[Asterisk-Users] Digium and mailing lists

[Benjamin on Asterisk Mailing Lists]

On Sat, 2 Oct 2004 23:16:05 +0100, Kevin Walsh <kevin at cursor.biz> wrote:
> A patent is not legal in England or Europe if it describes ...

There is no such thing as an illegal patent. If it is a patent, it's
legal. If it is not legal, it's not a patent.

Whenever a letter of patent has been issued to a patent holder, the
patent is legal in the territory over which the respective patent
office has jurisdiction. There are questionable patents, yes, but it
takes a costly legal challenge to have them revoked. Until they are
revoked, they legally remain in force.

Let's just close this line of arguments by saying that:

- we agree that the patent law in most of the world excludes software
and mathematical discoveries from eligibility for grant of a patent.

- we disagree in how close to the letter patent law is actually
executed and how easy it is to get justice in patent matters.

In respect of the G.729 codec and encumbrance by patents, questionable
or not, I really don't understand what the problem is. If you don't
like the fact that, for all practical purposes, there is a tax on
G.729, then DON'T USE IT.

To me it would seem that finding an *alternative* to G.729 is the real
issue here, not how realistic it is to shoot down patents. In my
opinion it is far easier and much cheaper to replace G.729 altogether.

ILBC is a very good alternative to G.729. Talk to your suppliers and
demand that they support ILBC. We have been doing just that and phone
manufacturers are telling us that they will support ILBC as soon as
their DSP circuitry suppliers support ILBC. DSP chipsets with ILBC are
becoming available now, ie Texas Instruments TNETV901 or Centrality
Communications PA168.

Just google for "DSP chipset +ILBC".

In conclusion it would seem that all we have to do is wait a little
and live happily ever after with ILBC in restricted bandwidth
situations. No reason to get excited about G.729 and patent
encumbrance.

Perhaps we should rather have a discussion how we, as a community, can
contribute to accelerating the uptake of ILBC. That would be my
recommendation anyway.

rgds
benjk

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