patents

[Karl Goetz]

Chanchao wrote:
> On Wed, 2006-03-29 at 13:15 +0100, Daniel Carrera wrote:
> 
>>> so it seems that legal action over the MP3 format is not a practical
>>> problem for open-source distributions and users.
> 
>> There might be. Does Ubuntu qualify as non-commercial use? There is a 
>> company behind it that makes money from it.

I was under the impression that Canonical make money out of supporting
Ubuntu, rather then selling it per se?
> 
> Indeed.. Though if Ubuntu/Canonical wants to remain on the cautious side
> they could do a consumer version and a business-user version that
> doesn't include the mp3 stuff, just like now.  
> 
> mp3 really is the biggie, this is one that users EXPECT.  The issue with
> Java is going away because the j2re thingy mostly works and is getting
> better, and very windows-specific formats such as wma/wmv, while useful,
> users wouldn't expect out of the box. 

If i may be so bold - *Anyone* who takes the "Windows has mp3 playback,
so i expect Ubuntu to install with stuff like MP3" playback  is being
unreasonable.
Strait out.
I have not *ever* installed an MS Windows system and had mp3 support out
of teh box. NOT EVER.
Some OEM systems (ones that were bought and came with "rescue" cds) have
the multimedia stuff on the *second* cdrom - I have never encountered it
on the first (Windows) CD.
> 
> mpeg-2 is another one that would be very useful, but still not as
> completely essential as mp3. :)
> 
> Another essential one is viewing a website, getting a message saying
> 'this site uses flash, do you want to download the plugin' and being
> able to click the button and having it actually work. :)

Yes... i will agree that for a lot of people that would be nice - almost
all people in fact ;)
> 
>> There might also be a philosophical side to the problem.
> 
> Yes: "Should humanity have music?" :)

Yes, and they should be able to share it and modify it...
kk

> 
> (Not that I want to go there in this discussion , but mp3 has become the
> de-facto standard for digital music, so I stress this point by talking
> about 'having music' or not.  Ogg, schmogg, whatever, that's not what
> people by and large use, currently, and likely for years to come.)
> 
> Cheers,
> Chanchao
> 
> 


-- 
Karl Goetz
The buck stops there -> $
Australian Ubuntu users team - http://wiki.ubuntu.com/AustralianTeam