SanDisk MP3 Players Seized in MP3 Licence Dispute

MrSteveSD writes "According to the BBC, German officials have seized Sandisk's MP3 players at the IFA show in Berlin. The Italian company Sisvel claims that Sandisk has refused to pay license fees for the MP3 codec. Sisvel President Roberto Dini has said that Sandisk could get an edge over competitors by not paying the fees. How much are proprietary format licensing fees pushing up the cost of consumer goods?"

Patenting a Form?

[w33t]

This doesn't make sense to me. I mean, I guess it should, but how can one patent a format?

I mean, I can see patenting an algorithm (an original implementation) that allows you to effeciently encode/decode a particular format - or even patenting hardware that works specifically with those formats.

But the format itself?

Why must you pay fees if you develop your very own, original and novel algorithm for decoding the mp3 file format?

I'm just having trouble wrapping my brain around this for some reason.

Patenting a format just feels like patenting a poetic form or something. Sure, you can write an original poem and copyright it, that seems common sense...but claiming the poet must pay licensing just for making their poem a haiku?

It just seems absurd to me.

This should no longer be an issue

[ChrisLTD]

How long has the MP3 technology been around? Shouldn't this sort of thing have entered the public domain if there was any sanity in the Intellectual Property system?

Re:Patenting a Form?

[RPoet]

I suppose they don't have their own novel algorithm for decoding MP3. Such a thing, if it existed (which it probably cannot), would clearly dodge any patent fee claims.

Ogg doesn't suit the purpose well

[Rix]

It's fine on a desktop with a high powered general purpose processor, but less so in a hardware implementation.

SanDisk take revenge, switch to Ogg and FLAC

[Anonymous Coward]

Hope this is a good lesson for all stupids blindly embracing and promoting low quality MP3 is the way to listen quality music. The MP3 is a marketing hype, it is the armature's music format. SanDisk, take revenge! Just say sorry and switch to Ogg and FLAC.

This is again reminds all about the advantages of open formats. Open formats are patents free, royalty free and best of the best quality. MP3 max sample rate: 48 kHz, FLAC max sample rate: 1048.57 kHz, MP3 max bit rate: 320 kbit/s, FLAC max bit rate: Infinity, as same as original.

See this comparison: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison_of_audio_c odecs [wikipedia.org].

The value of proprietary formats

[DigitAl56K]

The article summary asks, "How much are proprietary format licensing fees pushing up the cost of consumer goods?".

Proprietary format licensing fees are not "pushing up" the cost of consumer goods. Consumer goods will use proprietary formats when the value to the consumer (and thus ultimately to the manufacturer) justifies paying the license fee. Without MP3 support would SanDisk be able to target such a large market? Probably not. They would save $0.75 in licensing and lose millions of dollars in sales overall.

At the end of the day it is not a "proprietary format" raising the price, it is market demand.

Everything is a trade off.

[twitter]

It's [ogg] fine on a desktop with a high powered general purpose processor, but less so in a hardware implementation.

I've heard that before, but not seen it. What exactly is the trade off? How do people like this [trekstor.de] do it? How does ogg compare to AAC or AAC with unFairPlay [slashdot.org]? How is it that my dinky ARM Zaurus plays ogg without a problem, just like the 233 MHz PII it's roughly equivalent to? Why don't I see the difference between ogg and mp3 on any of the devices I use besides the one cheap player I own that won't play ogg? It has a reasonable battery life, but this ogg player goes for 25 hours [trekstor.de].

Most importantly, is the performance trade off something worth paying licensing fees and putting up with extortion threats?

Re:Ohhh Puhleeeeeese!

[Tharkban]

I was merely making the point that someone HAS made a free codec and given it away for free. (hence why I quoted that passage)

and btw, I wouldn't buy an "mp3" player that doesn't support ogg. What good is a portable media player that can't play my music collection? I got sick of dealing with mp3's a long time ago. You can start laughing now.

Re:Ohhh Puhleeeeeese!-Reality "check".

[myster0n]

If you just check which players are supported by the rockbox firmware [rockbox.org], and then choose a player according to your budget, you won't be disappointed.
I own an iriver H320, which supported OGG out of the box (which was the reason I bought it). It was nice enough as it was, but now that I installed rockbox, I never want to go back to the original firmware.
But if you don't want to risk bricking your mp3 player (although the risk was almost non-existant with my H320), Cowon is also a good brand for sanely priced OGG players.

Re:Everything is a trade off.

[Anonymous Coward]

unFairPlay

twitter, please read this carefully. Following this advice will make Slashdot a better place for everyone, including yourself.

• As a representative of the Linux community, participate in mailing list and newsgroup discussions in a professional manner. Refrain from name-calling and use of vulgar language. Consider yourself a member of a virtual corporation with Mr. Torvalds as your Chief Executive Officer. Your words will either enhance or degrade the image the reader has of the Linux community.
• Avoid hyperbole and unsubstantiated claims at all costs. It's unprofessional and will result in unproductive discussions.
• A thoughtful, well-reasoned response to a posting will not only provide insight for your readers, but will also increase their respect for your knowledge and abilities.
• Always remember that if you insult or are disrespectful to someone, their negative experience may be shared with many others. If you do offend someone, please try to make amends.
• Focus on what Linux has to offer. There is no need to bash the competition. Linux is a good, solid product that stands on its own.
• Respect the use of other operating systems. While Linux is a wonderful platform, it does not meet everyone's needs.
• Refer to another product by its proper name. There's nothing to be gained by attempting to ridicule a company or its products by using "creative spelling". If we expect respect for Linux, we must respect other products.
• Give credit where credit is due. Linux is just the kernel. Without the efforts of people involved with the GNU project , MIT, Berkeley and others too numerous to mention, the Linux kernel would not be very useful to most people.
• Don't insist that Linux is the only answer for a particular application. Just as the Linux community cherishes the freedom that Linux provides them, Linux only solutions would deprive others of their freedom.
• There will be cases where Linux is not the answer. Be the first to recognize this and offer another solution.

From http://www.ibiblio.org/pub/linux/docs/HOWTO/Advoca cy [ibiblio.org]

Re:No Case

[infolib]

Germany is a member of the EU where mathematical operations are specifically excluded from patentability

That would indeed seem to be the reasonable interpretation of the European Patent Convention which prohibits patenting of "programs for computers". In practice, several countries have built case law where you can patent, not "a program doing X" but "a computer running a program doing X" which very much amounts to the same thing in other words. (In the same way you can't patent business models "Persons A, B and C doing Y", but often "Persons A, B and C doing Y with a computer network").

For a start you can dive into this very humorous treatment of "as such" [www.ffii.se].

Re:The value of proprietary formats

[RAMMS+EIN]

``Proprietary format licensing fees are not "pushing up" the cost of consumer goods. Consumer goods will use proprietary formats when the value to the consumer (and thus ultimately to the manufacturer) justifies paying the license fee. Without MP3 support would SanDisk be able to target such a large market? Probably not. They would save $0.75 in licensing and lose millions of dollars in sales overall.''

Very true. However, that's assuming that what consumers want is an _MP3_ player. If you assume they want a _music_ player, you can compare MP3 to other formats, including ones for which no royalties need be paid.

Which of these assumptions is closer to the truth? I think it's fair to say that most people don't actually care which format their music is in. Having said that, people do care about interoperability; they want the music they download from the 'net to play on their music players. I think, for most people, that music will be in MP3 format, but for some it's AAC, WMA, PCM, Vorbis, or FLAC.

As it stands now, MP3 is the common denominator format; almost all players (hardware and software) support it, and it's commonly found online. As long as it's the only format players can be depended on to support, there will be an incentive for sites to offer it. As long as it's commonly found on sites, there will be an incentive for players to support it. However, strong forces are at work to break this bind. Microsoft would rather you used the proprietary WMA format, and is pushing sites and players to support it. Apple is doing the same with AAC. Both of these offer better quality than MP3, are often combined with DRM, and require license fees to be paid. Vorbis offers better quality than the others, has a completely public specification, and requires no license fees to be paid. For some reason, it seems to be impopular with users, though. I think this is due to (lack of) marketing, and a sort of a boycott from Apple and Microsoft (the players pushed by these companies don't support Vorbis without third-party plugins).

Re:No Case

[ajs318]

European law says very clearly: Mathematics is not patentable. And MP3 decoding is pure mathematics -- an autistic kid probably could do the calculations in his* head fast enough to imagine the sounds in real time. Anyone is allowed to do the calculations done by the patented device without paying anything to anyone. Any patents must cover a specific device -- one means to a given end, and not the end in itself. Sandisk's implementation is likely to differ so much from the reference implementation as not to constitute a breach of patent.

Sandisk should move for an annulment, since it's clear that the patents should never have been granted in the first place. And then every manufacturer who has ever paid the bogus licence fee should get together and sue the licencing authority.


*Not intending to be sexist, I just never heard of a girl diagnosed with autism .....

Re:No Case

[infolib]

European law says very clearly: Mathematics is not patentable. And MP3 decoding is pure mathematics

Well, I agree with you. But how sure can Sandisk be that the judge will buy it? Case law has a rather tricky history in this area, and EPC art. 52(2) hasn't been very well respected. Besides, Sandisk is in it for the money, not for fairness, respect for the law or the greater common good.

But yes, if this goes all the way it could be a very interesting test case. There's both a hope and a danger there.

Re:Just came here in a time machine from 2010.

[CastrTroy]

I don't think that online lossless downloads will take off anymore than DVD quality video downloads. The problem is, is that high speed is only as cheap as it is, because 90% of the people on it only use 3% of the available capacity. If everybody on high speed internet started downloading a 300 MB CD (losslessly compressed) everyday, or downloading a 4.7 GB DVD every week, then would either quickly see our bandwidth go out the window, with all the extra traffic, or see the internet providers start charging twice as much in order to keep the demand in check with supply.