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Re: XMMS and the new MP3 patent terms



On 29.08.2002 11:22:41 Hans Ekbrand wrote:

> On Thu, Aug 29, 2002 at 09:40:27AM +0100, Pavel Bradut Boghita wrote:

[...]
> > I would like to get something a bit more clearer in my head. My 
parents have
> > been involved with patents at one stage or another in their lifes. And 
from
> > what I've seen they really had to work hard to prove that whatever 
they were
> > pattenting was original and not done before (this was/is happening in
> > Romania).
> > How then, can someone patent code which has been around and used for 
quite a
> > while I  just don't get it.
> 
> AFAIK it's not the code that is patented (Fraunhofer has licensed code
> that one can use if one pays for it, but that is not the problem here,
> since there is GPL encoders/decoders available) , but the MP3 audio
> compression concept, i.e. that particular technique (a high level
> algorithm, if I understand these things correct) to transform and
> compress raw audio samples to mp3-files.

And it has been patented a while ago.
There was only a kind license which allowed the free personal usage.
Now this part with free usage is deleted. (source: online it-news-site)



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