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Re:YouTube no longer supports 4K video playback in Safari by celsoazevedo on Sunday January 15, 2017 @08:38AM (#13403896)
Maybe it has something to do with costs? VP8 and VP9 are free while distributing h.264 and h.265 content will cost millions in fees per year. It makes sense to use free codecs instead of h.26x
Re:YouTube no longer supports 4K video playback in Safari by WildUtah on Sunday January 15, 2017 @09:05AM (#13404000)
Alphabet's Google's Youtube already pays the maximum annual license fees to MPEG-LA. They're not concerned about saving money by switching.
Re:YouTube no longer supports 4K video playback in Safari by MyOwnSpirit on Sunday January 15, 2017 @09:18AM (#13404060)
Also people maybe should realize that vp8 and vp9 are not entirely based on free patents. Instead, Google pays companies to use their patents and distribute the related technologies freely.
Re:YouTube no longer supports 4K video playback in Safari by kuschku on Sunday January 15, 2017 @09:22AM (#13404078)
> VP8 and VP9 are free

Unless Google ever uses one of your patents, and you have to sue Google over that.

VP8 and VP9 come with a no-litigation clause that basically requires you to share all your patents with Google if you use VP8 and VP9 – which is a shame.

Re:YouTube no longer supports 4K video playback in Safari by lern_too_spel on Sunday January 15, 2017 @10:48AM (#13404479)
No. Here's the license. https://www.webmproject.org/license/additional/

You only lose the right to use WebM parents if you file litigation against any user of WebM (not just Google) over any implementation of WebM. You can sue Google about anything else and not suffer WebM license consequences.

You're probably thinking of Facebook's open source patent rider. https://github.com/facebook/react/blob/master/PATENTS

Re:YouTube no longer supports 4K video playback in Safari by kuschku on Sunday January 15, 2017 @02:59PM (#13406028)
Indeed, turns out, I was wrong on that. Now I wonder, if i own MPEG patents, could I sue Google for misuse of them, while licensing WebM? There’s quite some overlap with them.

And yes, Facebook and Tesla’s patent licenses are completely ridiculous.

Re:YouTube no longer supports 4K video playback in Safari by lern_too_spel on Monday January 16, 2017 @04:42PM (#13413281)
You can sue Google about misuse of MPEG patents and keep your protections under the WebM license, so long as you do not sue Google or anybody else about WebM's patents.
Re:YouTube no longer supports 4K video playback in Safari by clouddrover on Sunday January 15, 2017 @09:32AM (#13404119)
> basically requires you to share all your patents with Google if you use VP8 and VP9

Do you have a link to the license which says you must share all your patents with Google?

Re:YouTube no longer supports 4K video playback in Safari by kuschku on Sunday January 15, 2017 @02:58PM (#13406024)
It turns out Google removed the "you lose the right to the license if you sue Google for literally anything" part, but Facebook still has it in React, and Tesla has it in their licenses.

That’s the usual wording of these clauses, and the problem.