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Topic: MPlayer site "Closed for patent infringement" (Read 9498 times) previous topic - next topic
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MPlayer site "Closed for patent infringement"

Reply #25 –
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Forgive my ignorance, but is http://www.mplayerhq.hu the official mplayer site?  It's still up and there isn't news about patent infringement.
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That link redirected me [a href="http://www.mplayerhq.hu/homepage/index.html]here[/url], you must be seeing a different page then I am . . . . unless you don't consider "Closed for patent infringement" in huge letters at the top of the page "news about patent infringement." 
gentoo ~amd64 + layman | ncmpcpp/mpd | wavpack + vorbis + lame

MPlayer site "Closed for patent infringement"

Reply #26 –
Quote
Quote
Forgive my ignorance, but is http://www.mplayerhq.hu the official mplayer site?  It's still up and there isn't news about patent infringement.
[{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a]

That link redirected me [a href="http://www.mplayerhq.hu/homepage/index.html]here[/url], you must be seeing a different page then I am . . . . unless you don't consider "Closed for patent infringement" in huge letters at the top of the page "news about patent infringement." 
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I clicked your link and I got exactly the same page.  I did a shift-reload and same thing.  Nothing about patent infringement.  I even went and downloaded the latest mplayer  Maybe its only for certain countries?

EDIT:  Here's a [a href="http://rarewares.org/quantumknot/mplayer.jpg]screenshot[/url] of what I see in that link

MPlayer site "Closed for patent infringement"

Reply #27 –
It is perhaps only displayed based on IP locations?

Anyway, once again, it is just a DEMONSTRATION (ie activism), not a real shutdown because of patent infringements.

MPlayer site "Closed for patent infringement"

Reply #28 –
Is there something that us, the ppl outside Europe, can do?

MPlayer site "Closed for patent infringement"

Reply #29 –
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There are, of course, complications to the issue..

If some guy or company invents a great new hardware gizmo he is entitled to patent protection, right? (with the usual implied, but not always followed, conditions that the invention is truly original and not obvious).  Some of you guys just want free stuff and don't believe in IP protection at all, but hardware patents have long been the law so lets start there.

What if there is a choice of a pure hardware implementation or using upgradeable firmware.. firmware is better for the consumer if there are future improvements, but if there is no software protection he will not go that way.

If the device can be implemented entirely in software then does it really require a patent on it? How can a new series of numbers that, interpreted a certain way, perform a function, seriously be considered patentable?

If the has invented a new hardware gizmo and then it has a software component in it, then the software is likely pretty useless without the hardware gizmo to put it in. And hardware certainly is patentable. So why does he need to patent the software as well?

I'm a software developer by trade, and software patents threaten my livelihood. Why? Because I can sit down, write a piece of software to do something, and violate a patent without knowing it. I have, in fact, done that. Nothing came of it because that software was purely internally used and I didn't find a patent violation until a couple years later anyway after I had left that job, but the point is that software patents make it nearly impossible to write software without violating at least one of them.

Copyright is enough. Everything I write is copyrighted. People can't copy it without my permission. But patents go too far. Because if you can patent software, then you're essentially patenting an idea and not a specific implementation of that idea, and nobody can write software that does anything even remotely close to that idea. You can't infringe copyright unintentionally, but you can, and generally do, infringe patents unintentionally. Happens a *lot*, and most people never know it. Where would we be if somebody patented software to play MP3s? Nobody could make an MP3 player. Software patents don't just cover implementation, because in software, implementation and idea are often one and the same.
 

MPlayer site "Closed for patent infringement"

Reply #30 –
Am I seeing something some of you aren't seeing?

"Closed for patent infringement

This headline might soon become a reality" <---- Second line there!