3 ms·
Firefox could pay the licensing fee for the copies of Firefox they distribute themselves, but they can't pay the licensing fee for unknown downstream users - th
by thristian 17y ago
Firefox could pay the licensing fee for the copies of Firefox they distribute themselves, but they can't pay the licensing fee for unknown downstream users - the various Linux distros who build their own Firefox builds, projects like Seamonkey and Camino, any random people who want to use the Gecko source for something. Mozilla is pretty committed to making sure that anyone who uses Gecko has access to all the HTML features that Firefox has, so having a special feature-filled Mozilla-branded version and leaving everybody else out in the cold is not really an option.
Although Chrome supports H.264 video, I believe Chromium does not.
- wmf 17y agoIf Mozilla is more committed to open source ideology than making video actually work that's their choice, but they could do things differently if they wanted to.
- ZeroGravitas 17y agoMozilla is a non-profit org dedicated to the open web. They can no more do things differently than a shareholder owned corporation can just decide to not make profits.
- blasdel 17y agoThe patents (and thus the license fees) only apply to object code -- distributing the source code ain't infringing shit. Mozilla already has compile flags that generate binaries other people aren't allowed to distribute -- the logo and trademarks are decidedly non-free, hence IceWeasel.