typo fix

Vorbis development, status & patent issues

Reply #56
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So, please, which facts would you like to see as proof?

Well, for starters an explanation why patent# US5214742 about windows switching doesn't apply to Vorbis.

This is a reasonable request. I'd like to know the answer myself, but all I can say for now is that I'll try to find out.

Vorbis development, status & patent issues

Reply #57
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Given the premise that the patent opinion can not be disclosed

That's something I don't understand. Why can't it be disclosed? To prevent the lawyer getting screwed if patents are actually found in vorbis code?

I am just guessing here, since Jack didn't comment on the reasons, but I'm guessing it's for pretty much the same reason that MS doesn't give out the source code to their software. It's intellectual property that was obtained for a price. Information wants to be free, and it's such a shame that sometimes it is not.

Vorbis development, status & patent issues

Reply #58
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Consider the following analogy: A friend of yours has been smoking for most of his life, and he decides to give up smoking. So he says that he quit smoking. You ask him to prove it. Of course, he can't prove that he's quit smoking for good, because that would require looking into the future. All he can prove to a reasonable degree is that he is not smoking anymore. Only on the day he dies after not having smoked for the rest of his life can he prove that he actually quit smoking.

I'd consider this analogy more fitting: A friend of yours is either smoking or not (you don't know for sure). He advertizes and strongly argues that he doesn't smoke and he insists to be strong supporter of healthy lifestyle, though there's something smelly in the air near him.   
So, you either have to catch him in the action, or get a doctor's diagnosis which proves that his lungs are clean in order to know for sure.. 
Juha Laaksonheimo

Vorbis development, status & patent issues

Reply #59
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Consider the following analogy: A friend of yours has been smoking for most of his life, and he decides to give up smoking. So he says that he quit smoking. You ask him to prove it. Of course, he can't prove that he's quit smoking for good, because that would require looking into the future. All he can prove to a reasonable degree is that he is not smoking anymore. Only on the day he dies after not having smoked for the rest of his life can he prove that he actually quit smoking.

I'd consider this analogy more fitting: A friend of yours is either smoking or not (you don't know for sure). He advertizes and strongly argues that he doesn't smoke and he insists to be strong supporter of healthy lifestyle, though there's something smelly in the air near him.   
So, you either have to catch him in the action, or get a doctor's diagnosis which proves that his lungs are clean in order to know for sure.. 

Yes, but until you catch him in the act, all you have is suspicion, not proof. And, to extend your analogy back to the situation that Vorbis is in, this person is living under constant video surveillance, so catching him in the act should be easy

Vorbis development, status & patent issues

Reply #60
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Consider the following analogy: A friend of yours has been smoking for most of his life, and he decides to give up smoking. So he says that he quit smoking. You ask him to prove it. Of course, he can't prove that he's quit smoking for good, because that would require looking into the future. All he can prove to a reasonable degree is that he is not smoking anymore. Only on the day he dies after not having smoked for the rest of his life can he prove that he actually quit smoking.

I'd consider this analogy more fitting: A friend of yours is either smoking or not (you don't know for sure). He advertizes and strongly argues that he doesn't smoke and he insists to be strong supporter of healthy lifestyle, though there's something smelly in the air near him.   
So, you either have to catch him in the action, or get a doctor's diagnosis which proves that his lungs are clean in order to know for sure.. 

Yes, but until you catch him in the act, all you have is suspicion, not proof. And, to extend your analogy back to the situation that Vorbis is in, this person is living under constant video surveillance, so catching him in the act should be easy 

Yeah and to further extend this analogy to Vorbis, I think you wouldn't make a bet and risk losing your life-savings that he indeed doesn't smoke. And constant surveillance doesn't mean that there's actually anybody who bothers as long as he's only smoking cigarettes..
Juha Laaksonheimo

Vorbis development, status & patent issues

Reply #61
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Consider the following analogy: A friend of yours has been smoking for most of his life, and he decides to give up smoking. So he says that he quit smoking. You ask him to prove it. Of course, he can't prove that he's quit smoking for good, because that would require looking into the future. All he can prove to a reasonable degree is that he is not smoking anymore. Only on the day he dies after not having smoked for the rest of his life can he prove that he actually quit smoking.

I'd consider this analogy more fitting: A friend of yours is either smoking or not (you don't know for sure). He advertizes and strongly argues that he doesn't smoke and he insists to be strong supporter of healthy lifestyle, though there's something smelly in the air near him.   
So, you either have to catch him in the action, or get a doctor's diagnosis which proves that his lungs are clean in order to know for sure.. 

Yes, but until you catch him in the act, all you have is suspicion, not proof. And, to extend your analogy back to the situation that Vorbis is in, this person is living under constant video surveillance, so catching him in the act should be easy

From my point of view anyone that might be interested in investing a serious amount of money in this person, for whatever reason where the smoking issue matters, would certainly require a doctor's diagnosis. Wouldn't they? Of course this wouldn't guarantee that he would never start again, but at least they would know if he told the truth and could be trusted.

Btw: Interesting discussion 

Vorbis development, status & patent issues

Reply #62
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It is a FACT that AOL did the same, and deemed Ogg Vorbis suitable for inclusion in WinAmp.

I quote Jack:

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AOL lawyers contacted us some time ago, claiming to be doing something
similar.  I have no knowledge if an opinion was written, or anything
other than the two facts: 1) AOL lawyers were digging around in this
area 2) soon after Winamp started shipping Ogg.  Several conclusions can
be drawn.


Note the words 'claiming' 'no knowledge' 'anything other than'.

Your conclusion is correct: they deemed it suitable for inclusion of Winamp. Whether or not this implies that Vorbis has no patent risk is a whole other matter!

Vorbis development, status & patent issues

Reply #63
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Sometimes you could even get the impression that Xiph.org is not interested in Vorbis development/tuning at all, considering that Garf's excellent tuning haven't yet been merged into the main source tree.

There can be valid reasons for that, notably it might be better to just fix things in a more general or through way. The problem is just that Vorbis development is...slow or nonexistant.

Vorbis development, status & patent issues

Reply #64
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I am also wondering about intensity stereo, used in both Vorbis and Speex.

Those probably do not apply to Vorbis as they all talk about using stereo coding in scalefactor bands. Patent numbers: EP0910927 and EP0910928.

About speex: looks like a CELP codec to me, I don't know if that is patented.

ACELP is patented, not CELP. Also, the intensity stereo support in Speex (can't comment on Vorbis) is not even divided in frequency bands so I don't see how it's going to be a problem. (even if it were, it's easy to strip from a file and it has never been intended to produce really good stereo)

Vorbis development, status & patent issues

Reply #65
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Nobody from Vorbis has ever wanted to back up the patent-free moniker with any real facts, nobody wants to give any guarantees.

Vorbis has always used 'patents' as an argument against MPC, but the reality is that the situation with Vorbis is no different than the one of MPC. If you're going to throw mud, expect to receive some too.

Show something tangible to support the claims, not again hollow things we are supposed to believe, just as we were supposed to believe bitrate peeling would be a major feature advantage of Vorbis, like, 4 years ago already?

...

Difference is, Linux vendors such as HP are idemnifying their clients from SCO's claims. Is Xiph.org going to do the same?

I suggest you call Thompson/FhG and ask them if they can guarantee (with indemnification) that if you license their MP3 patents, you won't get sued by someone else owning (previously unknown) patents on MP3. They won't. Nor will anyone else. Want to know why? Because the whole patent system is just a big lottery. There are probably patents out there covering "use of the multiplication in multimedia software" or anything stupid like that that probably wouldn't hold, even in US courts.

So what does patent-free mean? It means that 1) we did not patent that piece of software and 2) we have done a reasonnable check (similar to what FhG and others also have to do) that there are no 3rd parties that own patents on the software. That's unfortunately about the best that can be done about patents right now, so it comes down to "patent-free" unless proven otherwise.

Vorbis development, status & patent issues

Reply #66
I think the matter about Vorbis and patents, and claims made about the situation is rather simple.

1.  If you can't disclose the information found by the patent search, showing that there are no patents, then it is utterly useless to say that Vorbis is "patent free" in expectation of people accepting it.  There is no way for a third party to verify this without doing their own work entirely (which is impractical).  One cannot even begin to make assumptions about the legality of Vorbis without this information either, so basically when Vorbis is being marketed as a superior solution on the merits of "patent free" and "legality," you are simply asking us to make a leap of faith.

2.  If we are going to take an "innocent until proven guilty" approach (and by the way, this approach is not some sort of a priori self-given fact or fundamental method of the universe, it's simply a common approach used by most people -- this does not mean that it is correct), then how can Vorbis presume to be superior to other codecs on the front of legality when these other codecs are just as "innocent"?

MPC for example is a great codec which is still "innocent" and has not been proven "guilty," yet Vorbis claims to somehow be better in that the patent situation is clear and that it is legal.  The comments in this thread show that this is far from the case.  So, fundamentally, Vorbis is not better than other codecs which have also not been "proven guilty," using this line of reasoning.

Side Note:  Whether or not a conviction is made in a court of law is irrelevant to the truth of falsity of something.  All a court says is whether someone or something is in the right or wrong for being or doing something, and if and how recompense should be provided.  Hence, Vorbis may or may not actually be using patented technology now (which would by definition imply patent infringement unless there was either a payment for the technology or a release to use the technology freely) and this is so whether or not it has actually been tested in a court.

Why does this matter?  For one, it's certainly an important consideration to take into account if one is attempting to make predictions about the future.  If a company is worried about whether or not they will be sued for using Vorbis, then whether or not Vorbis is using patented technology now is very significant, even if it has not been tested in a court of law.

3.  If the single biggest selling point of Vorbis is that it is patent free, yet no information is disclosed publically about studies on this and the developers and the company will make no guarentees to such, it would seem to me that somehow there is a very fundamental flaw in the entire marketing approach here.

It would appear that most very staunch supporters of Vorbis seem to accept for a fact this aspect of Vorbis as being true, yet, once again, it seems that from the case of this thread that this situation is anything but clear and that in no way have this aspect been proven.

The solution is simple, though disappointing for many:  Simply stop claiming that Vorbis is patent free as a matter of fact, or provide some sort of grounds for this and take the entire notion of it as being serious to those who are supposed to believe it.

Vorbis development, status & patent issues

Reply #67
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I suggest you call Thompson/FhG and ask them if they can guarantee (with indemnification) that if you license their MP3 patents, you won't get sued by someone else owning (previously unknown) patents on MP3. They won't. Nor will anyone else. Want to know why? Because the whole patent system is just a big lottery. There are probably patents out there covering "use of the multiplication in multimedia software" or anything stupid like that that probably wouldn't hold, even in US courts.

So what does patent-free mean? It means that 1) we did not patent that piece of software and 2) we have done a reasonnable check (similar to what FhG and others also have to do) that there are no 3rd parties that own patents on the software. That's unfortunately about the best that can be done about patents right now, so it comes down to "patent-free" unless proven otherwise.

http://www.hydrogenaudio.org/forums/index....ndpost&p=137256

Vorbis development, status & patent issues

Reply #68
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So what does patent-free mean? It means that 1) we did not patent that piece of software and 2) we have done a reasonnable check (similar to what FhG and others also have to do) that there are no 3rd parties that own patents on the software. That's unfortunately about the best that can be done about patents right now, so it comes down to "patent-free" unless proven otherwise.

But the problem, as has been repeated many times in this thread, is how can we be sure of this patent search?  Not in whether or not it was actually thorough enough, but more fundamentally, that it even exists in any meaningful sense.

So far, nobody will disclose any information about it other than to say that it does indeed exist.  How is this any more useful than simply saying nothing at all, especially when there is no real reputation here to trust or any promises of compensation, etc. ?

Considering the following, is it actually reasonable for us to simply accept Vorbis as being patent free?

1.  A patent search which you won't give us any details of.
2.  A lack of indemnification.
3.  A lack of conditions which would at least imply the correctness of the search (who exactly did the search, what did they search for, etc.. even if we can't have the results).
4.  Statements from others (Fhg) likely to be knowledgeable on the matter that indeed there may be patent infringement.

I could go on...

It seems a little absurd, doesn't it?  It kind of appears to me that Vorbis wants to play the game (make statements of "matter of fact" in the patent/licensing arena), yet isn't willing to play by the existing rules (disclosure of information on patent searches, etc. which form the basis of their statements).

Quite simply, it doesn't seem to work to well.

Vorbis development, status & patent issues

Reply #69
This is a question that's bothered me.  If Vorbis is patent-free, then what would prevent someone else from filing for a patent on Vorbis technology and suing the pants off of Xiph?

Another question I have is this: It seems that getting a patent for a piece of technology is not that difficult (relative to say... developing it). Wouldn't Xiph holding a patent on Vorbis technology put them in a stronger position lawsuit-wise to defend themselves?

Vorbis development, status & patent issues

Reply #70
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This is a question that's bothered me.  If Vorbis is patent-free, then what would prevent someone else from filing for a patent on Vorbis technology and suing the pants off of Xiph?

Prior art.
Juha Laaksonheimo

Vorbis development, status & patent issues

Reply #71
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MPC for example is a great codec which is still "innocent" and has not been proven "guilty,"

So you're saying MPC is patent free? Great. Prove it, please

Vorbis development, status & patent issues

Reply #72
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MPC for example is a great codec which is still "innocent" and has not been proven "guilty,"

So you're saying MPC is patent free? Great. Prove it, please

You first say Vorbis is patent free because nobody proved it isn't, which leads to Dibrom saying that this also goes for MPC. He didn't say MPC *is* patent free, only that MPC is patent free by Vorbis' standards. So the question remains: what security does Vorbis offer that e.g. MPC doesn't?

Vorbis development, status & patent issues

Reply #73
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MPC for example is a great codec which is still "innocent" and has not been proven "guilty,"

So you're saying MPC is patent free? Great. Prove it, please

Err.  You completely missed the entire point of my posts.

No, you see, I'm not saying this.  Not at all.  I'm not even assuming it.  In fact, I don't actually care whether it is or not in this conext; that factor is completely beyond consideration.

I'm saying that if you're basing the "patent free" condition on "innocent until proven guilty," then Vorbis is no more "patent free" than any other alternative which is still "not proven guilty."  MPC is one of these.

Hence, Vorbis is not different from MPC in this sense, and thus cannot be better.

Nowhere did I say that MPC is patent free, I'm simply using your method to show why there is no difference and can be no superiority in that sense.

Vorbis development, status & patent issues

Reply #74
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MPC for example is a great codec which is still "innocent" and has not been proven "guilty,"

So you're saying MPC is patent free? Great. Prove it, please

You first say Vorbis is patent free because nobody proved it isn't, which leads to Dibrom saying that this also goes for MPC. He didn't say MPC *is* patent free, only that MPC is patent free by Vorbis' standards. So the question remains: what security does Vorbis offer that e.g. MPC doesn't?

Exactly