Re: x11amp

[Josip Rodin <joy@cibalia.gkvk.hr>]

On Mon, Feb 01, 1999 at 06:25:59PM -0600, John Goerzen wrote:
> It would probably be wise to do so, within reason.  (Keep in mind that it
> may be technically illegal to use .gif for anything without paying Unisys,
> but since they gave us their 'blessing' by saying they'd only charge for
> commercial packages, we're OK and would not be sued.)
>
> However, nobody has ever demonstrated that 1) that patent is valid anywhere
> in the world, 2) that they hold a patent that applies to playing MP3s, and
> 3) that such patent has been vigorously defended such that courts would side
> in their favor.
> 
> Note also that if we really were under such patent restrictions, it would
> not be legal to distribute even in non-free.
> 
> Merely the *threat* of legal action, which would ultimately be unsucessful
> from their perspective, can not and should not influence Debian policy.

Okay, so we should not fear Fraunhofer now.

> > > The licensing terms are not vague: it's GPL.  That's about as solid as you
> > > can get.
> > 
> > Yes, but the patents and other restrictions fsck up.
> 
> I have yet to see that there are any applicable patents here.

There is another restriction, and that is mpg123 licence. Apparently,
x11amp includes some code from mpg123, and not only that not all of it
is GPL, but nothing is even distributable/usable without explicit
permission from mpg123 authors.

I'll go check with x11amp people about all this.

--
enJoy -*/\*- http://jagor.srce.hr/~jrodin/