Gregory Maxwell wrote: > On Tue, May 26, 2009 at 3:17 PM, Frank Murphy <frankly3d@xxxxxxxxx> wrote: > > Patents are *currently* illegal in Europe, (though they may be granted). > > The patents offices being self-funding and all that. > > Codec patents are generally not 'software patents' in the common > patent-speak meaning of the words. Not if you ask the patent lawyers, no. > The bulk of codec patent holders are European companies (I.e. > Fraunhofer, Nokia, etc). The collection of royalties for codecs is a > multi-billion dollar a year industry. There are many well funded > companies spending considerable amounts of money licensing codecs, > even on products which they only intend to market in Europe. On that > basis, I think it's safe to conclude that there is more to the > situation than you are suggesting. That's certainly true. None the less, Frank is right. These patents *are* illegal, if you read what the convention and the national laws actually say, and yet they are granted by routine. Whether they would hold up in court doesn't matter much apparently. They are effective anyway. Björn Persson
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