Microsoft's HD Photo to Become JPEG Standard? 369
Mortimer.CA writes "Ars Technica is reporting that Microsoft has submitted their HD Photo to the JPEG committee: 'Microsoft's ongoing attempt to establish its own photo format as a JPEG alternative (and potential successor) took another step forward today when the JPEG standards group agreed to consider HD Photo (originally named Windows Media Photo) as a standard. If successful, the new file standard will be known as JPEG XR.' Microsoft has made a 'commitment to make its patents that are required to implement the specification available without charge.' While JPEG 2000 exists, HD Photo has several advantages (not the least of which is a lot less CPU power is needed). Is this a big of an issue as ODF/OOXML?"
As long as anyone can implement it ... (Score:5, Insightful)
If the specification is as free as ASCII, to use one example, then there is nothing wrong in adopting that as a standard.
Re:can this be the only solution? (Score:5, Insightful)
Public Domain (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:can this be the only solution? (Score:5, Insightful)
They say, "One important aspect regarding the standardization of HD Photo is Microsoft's commitment to make its patents that are required to implement the specification available without charge."
"Alright, fair enough," I think, but then I wonder: "So, what's the application process like, and what are the licensing requirements?"
Might they say something like, "Oh, it's available free of charge, but you can't use it in an OpenSource / FreeSoftware project, because that's uncontrolled, there's no telling what liabilities we'll be exposed to, for letting you implement this,
Maybe that's "the trick" here?
Open Formats People!!!! (Score:1, Insightful)
Please just make the freaking standard open and available.
It's a 'standard', right? (Score:1, Insightful)
transfer all control or forget it (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:As long as anyone can implement it ... (Score:5, Insightful)
This is Microsoft's dream because you can't contest it in court. The agreement you're violating if you mix this technology with GPLv3 code is NOT the agreement with Microsoft, but the GPLv3! You would have to sue the FSF in order to use Microsoft's image format in your GPLv3 code.
For all that I despise the tactic, I have to admit that it's a clever little hack.
Re:could someone enlighten me? (Score:4, Insightful)
Most importantly, lossless compression might mean that you don't need to shoot in RAW all the time, and be at the camera manufacturer's mercy.
Re:What's wrong with JPEG2000? (Score:3, Insightful)
Quite frankly, I think JPEGs as they stand are too far along now for something that, with modern CPU power, offers an almost imperceptible advantage, to get any traction. Ten years ago, when computers and the Internet were slower, they might have had a chance, but now, no way.
There are too many real things to hate and fear Microsoft over. This appears to me to be a nonstarter, sort of like MSN has turned out to be for web searching.
Re:What's wrong with JPEG2000? (Score:5, Insightful)
Deja GIF. (Score:4, Insightful)
Yes, actually. The cat does "got my tongue." (Score:2, Insightful)
> specification available without charge.'
Ok
> While JPEG 2000 exists, HD Photo has several advantages (not the least of which is a lot less CPU power is needed).
Has anybody checked that the more efficient algorithms are among those in the patents to be released? What if they're hiding a patentable, very efficient decompression version, which they'll "discover" and patent, after this becomes the standard?
The "evil" in MS's actions: (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Deja GIF. (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:can this be the only solution? (Score:5, Insightful)
I won't speak to the potential for "legal wrangling", but regarding "politics", if this does get bogged down in politics then you can bet that it'll be the anything-but-Microsoft folks that are to blame. Hell, this very subthread starts with a post saying that this format should be rejected just because it comes from Microsoft, regardless of the merits and regardless of how liberal the license is. In other words, the format should be rejected on the basis of politics. The same BS that goes on in the ODF vs OOXML debates (the reality is that 90% of that debate is politics BS, not technical merits).
Re:What's wrong with JPEG2000? (Score:3, Insightful)
They will replace
Re:can this be the only solution? (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Deja GIF. (Score:2, Insightful)
Also, before we get too paranoid, keep in mind that jpeg is not a file format (technically). The standard describes it as a way for forming a serial data stream out of 2D image data. Yes, there is a way to easily turn this into a file format, but if you had to write your own file format, I think we'd all could come up with a more versitile structure than jpeg.
Re:"Nothing for you to see here; please move along (Score:3, Insightful)
This can only end badly.
Look, I dislike Microsoft just as much as anyone else, but that comment is just ill informed. Just because M$ might stand to make money off a deal does not mean it will "end badly." In the vast majority of industries, consumers gain when companies do something just to make money. Just because M$ in the past has found ones of making money that have been harmful to us doesn't mean it will be the case this time.
Re:Deja GIF. (Score:3, Insightful)
I think we could all do with a few less file formats going the way of the GIF format...
Re:can this be the only solution? (Score:4, Insightful)
OTOH, this political matter, lack of openness, drags in technical problems as well. A spec which is not open must be reverse engineered (and even then there is dubious legality), so only those who have access to the closed spec will necessarily be able to implement it correctly. This tilts the playing field for the software market heavily in favor of those with access to the closed spec. Any competitors will find that either their software fails to function correctly, or they have to do a lot more work to get correctly functioning software. The result: either a monoculture/monopoly in software using this spec, or a variety of incompatible attempts at implementing the spec, resulting in inability to carry files from one computer to another and expect them to still work.
So, a technical matter in the OOXML spec results in political wrangling, which wrangling is motivated by technical reasons anyways. Dig a little bit deeper than most people are willing to, and you find that it really isn't a matter (for most people) of Anything-But-Microsoft. It may look that way, because MS offerings are so consistently rejected, but nearly always, it is actually for technical reasons (perhaps technical by way of political in the middle, but technical at both ends (motivation for objection, and object of objection)).
Now, the OP who said "we should reject this just because it is from MS" might be a true Anything-But-Microsoft person. That would certainly explain the remark. OTOH, caution, a look at history, and an understanding of the technical matters involved in said history would also explain the remark quite easily. The reference to MS' "track record" suggests to me that perhaps the latter explanation is the right one. But then again, I'm an eternal optimist, always seeking to think the best of people until I actually have a real reason to think otherwise.
Re:"Nothing for you to see here; please move along (Score:1, Insightful)
Re:As long as anyone can implement it ... (Score:3, Insightful)
You should have your sarcasm detector checked: it seems not to be working.
There is no scheme to trap anyone: it is quite simple: if you do not want to accept the conditions I impose on my code, then write your own. If you are not willing to comply with my licence for my library, then do not use it. It is not that hard, really...
How on earth can that be construed as a scheme to trap anyone? And how is it different from anything else (apart from the fact that the GPL allow the party accepting it to do things that party would otherwise be not allowed to do)?
Re:It's a 'standard', right? (Score:3, Insightful)
Using the phrase correctly, and encouraging others to do so is one thing. Being crass and saying things like "No, it doesn't. Don't use phrases if you don't know what they mean" is just being an ass.
Re:can this be the only solution? (Score:3, Insightful)
Holy Cow. We just lived through a decade of that kind of behavior and you didn't notice? mp3Pro (so what) is licensable just like MP3, JPEG and everything else. Thomson never offered MP3 encoders up for free then suddenly demand royalties once MP3 got traction. Thomson always required a license. They did, however, suddenly demand a license for MP3 decoders. They're all greedy bastards. Submarine ransom demands are a great side business for Microsoft as well and everything they release is another opportunity to collect undue cash:
I'm no expert on their activities but this is a common historical pattern that nearly anyone can see (do you read Slashdot by any chance?). I've even been stung directly by their behavior and have seen the difference between profiting from your effort and profiteering off your victims. For the last decade, Microsoft has held back real progress by co-opting rising technologies, modifying them a little to make sure their competitors fail, and re-releasing a crudely inferior shadow of the original. The original technology is now overwhelmed and eliminated by their own version. Interoperability was never in Microsoft's interest. That's how a lot of dreams ended. Developers and users were simply upgrading their handcuffs with each new release of Microsoft "technology". Now, Microsoft is being dragged backwards through their own stew. The last resort is trying to control competition through patent infringement threats and forging deals with unlikely allies in order to threaten the rest of their competitors who didn't sign a pact with them. There's no innovation going on there. They're even trying to capture some of the OpenSource halo by calling proprietary technologies "Open" in an attempt to tie the word to Microsoft in the eyes of people who don't know any better.
Ach. Look at the time...