[Turing_Machine]

I looked around, but didn't see any mention of potential patent issues. I assume that this has been considered? The Ogg Vorbis people spent a lot of time on that back when they were developing their format.

Other than that, looks great!

[speedgoose]

The website says it’s made in Hesse. No software patents to care about there.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Software_patents_under_the_E...

[morelisp]

Probably the most infamous audio format patent ever was owned by a German research institute.

[speedgoose]

I guess you mean this one: https://patents.google.com/patent/US5812672

That was an USA patent from Fraunhofer, who made quite some cash from mp3 license fees (100 000 000€ according to Wikipedia).

[nullc]

No. The claim that there are no patents in Germany on this stuff is common internet misinformation(*). There are a great many coding patents from Fraunhofer all around the world, including in Europe.

Presumably because it's much easier to get injunctive relief in Germany I've seen more codec related litigation there than anywhere else.

(*) Like many pieces of misinformation it has its roots in a seed of truth: Particularly between 1998 (State Street) and 2014 (CLS v Alice) the case law in the US supported software patents.

The real confusion is that "Software patents" is an obscure term of art which refers to patents specifically on software methods without any reference to a physical machine or good.

When non-patent-attorneys say "software patents" they mean something more like "something I could infringe by writing software". But clever drafting allows people to write patents that software causes an infringement of without it technically being a "software patent": The patent's claims language will say something like "A recorded media containing instructions..." or "A microprocessor programmed to...". And this has been true in the US and Europe through the whole span.

Which is why there is an awful lot of patent action impacting software in places where "software patents" don't exist, such as the US (as of right now) and Europe.

[GoblinSlayer]

>2014 (CLS v Alice)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alice_Corp._v._CLS_Bank_Intern... - this?

>The patents were held to be invalid, because the claims were drawn to an abstract idea, and implementing those claims on a computer was not enough to transform that abstract idea into patentable subject matter.

[nullc]

Yep.

[IshKebab]

You can absolutely patent software in Europe. Sorry. It's a common misconception that you can't. There's a stupid dance you have to do so it isn't technically "software" that you're patenting... but really it is.

[speedgoose]

From my understanding you can patent things supported by software, but not the software itself. A physical digital music player with a fancy software audio compression is patentable, but not the algorithm on its own.

[IshKebab]

No you can definitely patent software. It seems to be a confusing mess as to exactly how you do it and what is patentable, but you can.

https://www.novagraaf.com/en/insights/patentability-software...

> As a result, the widespread belief in the non-patentability of software is simply a misconception, partly as a result of insufficient training of innovators and the lobbying activities of certain interested parties.

https://fsfe.org/activities/swpat/swpat.en.html

> The European Patent Convention states that software is not patentable. But laws are always interpreted by courts, and in this case interpretations of the law differ. So the European Patents Office (EPO) grants software patents by declaring them as "computer implemented inventions".

[speedgoose]

Yes I find the EPO to be a bit shady by accepting software patents, and the fees, when the patents aren’t enforceable by law. I’m not a lawyer but I known how to read and I would ignore the patents trolls and I consider the risk to lose in court very low. The day something like the VideoLan association loses a trial, I may reconsider my position.

[Turing_Machine]

Maybe not, but that doesn't help people who aren't using it in the EU.

[speedgoose]

True, it hasn’t stopped hobbyists from using x264, ffmpeg or VLC in the past but that would probably prevent companies in some markets to use this audio format.