MP3 Licensing

[queenorych]

I emailed thomson.net about mp3 licensing, and they don't charge for personal use. Why can't Ubuntu get a license for mp3's and include it in the distriubtion straight up?

[mpettitt]

Because you can install Ubuntu in a commercial environment?
Because they distribute it in an almost commercial manner?
There is a whole page about the issue on the Ubuntu wiki if you want all the reasons.

[zenwhen]

This has been gone over time and time again and there really isn't much else to discuss about this that hasnt already been rehashed a million times. It cannot be done, and probably wouldn't be done if it could be done. Ubuntu is a free distro.

[Stormy Eyes]

I emailed thomson.net about mp3 licensing, and they don't charge for personal use. Why can't Ubuntu get a license for mp3's and include it in the distriubtion straight up?

Including MP3 support in a Linux distribution is probably not what Thomson meant by personal use; especially if you mean to make money by charging for tech support contracts.

[BWF89]

Is it possible for a Ubuntuer to pay .75 to whoever owns MP3 so he can legally listen to them?

[lotusleaf]

I emailed thomson.net about mp3 licensing, and they don't charge for personal use. Why can't Ubuntu get a license for mp3's and include it in the distriubtion straight up?

You down with ogg? yeah you know me!

Switch to ogg, convert any mp3 to ogg (if it's legal to do so)

If a stand alone device doesn't support the ogg format then you either need to purchase a device that does or contact the companies to express your desire for a device which supports the ogg format.

You down with ogg?

[BWF89]

convert any mp3 to ogg
That sounds like it's illegal.

[poofyhairguy]

I emailed thomson.net about mp3 licensing, and they don't charge for personal use. Why can't Ubuntu get a license for mp3's and include it in the distriubtion straight up?


Because of that word. Distribution. Its free for users to use the codecs. Its not free to distribute them. I wrote part of the disclaimer here once to help explain:

https://wiki.ubuntu.com/RestrictedFormats?highlight=%28restricted%29

[poofyhairguy]

Is it possible for a Ubuntuer to pay .75 to whoever owns MP3 so he can legally listen to them?


Its free for personal use.

[Lovechild]

free for personal use does seem to clash with the gpl would, regardless of how one looks at "personal use", that not be in direct violation of the GPL say if one linked the mp3 decoder to somethng under that license (which I'm quite sure might happen)

[lotusleaf]

That sounds like it's illegal.

Even if the MP3 formatted file(s) are converted to the ogg format on an OS (such as Windows) if it legally supports the use of the MP3 format? All speculation here on my part, I'm not recommending anything, I only use the ogg format.

People need to switch to free/open formats and quit buying from companies who only support proprietary formats AND let the companies know why you bought (or didn't buy) their products.

[gord]

i wouldn't recomend converting mp3's to vorbis, re-rip to vorbis, else you end up with all the artifacting and lossyness of mp3 and ultimatly, less quality ;)