[M4IF Discuss] hourly usage fee for MPEG4

[Craig Birkmaier]

At 5:27 PM +0100 2/22/02, AVARO Olivier FTRD/DIH/REN wrote:
>Hi Craig, all,
>
>1- Who will pay for that ? What you propose if FAR from being free. 
>It needs as well lot of time.

I would suggest that a number of companies have done the research 
already. YOu might be surprised what you would learn if you asked.
>2- Without the "good" patented tech. what quality will you reach ? 
>What you gain in the patent fee, you loose it in the bandwidth cost 
>:-)

Again, if you ask, you may just find that some of the patents issued 
in the '90s are not as essential as you think. The problem is that 
many of the JVT members are going to do everything in their power to 
make certain that the MPEG-2 essential patents ARE used.; they have 
no motivation to examine alternatives, or to reach consensus on an 
alternative approach.
>
>3- If one patent is found after the "free standard" is deployed, how 
>do you handle it ?

Good question. I would think that the current MPEG-2 provisions that 
require the identification of IP while the standard is being created 
would apply. And in the eventuality that an outside party stepped 
forward after the fact, they would be in an inferior position to a 
large group of companies that are trying to further entrench their IP 
in derivative standards.
Typically these patent bandits can be paid off.
>4- and ...
>
>Good luck :-)
>
>  > And there is one simple way to proceed if you are serious about a
>>  royalty free standard:
>>  Impose a requirement that any essential IP be offered on a royalty
>>  free basis. Unfortunately I don't know if this is possible under ISO
>>  or ITU rules.
>Unfortunatly I don't think it is.
>

This comes as no surprise.
-- 
Regards
Craig Birkmaier
Pcube Labs