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"We also hired patent lawyers and consultants familiar with this technology area. We created a new codec development process which would allow us to work throug

"We also hired patent lawyers and consultants familiar with this technology area. We created a new codec development process which would allow us to work through the long list of patents in this space, and continually evolve our codec to work around or avoid those patents. Our efforts are far from complete, but we felt it was time to open this up to the world." This burden is becoming far too great, when this is the cost necessary to achieve innovation.

coldpie 11y ago
Well put. It's crazy that they're pumping that much money paying lawyers in order to avoid using work that someone else has already done. They're forced to waste money and engineering talent in order to re-invent a technology due to our fucked up IP legal landscape.
- tokenizerrr 11y ago
  Not just re-invent, since if you happen to invent something by yourself the same way as it happens to have been patented then you're still in trouble.
  - stephengillie 11y ago
    Or (I'm assuming, IANAL) you could pursue a court battle, and attempt to prove that your independent invention means it's too obvious to be patentable.
    - loumf 11y ago
      I think you mean "too obvious" (can't be too novel) I think it would be a big mistake to admit that yours is the same, because if this doesn't carry you've effectively said you are infringing.
- serge2k 11y ago
  Or they could pay the people who invented it already. oh that's right. The whole point is they don't want to.
  - knowaveragejoe 11y ago
    That's because it's prohibitively expensive and negates the possibility of its inclusion in free products. At least, according to the blog post.
    - ChrisLomont 11y ago
      Older codec were not prohibitively expensive otherwise the proliferation of video products using patented codecs would not exist. His complaint against H.265 will likely be fixed, and then it too will catch on, just as H.264 did, despite these same types of complaints against it.
      - mschuster91 11y ago
        > Older codec were not prohibitively expensive otherwise the proliferation of video products using patented codecs would not exist. Because audio and movie pirates don't care what codecs they use, and VLC has supported pretty much everything you throw at it, patents be damned. What do you think most early iPod adopters filled the disks with? Surely no legally bought music, lol.
        ChrisLomont 11y ago
        There are many more products besides the few that skirt the law. >What do you think most early iPod adopters filled the disks with? The first iPods shipped with decoders for several patented codecs, including mp3. This supports my claim that the codecs were not prohibitively expensive to make gadgets that include royalty payments to codec patent holders.
        ZeroGravitas 11y ago
smithkl42 11y ago
Amen. As Thomas Jefferson (correctly) described patents, they're a part of positive law, not natural law. In other words, their only justification is pragmatic, not moral. You can't "own" an idea the way that you can own a couch or a car. We allow for (temporary) patent protection because it's supposed to encourage innovation and help our economy. If it doesn't - and it's clearly reached the point where it hinders rather than helps innovation - then we need to change things.
- manachar 11y ago
  To be clear, because some forget this part of patent law, the encouragement towards innovation was to encourage people to share and build on a communal set of ideas. The temporary monopoly on ideas was the carrot to get people to register their ideas in a central location (patent office) rather than lock ideas behind closed doors and secrecy. Too many people think the carrot of the temporary monopoly was the point of the patent office. In other words, we know that the community of ideas gets better with more sharing and building off of other people's ideas. As a society we decided to make laws to encourage this sharing. As a result, technological progress was immense. Sadly, the current situation seems to strongly suggest that we may need to find better ways to encourage sharing (Open Source has been great for much of software).
  - joepie91_ 11y ago
    Copyright was built with a similar purpose - enriching the public domain - and has failed in a similar manner. Both patents and copyright are failed experiments. They weren't meant to 'benefit creators' or 'guarantee an income', and they cannot take that role in a healthy society.
    - walterbell 11y ago
      Look at the direction of TPP, which mandates stronger copyright but has optional public rights: https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20150805/15521431864/why-does-tpp-repeatedly-require-stronger-copyright-when-it-comes-to-public-rights-makes-it-voluntary.shtml https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20150805/15521431864/why-d... "...the copyright section includes thirteen "shall provide" and just the one measly "shall endeavour." And if you add in the enforcement section you get another thirty eight "shall provide" and just a single "shall endeavour" buried in a footnote unrelated to the key points in the document. So, for those of you playing along at home, the message being sent by the TPP is pretty damn clear: when it comes to ratcheting up copyright and setting the ground rules for enforcement everything is required and every country must take part. Yet, when it comes to protecting the rights of the public and making sure copyright is more balanced to take into account the public... well, then it's optional."
oldmanjay 11y ago
I'm sorry, were you under the impression that creating a modern video codec was an effort that was not burdensome in any dimension? The entire anti-patent argument has rarely elevated beyond attempts at justifying people's desire to have everything they want for free. Do you have something to contribute that will help, or do you simply believe you are owed access to every technology everyone has created because your want is that meaningful?
throwawaykf05 11y ago
As has been said elsewhere, this is not the cost need to achieve innovation, this is the cost needed to avoid paying others who have already invented something before. And as often it is with patents, the outcome is more invention. All those workarounds are also innovation.
- ken47 11y ago
  Many readers would take issue of your use of the word "invented" in this context. Was the Pythagorean theorem also "invented" in your opinion?
  - throwawaykf05 11y ago
    Even mathematicians are conflicted whether mathematics is discovered or invented. My personal belief is that if something is true about the world without the presence of man, those are things to be discovered. If something is created that could not exist without man, those are invented. Of course, lots of shades of gray in between, but let's face it: Video codecs exist only because of things man created. They are definitely invented, even though the principles on which they operate may be discovered. Example: Taking the DCT of an image results in a particular pattern of numbers. That is a discovery. Exploring the repetition in that pattern to achieve compression is an invention.

coldpie 11y ago

Well put. It's crazy that they're pumping that much money paying lawyers in order to avoid using work that someone else has already done. They're forced to waste money and engineering talent in order to re-invent a technology due to our fucked up IP legal landscape.

tokenizerrr 11y ago
Not just re-invent, since if you happen to invent something by yourself the same way as it happens to have been patented then you're still in trouble.
- stephengillie 11y ago
  Or (I'm assuming, IANAL) you could pursue a court battle, and attempt to prove that your independent invention means it's too obvious to be patentable.
  - loumf 11y ago
    I think you mean "too obvious" (can't be too novel) I think it would be a big mistake to admit that yours is the same, because if this doesn't carry you've effectively said you are infringing.
serge2k 11y ago
Or they could pay the people who invented it already. oh that's right. The whole point is they don't want to.
- knowaveragejoe 11y ago
  That's because it's prohibitively expensive and negates the possibility of its inclusion in free products. At least, according to the blog post.
  - ChrisLomont 11y ago
    Older codec were not prohibitively expensive otherwise the proliferation of video products using patented codecs would not exist. His complaint against H.265 will likely be fixed, and then it too will catch on, just as H.264 did, despite these same types of complaints against it.
    - mschuster91 11y ago
      > Older codec were not prohibitively expensive otherwise the proliferation of video products using patented codecs would not exist. Because audio and movie pirates don't care what codecs they use, and VLC has supported pretty much everything you throw at it, patents be damned. What do you think most early iPod adopters filled the disks with? Surely no legally bought music, lol.
      - ChrisLomont 11y ago
        There are many more products besides the few that skirt the law. >What do you think most early iPod adopters filled the disks with? The first iPods shipped with decoders for several patented codecs, including mp3. This supports my claim that the codecs were not prohibitively expensive to make gadgets that include royalty payments to codec patent holders.
        ZeroGravitas 11y ago

smithkl42 11y ago

Amen. As Thomas Jefferson (correctly) described patents, they're a part of positive law, not natural law. In other words, their only justification is pragmatic, not moral. You can't "own" an idea the way that you can own a couch or a car. We allow for (temporary) patent protection because it's supposed to encourage innovation and help our economy. If it doesn't - and it's clearly reached the point where it hinders rather than helps innovation - then we need to change things.

manachar 11y ago
To be clear, because some forget this part of patent law, the encouragement towards innovation was to encourage people to share and build on a communal set of ideas. The temporary monopoly on ideas was the carrot to get people to register their ideas in a central location (patent office) rather than lock ideas behind closed doors and secrecy. Too many people think the carrot of the temporary monopoly was the point of the patent office. In other words, we know that the community of ideas gets better with more sharing and building off of other people's ideas. As a society we decided to make laws to encourage this sharing. As a result, technological progress was immense. Sadly, the current situation seems to strongly suggest that we may need to find better ways to encourage sharing (Open Source has been great for much of software).
- joepie91_ 11y ago
  Copyright was built with a similar purpose - enriching the public domain - and has failed in a similar manner. Both patents and copyright are failed experiments. They weren't meant to 'benefit creators' or 'guarantee an income', and they cannot take that role in a healthy society.
  - walterbell 11y ago
    Look at the direction of TPP, which mandates stronger copyright but has optional public rights: https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20150805/15521431864/why-does-tpp-repeatedly-require-stronger-copyright-when-it-comes-to-public-rights-makes-it-voluntary.shtml https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20150805/15521431864/why-d... "...the copyright section includes thirteen "shall provide" and just the one measly "shall endeavour." And if you add in the enforcement section you get another thirty eight "shall provide" and just a single "shall endeavour" buried in a footnote unrelated to the key points in the document. So, for those of you playing along at home, the message being sent by the TPP is pretty damn clear: when it comes to ratcheting up copyright and setting the ground rules for enforcement everything is required and every country must take part. Yet, when it comes to protecting the rights of the public and making sure copyright is more balanced to take into account the public... well, then it's optional."

oldmanjay 11y ago

I'm sorry, were you under the impression that creating a modern video codec was an effort that was not burdensome in any dimension? The entire anti-patent argument has rarely elevated beyond attempts at justifying people's desire to have everything they want for free. Do you have something to contribute that will help, or do you simply believe you are owed access to every technology everyone has created because your want is that meaningful?

throwawaykf05 11y ago

As has been said elsewhere, this is not the cost need to achieve innovation, this is the cost needed to avoid paying others who have already invented something before. And as often it is with patents, the outcome is more invention. All those workarounds are also innovation.

ken47 11y ago
Many readers would take issue of your use of the word "invented" in this context. Was the Pythagorean theorem also "invented" in your opinion?
- throwawaykf05 11y ago
  Even mathematicians are conflicted whether mathematics is discovered or invented. My personal belief is that if something is true about the world without the presence of man, those are things to be discovered. If something is created that could not exist without man, those are invented. Of course, lots of shades of gray in between, but let's face it: Video codecs exist only because of things man created. They are definitely invented, even though the principles on which they operate may be discovered. Example: Taking the DCT of an image results in a particular pattern of numbers. That is a discovery. Exploring the repetition in that pattern to achieve compression is an invention.