From: Vladimir Pantelic <pan_at_nt.tu-darmstadt.de>
Date: Fri, 24 Feb 2006 13:04:44 +0100

[IDC]Dragon wrote:
>> SRS/WOW are patented or something by a third party. Without paying them
>> a large chunk of money, it'd probably be very difficult to get a license
>> to use it, and even WITH the money, it'd be impossible to GPL it, which
>> is a requirement.
>
> Is that really a problem? If license fees apply, they have been payed by
> Iriver already.
> If something is patented, it is published, not a secret any more.
> My guess is that GPL and patents don't conflict. In the various MPEG
> standards, there are lots of patents and still public code exists. You have
> to pay fees to the MPEG pool if you make a product from it, pay royalties
> per piece. In our case, the product is already there, the fees must have
> been taken care of by Iriver.

Yes, but in many cases the license is tied to a specific implementation,
often also requiring certification by the licensor. If you do your "own"
SRS/WOW it might not be covered by the license that Iriver paid.

Regards,

Vladimir
Received on 2006-02-24