Robert, I pretty much agree with your observations. I guess I take the pragmatic approach. I think most people would concur though, that the information contained in https://help.ubuntu.com/community/RestrictedFormats is little more than a nod and a wink to the laws that exist (which the Ubuntu community has to do).
The reality is that I think we all know that almost everyone is civilly disobedient in this regard - we just don't like saying it in public. So it is frustrating why we all get so precious about this. I personally would like to see a few more public take-down notices (to draw attention to some of the inconsistencies) out there. (Why hasn't the ubuntu-restricted-extras*.deb ever been asked to be removed from Australian mirror sites?) But also I don't want ordinary people to have to put themselves on the perceived chopping block either. Regards, Martin martinvisse...@gmail.com On Mon, Apr 12, 2010 at 12:26 PM, Robert Collins <robe...@robertcollins.net>wrote: > On Mon, 2010-04-12 at 12:02 +1000, Martin Visser wrote: > > Barry, > > > > > > I am guessing you mean patents rather patterns. That said, I think you > > will find that those patents have not been enforced. They may have > > some standing, but I don't think any non-licence holder of media > > codecs and has been subject to legal proceedings in Australia (at > > least publically). > > Patents don't get weaker with lack of enforcement: there is no reason to > assume its safe just because there haven't been lawsuites. > > > (And put up your hand if you don't use MP3 on Ubuntu (without using > > Fluendo). And if you do, you are, IMHO and remember IANAL, morally > > clear, in that you probably already own multiple devices all that have > > full-licensed patents on them - hence have already paid the patent > > owners multiple times over). > > Its up to patent owners how they license: they may license per-device > rather than per-user (or however they choose). If they want a license > per device, you're infringing if you claim that you've paid but then use > another device. > > This sucks, but its the current state of law. > > Australia permits business process and software patents. > > If you want to lobby for changes to the patent system by civil > disobedience, thats your choice: but understand that the risk is real. > In particular, someone distributing patent infringing software is a more > visible target than an anonymous end user that downloads it. > > -Rob >
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