Alex :peace:Apr 18, 2017
Bob Mottram
I think this might be worth some sort of mini-celebration. I never thought I'd live to see the day.

"the MP3 technology became patent-free in the United States on 16 April 2017 when U.S. Patent 6,009,399, ...administered by Technicolor, expired"

Apr 17, 2017 at 10:05pmWeb
Show threadMMN-o ✅⃠Apr 17, 2017
First GIF, now MP3. Let's relive the '90s and forget about all the new, improved and libre-from-the-start technologies!!!
Show thread☠️ Grumpy OldmanApr 17, 2017
@mmn Easter is over, so let's break an ogg over it... ok - this joke is too flac. #1lettermissed
Show threadvinzvApr 17, 2017
@grmpyoldman @mmn  #badumtss
Show threadWoozle HypertwinApr 17, 2017

@bob Somehow I thought this had expired a few years ago, but okay...

Maybe I was thinking of the GIF patent.

Yay, one less evil thing to futilely attempt to avoid.

Show threadNobody [LinuxWalt (@lnxw48a1)]Apr 17, 2017
There are likely to be others outside of MPEG/MPEG-LA. Microsoft battled a patent troll over such patents a few years ago.
Show threadBenjamin Sonntag-King 🐙Apr 18, 2017

@bob couldn't agree more!
I wrote my own encoder (with an Internet friend) back in the 90's because of that :/ The encoder sucked but at least was free :D

Now let's use the wonderful Lame library freely at last everyone \o/

Show threadDerek I. Batting 💬🍵Apr 18, 2017
@bob I can't wait to encode all my music into 128kbps MP3s and put it all on Napst... oh, wait.
Show threadRigo WenningApr 18, 2017
@bob @jz Les brevets décisifs du Fraunhofer sont expiré depuis longtemps.
Mais naturellement, un grand nombre de gens essaye de racler de la tune avec des p'tits inventions annexes, surtout brevetable aux US avec son système brevet défaillant.
Aux US, j'imagine qu'il y a encore une bonne centaine de brevets en toc sur le mp3
Show threadmrayApr 26, 2017
@bob true. Now we have OGG, OPUS and FLAC and having free MP3 now ahs a sweet bitter taste. But YAY! anways... 🙂
Show threadsterApr 28, 2017
@bob flac and opus are still better though