Barely a day after Google announced they would be opening VP8 to the world via their WebM initiative, lawyers for all the major codec agencies got together to start talking about how it’s not as free as Google would like it to be. The MPEG LA group is already talking about creation of a ‘patent pool’ for the various infringing patents, and several engineers have spoken up regarding their feelings on the matter. While they would love for Google’s claims to be true, the realities are far messier. x264 developer Jason Garret-Glaser mentions a few specifically:
One specific characteristic of the codec that Garrett-Glaser considers particularly prone to patent risks is its handling of a feature called intra prediction. He accuses On2 of cribbing the technology from H.264.
“VP8’s intra prediction is basically ripped off wholesale from H.264,” he wrote. “This is a patent time-bomb waiting to happen. H.264’s spatial intra prediction is covered in patents and I don’t think that On2 will be able to just get away with changing the rounding in the prediction modes.”
Of course, Google probably has deep enough pockets to buy all the patents and then release it anyway, but only time will tell if they decide to go that far.
via Google support aside, WebM carries patent risks from MPEG LA.
