Linux seller licenses Windows Media technology

[neb1211]

Full Story From: http://news.com.com/2100-7344_3-5201352.html

Turbolinux, a Japanese seller of the open-source operating system, has bridged a philosophical divide by licensing Microsoft technology for playing digital music and video.

I thought this was interesting since we were talking about Windows Media Player in another thread.  This is really good news for Linux.
 

[delerious]

Linux users can I get a w00t w00t. Tis a foward towards a more easy multimedia funcionality, and could mean a little help from microsoft.

[acemaverick1381]

Whoa, whoa, whoa. Windows Media Player was bought by Turbolinux? Oh geeze, I hope it doesn't show up on any versions of Linux...

[JsutTechy]

Never heard of Turbolinux.. sounds like Lindows

[neb1211]

I think it is a good idea even though I hate Windows Media player.   Look at it this way.  Linux users have always been in the minority and probably always will.  Most webmasters and content creators could care less about the minority since it may only make up around 10% of the total traffic.  There are a ton of sites that only have their videos in wmv format.  Another thing is that most legal music download sites only offer downloads in the wma format.  This leaves the linux users without the ablity to legally download music.

Since Microsoft doesn't make linux the end user will most likely have a choice whether or not they want Windows Media Player installed on their computer or not.

[acemaverick1381]

Okay, Linux doesn't really nead the WMP itself, just its codecs. The devlopers of Linux could easily use the WMP codecs and write their own program to take advantage of them.

[neb1211]

Okay, Linux doesn't really nead the WMP itself, just its codecs. The devlopers of Linux could easily use the WMP codecs and write their own program to take advantage of them.

HA HA HA!!  Did you forget who you are talking about.  Microsoft is not going to let Linux use jsut the codecs.

[acemaverick1381]

Then what the hell is the point of TurboLinux buying WMP? You can't play WMP players without WMP codecs. Its that simple. That is of course, if you want to kill yourself and figure out how Microsoft wrote those codecs, and write your own.

[neb1211]

They licensed the whole thing, WMP and the codecs.  Microsoft wouldn't let TurboLinux jsut use the codecs and create their own player.  That is what I meant by my last thread.

[acemaverick1381]

Ah, okay. But here is the issue. Most Linux distros are open source, and TurboLinux happens to be one of them. That means, if they compile the WMP code using GCC, guess what? Its required that it becomes open source. So what I see happening is someone is going to modily WMP or even take the task or writing their own.

[neb1211]

Yeah they could but Microsoft wouldn't allow it to be distributed with the distro itself and knowing Microsoft they would probably bring the person(s), who wrote the program, to court.

[acemaverick1381]

Thats it true if they use the WMP codecs. I know one of these days, someone is going to rewrite these codecs and then they will be able to use thier codecs with their version of WMP that they also wrote. I doubt Microsoft will have a case to display in court then.