MPEG LA Declares H.264 Standard Permanently Royalty-Free
As I and many others guessed when this controversy popped up a few months ago – the whole H.264 End User Agreement “controversy” was indeed muchado about nothing. Good to see MPEG LA do the right thing and clear the air.
For those who missed this little controversy from back in May please read this post. The issue was with the end user license agreement for H.264 which states that the format cannot be used for “professional” distribution.
This is something we could all have worried about as the Canon HDDSLRs all shoot their footage in the H.264 format. But now: we don’t. So go back out and shoot – and always remember: as awful as some of the language in contracts often sounds at first – most of the time you can go back and discuss it with the other party. One of my favorite sayings is that “all contracts are meant to be negotiated.”
IMPORTANT NOTE (This applies to only footage that is put online for free – NOT FOR SALE. See comments below for clarification and rates.)
Thanks for clearing this up Vincent..
it did actually worrying me for awhile but I also completely forgot about it pretty fast too haha
“The issue was with the end user license agreement for H.264 which states that the format cannot be used for ‘professional’ distribution. This is something we could all have worried about as the Canon HDDSLRs all shoot their footage in the H.264 formate. But now: we don’t.”
My understanding is that this is incorrect. The way I read it, MPEG LA was making this true ONLY for free on-line distribution. Your use of h.264 is still license-bearing if you distribute in other formats (Blu-Ray, etc) or if you charge to view the videos on-line.
Am I mistaken?
Vincent, unfortunately you’ve interpreted this completely wrong. Read this.
Short version: Nothing has changed. It was already royalty free for the very specific use of online, no-charge video transmission (but not the encoders or decoders) already, until 2014 or 2016. It is not free of charge for that use forever. The decoders and encoders, as well as any other distribution method, remain heavily protected and chargeable.
Vincent Laforet Reply:
August 27th, 2010 at 8:48 am
@Hugo, Aha – so this controversy lives on… oh fun!
Vincent Laforet Reply:
August 27th, 2010 at 8:53 am
@Vincent Laforet, So how exactly is one supposed to deal with this is you are indeed correct? Does Apple play a royalty for every single video they put out – as all their videos are in H.264 format in iTunes as far as I know… do all of the studios pay it as well? Will independent filmmakers who sell their films have to pay royalties? This whole thing sounds a bit too convoluted…
Mike Roe Reply:
August 27th, 2010 at 10:41 am
@Vincent Laforet, Apple owns part of the patent for H.264 and is considered one of the “Licensors”. So they probably don’t have to pay for the license or they have a different agreement with the other Licensors/Patent owners.
I am NOT an attorney and could be completely wrong, but reading the license agreement gives me this impression of AVC/H.264 Video Royalties:
Sale Per Title – (DVD/VOD/PPV/Blu-Ray/Cable/Internet) –
* less than 12 minutes = No royalty due
* greater than 12 minutes = 2% of sale price or $0.02 per title whichever is less
Sale via Subscription Video Service(not ordered or limited by title) –
* Less than 100,000 subscribers=No royalty due
* 100K-250K subscribers=$25,000 per year
* 250K-500K subscribers=$50,000 per year
etc..
Broadcast TV/Satellite/Cable (free TV-viewer doesn’t pay)-
1 of 2 options:
1)1 time payment of $2,500 per AVC transmission encoder used.
2) Annual fee Per Broadcast Market based on market size:
* $2,500 per year per market of 100K-500K households
* $5,000 per year per market of 500K-1M households
* $10K per year per 1M+ households
Free on the Internet = No Royalty Due
Vincent Laforet Reply:
August 27th, 2010 at 2:29 pm
@Mike Roe, Thanks for the great info!
I just read the press release from MPEG LA and you are correct, David.
The license is only royalty free for “Free” Internet distribution.
Here is a quote from the release:
“will continue not to charge royalties for Internet Video that is free to end users (known as
“Internet Broadcast AVC Video”)… Products and services other than Internet Broadcast AVC Video continue to be royalty-bearing.”
and the problem is not only distribution, but even more importantly, recording: when you buy your “consumer” canon camera, it comes with a licence to record H.264 content… only for personal use! if you then use that camera to record something like a House episode or a fully-fledge movie, you are doing more than you have rights to do; they have not cared so far, but that could change
still, I don’t think this will ever be a problem for anyone: if they ever care, that’s because you have some very big pockets; so it’s much ado about nothing, indeed
And from the open source software side of the house, Mike Shaver from Firefox weighs in here: http://shaver.off.net/diary/2010/08/27/free-as-in-smokescreen/