ubuntu marketing

[Jeff Spaleta]

On Fri, Feb 22, 2008 at 10:26 PM, Valent Turkovic
<valent.turkovic at gmail.com> wrote:
>  > Flash and multimedia is no
>  >  exception.  If the open flash that we can distribute sucks...then we
>  >  find a way to fix it..and fix it legally.
>
>  And now you say this needs to be fixed legally?!? Are you confused or am only I?
>  Please clear this up, you got me really confused right now.
>  AFAIK there is no legal and/or free way of making flash work via
>  swf-dec project if that is what you are implying.

I never said that there are easy solutions to the problem. If easy
solutions existed...we'd be making use of them.  It must be open and
it must be legal. I never said that a solution currently exists which
satisfies both conditions.  But if fluendo can make an open source
legal mp3 binary available, surely work can be done to make other open
source but legally obtainable binaries available for other codecs
(even if they cost money to get).  How long did it take for an entity
like fluendo to make a legal and open source mp3 implementation
available? 4 years or more since Red Hat dropped support for mp3
decoding (I forget exactly when rhl drop mp3 playback, it was
pre-fedora).  Hopefully it won't take another 4 years for them to be
able to provide further open codecs..even if they a non-zero cost to
users.



>  You talking too general, please don't generalize this issue with
>  classic open vs. closed source debate.  I know the benefits of open
>  source solutions and I really support them, but I don't see any open
>  source solution right now that makes users able to use flash video
>  online. Currently swf-dec works ONLY with youtube.com (most of other
>  sites don't work) and ONLY after you install illegal codecs!

Life's tough. The legal burden of software patents is a bitter pill.
The world is going to come to an end when the first software patents
get upheld in court in the EU.

>  I'll be happy to work out the quirks with swf-dec people but until
>  most of sites work don't force them to use this. Let's get enough
>  advanced users aware of swf-dec and later make the switch to open
>  solution later -  but first let's make it first so that it doesn't
>  suck this hard.

In a word, no. We will continue to suck, until people feel compelled
enough to find a solution we can live with. Open and legal..those are
the rules.

>  Ok, I understand that, I have heard it dozen of times since I joined
>  mailing lists, but if users agree with adobe licence there are no
>  patent violations for fedora or red hat. right?

You are perfectly free as a user to install adobe's stuff. Fedora as a
project isn't going to go out of its way to make using proprietary
software easy. It just isn't.

>  People need things to JustWork, and flash video is really high on that
>  list, you need to accept and aknowledge that.

I accept and acknowledge that people have a need for all sorts of
proprietary software. I personally have a need for Labview, IDL and
Picasa.. I don't expect Fedora to cater to my needs. just as I
wouldn't expect Fedora to cater to the needs for Adobe flash.  The
relative popularity of Adobe flash compared to that of Picasa doesn't
change the issue of proprietariness that makes Adobe's software
inappropriate to prefer inside of Fedora controlled space.

A year from now it won't matter, MS's Silverlight with crush the life
out of Adobe and they will be forced to open source their stuff in a
last ditch effort to keep from being crushed.

> We all would be really
>  happy if swf-dec would work and legally on fedora, but it doesn't. We
>  would be happy if adobe opensorced their player and let go of its
>  patents, but they don't...

I'd be happy if we all just went back to using gopher servers and
watching ascii animations.

-jef