[Foundation-l] We should permit Flash video playback

Sat Jul 21 12:11:34 UTC 2007

On 7/21/07, Peter Halasz <email at pengo.org> wrote:
> On 7/21/07, Tim Starling <tstarling at wikimedia.org> wrote:
>
> > I don't understand this argument at all.
> >
> > Nobody is suggesting delivering content exclusively in a patent-encumbered
> > format. The proposal is to deliver content in either Ogg Theora or FLV as
> > the client requires. Converting a video into a non-free format does not
> > make the video non-free. The transparent copy will still be available --
> > the Ogg Theora source file.
> >
> > We support Internet Explorer for browsing our website -- we have
> > IE70Fixes.css, for instance. Are you saying that to be truly free, we
> > should delete this file and deny access for anyone using Internet Explorer?
> >
> > Or to make another analogy, why didn't anyone complain about non-free
> > software when we made the text of Wikipedia available for download in
> > TomeRaider format? Was that a mistake? Now that I have drawn attention to
> > it, should we delete it from our servers and then burn the hard drives
> > that held it in a purification ritual?
> >
> > We are supporting free software by fully supporting a complete free
> > software stack in the client, and by using free software in the server. It
> > would not help our mission to support free software in this third way --
> > by boycotting non-free client systems.
> >
> > -- Tim Starling
> >
>
> I'm reply to this message to agree with everything in it. Tim makes
> many of the exact points I was about to start penning, but more
> eloquently (including the IE example).
>
> Allowing Proprietary Flash clients to display our Free OGG content is
> a Good Thing, even if we have to transcode to flv to get it there.
> Playback is not a zero sum game -- we can support different clients.
> Let's not get pretend this is the same as supporting FLV as a native
> file format -- it's not. It's only about playback.
>
Is this definitely legal?  Can the WMF transcode OGG to flv without
permission from anyone?  If so, I really don't see the problem, per
the reasons you give.  But Kat mentioned this:

"So, great, you can edit the theora version with only free tools, but
then you can't update the Flash version; you're dependent on someone
willing to play by their rules to do so."

This implies that some sort of permission is needed to transcode OGG
to flv (or maybe it has to be done outside the US).

I guess I could just look up the answer to this, but there are
probably others on this list wondering similar things.