linuxaudio.org

Lee Revell wrote:
>Personally I think it's a losing battle to ask Windows users to use

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>anything but WMP.  Like it or not MP3 is the standard.  We need to make

>MP3 "Just Work" on Linux.

>

>

What's the problem ? Is there a lack of MP3 players for Linux ?

>MP3 is not a "closed format" it just has some patent issues (which may

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>not be issues at all).

>

>

The "issue" is that Frauenhofer has openly stated its intention to

collect royalties from any & all MP3 encoders, and they've done a pretty

good job of it. They are easy with the decoders (more people playing

MP3s mean more people buying the encoders so more people will play MP3s,

loop ad infinitum), which is why I asked what's the problem with MP3

"just working".

See these URLs:
    http://www.8hz.com/mp3/
    http://bladeenc.mp3.no/
    http://www.mp3dev.org/mp3/ (for the interesting "educational

purposes" rationale)
    http://www.mp3licensing.com
AFAICT only the LAME project continues to produce an open-source MP3

encoder, and they are vocal about the fact that it is not based on the

dist10 code. But if I recall correctly there was a time when even the

LAME guys weren't really sure of their position wrt Frauenhofer's legal

arm. At any rate, no binaries are available from the LAME site, only the

"educational" source code.
Don't take me the wrong way, I'm not fundamentally opposed to the

format. I've done this research a few times already, it's always the

same conclusion: Frauenhofer have worked and *will* work their legal arm

to enforce their patent, EOF.
>I find it amusing that so many people who won't use MP3 due to its

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>"encumbrance" will happily run the proprietary Nvidia driver..

>

>

I prefer Ogg because it sounds good and is open-source. If it sucked I

wouldn't use it, open-source or no.

I use the nvidia driver for my ancient video card because I do some

3D+audio stuff with Pd, I like the Stellarium program, and I

occasionally use the OpenGL display in Snd. When I read some rave

reviews of the ATI cards from someone else on this list who does similar

work, I'll consider purchasing an ATI card (assuming it's an affordable

purchase).
Best,
dp