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MP3 was not "an open standard", it was a patented technology, owned by the Fraunhofer institute and lead to hilarious lawsuits against people putting MP3 capabi
by TheRealPomax 4y ago
MP3 was not "an open standard", it was a patented technology, owned by the Fraunhofer institute and lead to hilarious lawsuits against people putting MP3 capabilities in both hardware and software without even knowing they had to pay license fees, until Fraunhofer gave up and gave MP3 to the world. And not "way back when", this is a story that didn't have a happy ending until 2017. And then only because technology had passed it by with the industry having mostly moved on to newer, better codecs.
- worik 4y ago> until Fraunhofer gave up and gave MP3 to the world I thought the patent ran out.
- TheRealPomax 4y agoIn the US, patents don't just "run out", the patent owner has to actively not bother tweaking something trivial, filing for a new patent on top of their own while it's still active, and then start arguing that even though the old patent runs out, folks who act on that are now in violation of the new patent.