Why Patent Free Codecs Are Important

We are all familiar with visiting a website to watch a movie file or listen to an audio track and it telling us we have to install a plugin or codec to play the file. This is a common tactic of malware writers, to trick the unwary user onto clicking on like a video.exe to supposedly install the codecs to play that video file to then wonder why they're now part of a botnet. This is a huge security risk for users and can easily be solved if the codecs are pre-installed on their PC.

A huge myriad of uses for websites, means there's always going to be something that a user needs to download and install to run something, but in the case of video and audio files, these uses are generic to most users needs. The only reason anyone needs to download and install codecs in the first place is because of companies like Microsoft, Apple and Adobe insisting on using their codecs as lock in weapons.

Patented formats like Flash or mpeg are a problem here as they can't be redistributed without a licence. Microsoft and Apple both pay for that right, but Linux distros, being mostly volunteer based and donation / advertising funded can't. They often rely on closed source code too, which means they lose the benefits of peer review and improvements.

The introduction of HTML5 allowed media files to play in your browser without installing codecs on your PC. The standard did not specify they had to be certain formats however. Mozilla Firefox chose a true patent free Ogg format. Ogg Theora is a free video format, it's sister Ogg Vorbis is the audio version.

Both Ogg Vorbis and Ogg Theora can be redistributed royalty free, patent free, cost free on all systems. Ogg is completely cross platform and vendor neutral too. While Microsoft and Apple use their formats to try and lock you into their products and revenue streams Ogg will work everywhere. In other words, there is no legal or financial barriers to installing Ogg on any PC right out of the box, before the customer even sees it. The more websites who use HTML5 with Ogg, the safer our browsing will be.

Tricking users into clicking on links will always go on, there are more avenues than just video files but it's a solution we have at our fingertips right now, if we can only use it. A lot of problems we have are down to users not being trained enough to avoid basic scams. This also needs addressing.

The use of patent free formats like Ogg on websites is a good answer to security concerns, but it's more than that. By using a patent free open standard format, your content will never be locked away if a company goes out of business, or changes the terms of it's licensing. Developers can compete in making better and better players by using the same open standards, which helps both competition and innovation. The same applies to any open standard formats, regardless of their use.

If all your media files are reliant on one vendors applications they can stagnate it, offer you nothing, no reason to stay with them other than the fact that you can't leave. They can also strongarm you into buying the new version of something by dropping support for the version you've already paid for and are already using. They don't need to offer you any reason to buy because they know you eventually have no choice.