Re: MPlayer

[William Ballard <40711.nospam@comcast.net>]

On Tue, Jul 20, 2004 at 01:35:08AM +0200, Michelle Konzack wrote:
> Oh yes, if you have bought a Windows Version with for example 
> your Computer, you can use the Win32 codecs as you want.
> 
> Not all is realy Illegal... 

Well, it looks like the flamewar is gonna start anyway.  Surely it's a 
violation of the DMCA even to reverse engineer the codecs.  The whole 
thing just smells like "big steaming lawsuit waiting to happen."  BigBad 
Companies always sue you when you've got something they want, and/or 
don't keep your nose to the grindstone.  I was trading MP3s since '97, 
and it wasn't until 13 year olds started doing it and costing BigBad 
Companies money that they made it illegal -- and boy howdy did they ever 
do that.

I wouldn't touch MPlayer with a 15 pole.  Then again, maybe these codecs 
fall under the "middleware" provision of the Justice Department act and 
have to be opened up.

Basically the situation is Mplayer isn't taking away any market share 
from anybody, even though it's highly useful under Linux, but it sure 
seems awfully lawsuit-prone to me.

There.  Flame on.