OSI President Questions WebM Patent License Compatibility with Open Source

Via the H comes a report that the Simon Phipps, current President of the Open Source Initiative, thinks that the VP8 patent Cross-license agreeement Google brokered with the MPEG-LA is incompatible with the Open Source definition. The primary problems are that the license is not sub-licensable and only covers certain uses, leading to conflict with OSD clauses five, six, and seven. Phipps concludes: "As a consequence, I suggest the license is flawed when considered in relation to open source projects and is likely to be negatively received by many communities that value software freedom. Doubtless a case can be made that the patent license is optional, but I suspect the community issues may remain. Once again we're left with our fingers crossed. Google's making the right noises, but this draft agreement seems like a particularly unworkable approach for free and open source software. Its failure to allow sublicensing seems like a major flaw. Even if this doesn't result in a requirement for all end-users to sign the agreement, the discrepancies between this document and the OSD leave it disruptive to open source adoption of VP8."

Mozilla

[WedgeTalon]

Pretty sure this is why Mozilla originally decided to instead back Ogg Theora video.

Got an alternative?

[gr8_phk]

It's great to write an article outlining the problem, but it would be nice if he offered a better solution. Google put WebM / VP8 / VP9 out there are open source with a strong belief that it didn't infringe the H264 patents. Turns out the scum at MPEG-LA rounded up some patents for an attack and Google has made some effort to allow use of those patents. What else could they do? Go to court and get the claims thrown out? Perhaps, but what it some are valid claims?

We can hope that Google has a larger strategy than they are letting on. The thing to do is get WebM out there to take power away from MPEG-LA. For the short term that means Google, Android, and the major browsers have to be able to use it, and then YouTube needs to use it exclusively. Everyone else can use the code, but it's kinda hard for Google to influence other patent holders. Rather than just complain, the author and OSI should propose a better solution - there isn't one.

BTW, your phone probably supports VP8 - Android has supported it in software since 2.3(?) and Google has made hardware implementations available for some time now with many SoC vendors licensing it (for free).

Re:Mozilla

[caspy7]

Pretty sure the fact that VP8 having not been released into the wild (or released at all) is why Mozilla originally backed Ogg Theora. (bonus fact: Theora is based on VP3, an earlier iteration of VP8.)