Re: legal issues on media codecs (was Re: very rough pre-gep tentative new modules list)

[Jeff Garzik <jgarzik mandrakesoft com>]

Havoc Pennington wrote:
> A possible answer is to have a pluggable media system, where various
> codecs can be dropped in, and ship only unencumbered codecs such as
> ogg ourselves. If the plugin system is compatible with non-GPL plugins
> (say an X/BSD-style license plugin), then people could license the mp3
> patent and then include an mp3 plugin, for example, at some point in
> the future.  If the plugin system requires plugins to be GPL, then
> patent licenses are impossible - which may be a policy decision we
> want to make, but I'm not sure it makes sense. Or another alternative
> might be to allow GPL only but have an exception for codec patent
> licenses.


There is an additional technique in use right now that is worth pointing 
out -- for some video codecs, the only thing available is a Win32 DLL. 
There is Linux software (http://dvr.sourceforge.net/ comes to mind) that 
can use certain algorithmic DLLs without much assistance.

It's not a stretch to think that its a good idea for audio codecs as 
well.  One certainly does not want to encourage use of closed source 
Win32 DLL codecs, but it is more than reasonable to leave that avenue 
open for situations where there is no other choice.

	Jeff