Re: Summary of Licenses, fallback system for MCF, etc.

Quoting ChristianHJW <[email protected]>:
> 3. Logo : There is a kind of 'fallback system' for MCF coming along with
> the

> license for the logos, which shall be protected in our ideas :
> 
> There is still a chance, even if being really small for the time being,
> that
> MCF gets wide support in a big variety of software products, and maybe
> even
> standalones ( hardware players ) one day. To explain things a bit : if
> you
> go any buy a 'noname' DVD player for 99,- Euro somewhere in the
> supermarket,
> made in China, here is where the money goes ( approximate numbers ) :
> 
> 25,- - 30,- Euro : end-customer dealer, marketing group, centralized
> purchasing for small dealers, etc.
> 15,- - 20,- Euro : international trading company, caring about import,
> etc.
> ; including shipment costs and insurance
> 10,- Euro : European import tax
> 16,- - 20,-  Euro : VAT
> 8,- Euro : license cost to MPEG-LA, including MPEG1/2 video and parsing
> MPEG
> container
> 2,- Euro : license cost to Fraunhofer for MP3 playback
> 3,- Euro : use of 'DVD video' logo on the package, to advertise specs
> compliancy
> 2,- Euro : license cost about Dolby AC3 surround, including Dolby logo (
> add
> something similar about DTS, if supported )
> 
> Money left for hardware :
> 
> < 20,- Euro / unit !!
> 
> If these guys could save some 4 - 5 Euro for not using MPEG container,
> but
> only MPEG4, AC3 and MP3 codecs in an MCF container they could increase
> their
> profit by +10 % immediately !!

Hum... Due to the existing base of MPEG contained files on CDs and DVDs it is
the very last compatibility they will drop !
Now 0.5 Euro for using the MCF logo (and being MCF certified) isn't such a big
price but could help us maintain the website and code progress.
 
> As responsibly acting adults we should have a 'fallback system' to be
> able
> to cope with the situation once it would ever happen ! Please, dont
> argue
> about probabilities now, i know myself its very unlikely to ever happen,
> but
> what do you do if it would happen ? What do you think will sourceforge
> tell
> us if they have 50.000 downloads of libmcf / months ? 

libmcf is a library that won't get updated everyday. Only applications which
will be distributed with libmcf will be downloaded many times, not libmcf
itself. This is something for the developpers, not the average user.

> Back to Logo license :
> 
> Once MCF support would really become a 'sales argument' helping
> companies to
> sell their products, whether these were software or hardware players, i
> cant
> see any reason why we shouldnt charge money from them for doing so, so
> we
> were capable of
> 
> - paying for the worldwide protection of the MCF logo
> - buying some decent hosting, for transor distribution via
> download-server,
> controlled by libmcf
> - employ a few people working full time on MCF specs and libraries
> maintenance, so the format gets even better
> 
> As a result we are planning on creating a special license for the
> logos.
> These license would
> 
> - grant free use of the logos for non-commercial apps, forever
> - grant free use of the logos for commercial apps, but this could be
> subject
> to change in future ( fallback system )
> 
> We could maybe also think about making the general MCF logo free in
> any
> case, but only retain the right to raise fees on the ' MCF special
> profiles
> compliance' logos ....
> 
> I hope i could clarify a bit what the original intentions were.
> 
> One last question to you :
> 
> Would you really have a problem to get money for MCF from SONY ?
No
> Would you really have a problem to get money for MCF from TOSHIBA ?
No
> Would you really have a problem to get money for MCF from ADOBE ?
No
> Would you really have a problem to get money for MCF from CREATIVE ?
No
> etc.
Yes
> Why should all those companies benefit from our hardwork ? For free !!

Because this is a free and open format. We knew this from the start.

Raising funds is interresting for :
a/ legal matters (patent infrigment, patent research, MCF name use)
b/ MCF compliance hardware and software test development
c/ help other projects like UCI (pay a few developpers ? that's a LOT of money)

I don't know how much these things would cost. Maybe a deal for paying (dev) ppl
who be to have some partners (Sony ? Adobe ? etc) paying for them in exchange
for progress on the format they'll be able to use. I think it's something common
among the OSS community.

On the other side, what would happen if we have 0 Euro (or dollar) ? We have
free hosting. MCF development is progressing slowly, but it does progress. Same
goes for other related projects. Only the legal aspect could be a problem but
only for libmcf, the spec wouldn't be a problem.

So going the "money" way is maybe a huge step for limited needs.

Although we are free and open, we don't want our work to be spoiled with
incompatible softwares that claim they are MCF compliant and ruin our efforts.
That's IMO the major problem or remaining free (or everything).


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