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I heard the same about h.264 vs VP9 and it turned out that patent licensing wasn't a long-term issue. For a while you got that license from Flash (if y'all reme

I heard the same about h.264 vs VP9 and it turned out that patent licensing wasn't a long-term issue. For a while you got that license from Flash (if y'all remember when Flash was the way Youtube worked, and I recall mention that it was one of the primary reasons Flash Player was never opened sourced). Then the license for h.264 it was included in every copy of Windows 8 (IIRC). Nowadays no one even mentions the h.264 license. I'm no expert on the new license but it seems the restrictions on HEVC are relatively light. I'm pretty sure it is free to compress and distribute media but the license affects hardware and software encoders/decoders. So maybe your HEVC enabled video card with built-in decoder will be a dollar more expensive. I know that every Apple device shipped comes with HEVC hardware standard for the last few years. I would wager most Android devices too.

niftich 7y ago
From English Wikipedia article "Advanced Video Coding", with cited sources: "The commercial use of patented H.264 technologies requires the payment of royalties to MPEG LA and other patent owners. MPEG LA has allowed the free use of H.264 technologies for streaming Internet video that is free to end users, and Cisco Systems pays royalties to MPEG LA on behalf of the users of binaries for its open source H.264 encoder." (...) "On August 26, 2010, MPEG LA announced that royalties won't be charged for H.264 encoded Internet video that is free to end users.[74] All other royalties remain in place, such as royalties for products that decode and encode H.264 video as well as to operators of free television and subscription channels.[75] The license terms are updated in 5-year blocks.[76]" [74] "MPEG LA's AVC License Will Not Charge Royalties for Internet Video that is Free to End Users through Life of License" (PDF). MPEG LA. August 26, 2010. Retrieved August 26, 2010. http://www.mpegla.com/Lists/MPEG%20LA%20News%20List/Attachments/74/n-10-08-26.pdf http://www.mpegla.com/Lists/MPEG%20LA%20News%20List/Attachme... [75] Hachman, Mark (August 26, 2010). "MPEG LA Cuts Royalties from Free Web Video, Forever". pcmag.com. Retrieved August 26, 2010. https://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2368359,00.asp https://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2368359,00.asp [76] "AVC FAQ". MPEG LA. August 1, 2002. Retrieved May 17, 2010. http://www.mpegla.com/main/programs/AVC/Pages/FAQ.aspx http://www.mpegla.com/main/programs/AVC/Pages/FAQ.aspx
- reggieband 7y ago
  > streaming Internet Video that is Free to End Users Yeah, doesn't sound like that would include Netflix, etc. Nor would it include a huge amount of other video that is distributed in other ways. It also doesn't cover using your computer to encode h.264 like your webcam almost certainly does. The fact is you probably have several h.264 enabled devices on your computer right now that are licensed. And just because Cisco is covering the cost for it's open source encoder doesn't mean the license doesn't exist. My feeling is if HEVC wins the race it will be the same. 90% of people won't even notice since your license will be included in your hardware/OS without you ever knowing.
threeseed 7y ago
This is why H.264/H.265 are dominant today. Because end users aren't exposed to licensing. I can freely record video on my Sony camera and watch it on my iPhone, Mac, PS4, Switch etc.
izacus 7y ago
No, HEVC licensing is an insane mash of several patent pools and a few companies trying to extract a buck out of anyone that uses it. It's significantly less clear and more complex than what H.264 was and the license fees are higher as well... If you even have a legal team that can figure out who needs to be paid. I'm on the phone so I can't really look up all the resources, but they shouldn't be hard to find. But this licensing mess is also why most oss development stalled and we still don't have an encoder that would be anything close to the quality of libx264. Instead, most important OSS experts have moved on to AV1.
- reggieband 7y ago
  > HEVC licensing is an insane mash of several patent pools Yes, but they aren't coming after users. Look at the pools, it is mostly device manufacturers like TV, audio systems and mobile phones. They are holding each other in a mexican stand-off. Two of the three largest pools have already agreed to the same $0 royalty for non physical distribution that h.264 has. They want to extract that money from their competitors in the physical device space. Fair enough, the uncertainty around final pricing is slowing adoption. But that can ossify quickly, although no guarantee it will. I hate I'm being drawn into a patent argument when my point is: it won't matter either way. Even if HEVC wins 99% of people will never be affected by a license fee. Let them scrap over $0.25 royalty fees on TVs all they want. In the end I don't care if it is HEVC of AV1 that wins. I just want the fight to be over so I don't have the cognitive overload of having to support both.
- ksec 7y ago
  >No, HEVC licensing is an insane mash of several patent pools and a few companies trying to extract a buck out of anyone that uses it. The user paid less than $1 per devices for turning on the blocks of Hardware Encoder and Decoder which is on by default for almost of all of the 1.2Billion Annual Smartphone shipment and 250M PC as well as 300M of Tablet. As far as I am aware, there are no royalty fees to be paid if you are delivering your content on Digital / Internet Streaming. Only if you are on disc such as BlurRay.

niftich 7y ago

From English Wikipedia article "Advanced Video Coding", with cited sources: "The commercial use of patented H.264 technologies requires the payment of royalties to MPEG LA and other patent owners. MPEG LA has allowed the free use of H.264 technologies for streaming Internet video that is free to end users, and Cisco Systems pays royalties to MPEG LA on behalf of the users of binaries for its open source H.264 encoder." (...) "On August 26, 2010, MPEG LA announced that royalties won't be charged for H.264 encoded Internet video that is free to end users.[74] All other royalties remain in place, such as royalties for products that decode and encode H.264 video as well as to operators of free television and subscription channels.[75] The license terms are updated in 5-year blocks.[76]" [74] "MPEG LA's AVC License Will Not Charge Royalties for Internet Video that is Free to End Users through Life of License" (PDF). MPEG LA. August 26, 2010. Retrieved August 26, 2010. http://www.mpegla.com/Lists/MPEG%20LA%20News%20List/Attachments/74/n-10-08-26.pdf http://www.mpegla.com/Lists/MPEG%20LA%20News%20List/Attachme... [75] Hachman, Mark (August 26, 2010). "MPEG LA Cuts Royalties from Free Web Video, Forever". pcmag.com. Retrieved August 26, 2010. https://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2368359,00.asp https://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2368359,00.asp [76] "AVC FAQ". MPEG LA. August 1, 2002. Retrieved May 17, 2010. http://www.mpegla.com/main/programs/AVC/Pages/FAQ.aspx http://www.mpegla.com/main/programs/AVC/Pages/FAQ.aspx

reggieband 7y ago
> streaming Internet Video that is Free to End Users Yeah, doesn't sound like that would include Netflix, etc. Nor would it include a huge amount of other video that is distributed in other ways. It also doesn't cover using your computer to encode h.264 like your webcam almost certainly does. The fact is you probably have several h.264 enabled devices on your computer right now that are licensed. And just because Cisco is covering the cost for it's open source encoder doesn't mean the license doesn't exist. My feeling is if HEVC wins the race it will be the same. 90% of people won't even notice since your license will be included in your hardware/OS without you ever knowing.

threeseed 7y ago

This is why H.264/H.265 are dominant today. Because end users aren't exposed to licensing. I can freely record video on my Sony camera and watch it on my iPhone, Mac, PS4, Switch etc.

izacus 7y ago

No, HEVC licensing is an insane mash of several patent pools and a few companies trying to extract a buck out of anyone that uses it. It's significantly less clear and more complex than what H.264 was and the license fees are higher as well... If you even have a legal team that can figure out who needs to be paid. I'm on the phone so I can't really look up all the resources, but they shouldn't be hard to find. But this licensing mess is also why most oss development stalled and we still don't have an encoder that would be anything close to the quality of libx264. Instead, most important OSS experts have moved on to AV1.

reggieband 7y ago
> HEVC licensing is an insane mash of several patent pools Yes, but they aren't coming after users. Look at the pools, it is mostly device manufacturers like TV, audio systems and mobile phones. They are holding each other in a mexican stand-off. Two of the three largest pools have already agreed to the same $0 royalty for non physical distribution that h.264 has. They want to extract that money from their competitors in the physical device space. Fair enough, the uncertainty around final pricing is slowing adoption. But that can ossify quickly, although no guarantee it will. I hate I'm being drawn into a patent argument when my point is: it won't matter either way. Even if HEVC wins 99% of people will never be affected by a license fee. Let them scrap over $0.25 royalty fees on TVs all they want. In the end I don't care if it is HEVC of AV1 that wins. I just want the fight to be over so I don't have the cognitive overload of having to support both.
ksec 7y ago
>No, HEVC licensing is an insane mash of several patent pools and a few companies trying to extract a buck out of anyone that uses it. The user paid less than $1 per devices for turning on the blocks of Hardware Encoder and Decoder which is on by default for almost of all of the 1.2Billion Annual Smartphone shipment and 250M PC as well as 300M of Tablet. As far as I am aware, there are no royalty fees to be paid if you are delivering your content on Digital / Internet Streaming. Only if you are on disc such as BlurRay.