MP3 + GPL = illegal (was: Red Hat's Bluecurve)

[bscott at ntisys.com]

On Sun, 6 Oct 2002, at 1:01am, ddm+gnhlug at pizzashack.org wrote:
> I'd intended to explain that open-source MP3 players were permitted under
> the terms of their license ...

  And that license is available where?

  The MP3 algorithms are patented.  Thus, without a license, one cannot
legally use the algorithms.  Per the <http://www.mp3licensing.com> website,
"Use of our patents is not related to a specific implementation of encoders
and decoders, which means that a license under our patents is needed."  I
can find no statement that says "open-source" or "free" MP3 decoders are
permitted anywhere on that site.
 
  Yes, there have been statements from Thomson Multimedia that "free"  
(gratis) decoders are permitted.  However, those statements may or may not
constitute grant of license, and they certainly are not perpetual and
non-revokable.

  Those statements are also contradicted in other statements.  For example,
on the website <http://www.mpeg.org/MPEG/mp3-licensing.html>, there is this
infamous statement:  "We just are not enforcing the decoder rights on
decoders which are software only and have been written by some freeware
author (i.e. are freeware).  Please understand that this sentence does not
mean that I give an implied decoder license to everybody writing freeware
code..."

  As near as I have been able to determine, Thomson Multimedia has not
granted an explicit, perpetual, non-revokable license for the use of their
MP3 decoder patents in free (gratis) software.  That means distribution of a
GPL'ed MP3 decoder is, at the very least, questionable in legality.

> ... and in fact the terms have not changed at all ...

  All that means is that GPL'ed MP3 decoders have been illegal all along.

-- 
Ben Scott <bscott at ntisys.com>
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