Nero Files Antitrust Complaint Against MPEG-LA 247
hkmwbz writes "German technology company Nero AG has filed an antitrust complaint against the MPEG-LA, the company that manages the H.264 patent pool. Nero claims that the MPEG-LA has violated the law and achieved and abused 100% market share, by, among other things, using 'independent experts' that weren't independent after all, not weeding out non-essential patents from the pool (in fact, it has grown from the original 53 to more than 1,000), and retroactively changing previously-agreed-on license terms."
MPEG_LA Isn't the devil (Score:3, Informative)
Although I disagree with most of what that company does, their MPEG licensing fee is on the order of $2 per manufactured device to use their technology. This isn't really extortion. HDMI is 4 cents per device, but you're required to maintain a $10,000 license fee on top of that. I think gross abuse would be more on the order of $50/device.
Either way, I support the free and open standard provided by displayport, which dispatches with the fees.
Re:MPEG_LA Isn't the devil (Score:5, Informative)
MPEG_LA's official stance is that nobody can create a codec for compressed video of any sort without violating at least one of their patents.
Re:I didn't know Nero AG had time for this (Score:5, Informative)
They seemed so busy turning their superior burning tool into another bloated intrusive dog.
There are other completely free products that have matched Nero's (former) minimalist approach. CDBurnerXP is great on Windows. Brasero works great on Linux. On OS X, Burn is not quite as much my style, but it's simple and get it's job done.
Essentially, Nero got priced out of the "dirt simple I just wanna burn a damned CD" market. Bloatware is all that's left.
Re:I didn't know Nero AG had time for this (Score:5, Informative)
I don't have any affiliation with this project.
Re:MPEG_LA Isn't the devil (Score:5, Informative)
The problem is principle, even if I use totally clean-room reverse-engineering without even taking one look at their patents, I still am guilty of patent violations, how?
Among copyright, patent, and trademark, only copyright cares about the pedigree of any copy. Patents and trademarks can be infringed whether you have had any contact with covered goods or not.
Non-infringing video (Score:5, Informative)
Well, you probably would have trouble getting a modern compression system that doesn't infringe on one or more of their patents, but you can use an older video format.
Consider that DVD was developed in 1995, so the base MPEG-2 patents expire within 5 years, if not earlier.
The draft MPEG-1 standard was out in 1990, so a codec based on MPEG-1 technology should be free of patent issues.
H.264 dates from 2003, so we probably have another 13 years there.
Ultimately, it may take a legal battle with Google to invalidate or narrow some of the H.264 patents such that VP8 or something similar can compete patent-free.
Re:MPEG_LA Isn't the devil (Score:4, Informative)
well no, not yet anyways. But if you make a shortfilm with your camera and decide to sell it, then you have to pay up big time.
Re:MPEG_LA Isn't the devil (Score:5, Informative)
You might think differently if you got the manual your $8000 Pro HD camera out and read the manual
http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?pid=584693&l=d37e6ecc2a&id=1429834573 [facebook.com]
and then once you got that sorted out you read the manual to your $999 copy of Final Cut Pro
http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?pid=584692&l=a8a46fa560&id=1429834573 [facebook.com]
MPEG-LA is a virus
What timing! (Score:3, Informative)
This couldn't have come at a worse time for MPEG-LA. They're just now preparing for an epic struggle with Google over VP8 and Nero comes from behind and sticks a dagger in their spine.
Re:MPEG_LA Isn't the devil (Score:3, Informative)
Re:About time. (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Citation, please? (Score:5, Informative)
Actually, they don't indemnify at all. I've seen stories that apparently they are forming a patent pool for Theora and WebM/VP8, but the only place I can't find any confirmation of that is from MPEG LA themselves. The "official stance" referred to by the AC was mentioned in the story about them forming a VP8 pool, but said statement (and VP8 plan) doesn't exist on their site.
And they sue. A lot [mpegla.com].
They are founding a patent pool for human gene patents though. That can't be evil at all.
Re:Non-infringing video (Score:5, Informative)
Consider that DVD was developed in 1995, so the base MPEG-2 patents expire within 5 years, if not earlier.
Patents last 28 years (in the US at least), that puppy has another 13 years or so on it.
Huh? US Patents don't last 28 years. New patents have a term of 20 years from the earliest filing date. Patents filed before June 8, 1995 have a term that is the longer of (i) 20 years from the earliest filing date; or (ii) 17 years from the date of issue.
Comment removed (Score:5, Informative)
the NFL decision from the court (Score:4, Informative)
Here's the Supreme Court's decision:
http://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/09pdf/08-661.pdf [supremecourt.gov]
Re:The supreme court would say MPeg LA is illegal (Score:5, Informative)
No. They ruled that the Sherman Antitrust Act would apply for collective licenses. They could still collectively license trademarks without a problem. The specific issue was that the NFL argued they didn't need to worry about antitrust issues while issuing an exclusive collective contract. They may still be able to do exactly what they've already done, and there was no ruling banning collective licensing at all (and nothing that could even be construed to hold back any collective agreement of any kind).
But if you have a collection of competitors agreeing to to work together, antitrust issues apply. It may have some impact on this case if it's found that the cross licensing is an antitrust issue, but there's nothing that would prevent any group from collective licenses (presuming other laws not examined in this ruling aren't broken).
Re:MPEG_LA Isn't the devil (Score:5, Informative)
You might think differently if you got the manual your $8000 Pro HD camera out and read the manual
Your camera shipped with the generic end-user consumer license.
Your costs for MPEG 4 distribution look like this:
Shorts 12 minutes and under -
$0
Retail sales by title -
The lower of 2% of the price paid to the Licensee (on first arms length sale of the video) or $0.02 per title.
If you aren't grossing $150K+ in sales they have no interest in you whatever.
Subscription sales [The Geek's Strip Club Channel or DVD of the Month] -
100,000 subscribers or less - $0/yr.
100,000-250,000 - $25,000/yr
250,000-500,000 - $50,000/yr
500,000=1 million -$100,000 - $50,000.
Over 1 Million - $100,000/yr
Free TV Broadcast -
1-Time $2,500 fee for each AVC encoder
OR
Annual Fee For Markets Of 100,000 and Over - Starting at $2,500/yr
Internet -
End user does not pay by title or subscription - $0/yr [May in the future rise to the equivalent of Free TV Broadcast]
Enterprise Cap [Commonly owned legal entities] -
$5 million/yr
That is the real cost of H.264 licensing to a service provider the size of Disney or Google. Which means that production, storage and distribution of VP8 video is going to have to be mighty damn cheap to be competitive. SUMMARY OF AVC/H.264 LICENSE TERMS [mpegla.com]
Re:About time. (Score:5, Informative)
FTFA, Nero got a license from MPEG-LA saying that they didn't have to pay license fees for trial software. Now, MPEG-LA has changed their minds and has demanded payment retroactively for all the free trials Nero has provided before the change.
Re:I didn't know Nero AG had time for this (Score:3, Informative)
the problem is that in the "real" world corporations and the US Government do not allow free or open source software on their computers. It is all fine that you have free alternatives, but they won't be allowed on the machines due to administrative policies.
I work for the US Government, and we run a ton of open source on various systems. Most other governments and most corporations do too (Apache - a FLOSS product, runs most of the Internet).
Your statement is completely without merit.