Usual "forbidden items" explanation

Keith G. Robertson-Turner fedora-gmane.00001 at genesis-x.nildram.co.uk
Tue Jun 13 02:45:04 UTC 2006


Ed Greshko wrote:
 > Keith G. Robertson-Turner wrote:
 >> Ed Greshko wrote:

 >>> FWIW.....
 >>>
 >>> The file TrustedComputing_LAFKON_MID_theora.avi contains magic
 >>> that seems to imply
 >>>
 >>> TrustedComputing_LAFKON_MID_theora.avi: RIFF (little-endian) data,
 >>> AVI, 320 x 240,25.00 fps, video:, audio: MPEG-1 Layer 3 (stereo,
 >>> 24000 Hz)

 >> Yes, I thought I'd checked this, but I must have overlooked it -
 >> that file is not a valid Theora video file.
 >>
 >> The others are perfectly valid however, as is my initial assertion
 >> that Totem is set up as the default multimedia player for filetypes
 >> that it cannot handle, without downloading plugins that are not
 >> discussed in any detail. E.g. I had no idea until 5 minutes ago
 >> that the search I needed to do was for "gstreamer plugins" rather
 >> than "Totem plugins".

 > I think the point that is being missed is that the Fedora folks
 > can't legally distribute media players with plugins/codecs/etc that
 > infringe on patents and/or licensing/royalties.

First of all, I think I owe you, and this list, an apology. My little
tantrum was a little OTT and blown out of proportion.

The most unforgivable thing I did though, was make several assertions
without checking the facts, which are:

Totem *can* play encumbered filetypes, but not in its default
configuration - as distributed in Fedora.

Totem uses gstreamer plugins. This I knew from a long time ago, but
had completely forgotten about.

The Fedora Project are morally, legally and ethically right to exclude
encumbered software, and indeed pro-actively reject it. This I also
knew, and have never disputed.

 > So, no matter what media player is installed by default that would
 > be distributed by fedora it will be crippled to the point of not
 > being able to play certain formats.  So, one can't can't gripe about
 > the fedora folks.  And the argument of "distro X" can do it, why
 > can't fedora is irrelevant when "distro X" is from a country outside
 > of the USA.

I do not, and never have disputed that. In fact it is one of the
reasons I chose Fedora over other distros (although you wouldn't think
it by the way I'm harping on about encumbered filetypes). I use those
files because they are omnipresent and impossible to avoid, not
because I want to.

 > So, the well known solution is to pull your media player stuff from
 > places like rpm.livna.org. (They are based in France I believe)

Yes, I'm well acquainted with Livna, in fact I used to package for
them. You will see my name in the kmod-nvidia changelog if you look.

 > They have totem stuff that will play those formats that the fedora
 > distributed totem can't.

Not quite correct. There are *gstreamer* plugins on Livna that enable
Totem to play back encumbered filetypes. This is the source of
confusion. Unlike MPlayer, where the codecs/plugins are *clearly*
labelled "MPlayer", there is no immediately obvious connection between
gstreamer and Totem. If I had bothered to RTFM I would have made the
connection and solved the problem much quicker, but come on, in
reality people don't RTFM of *every* single package they use *in
detail* every time. So even though I've been through this problem
before, and knew about the link between gstreamer and Totem before,
months (years?) later I had forgotten and went through the same
frustrations again. Even I, with all my experience of Red Hat, Fedora
and Linux in general, got so completely stuck on this, that I posted a
stupid rand to this list. I think that says something about the
"broken" nature of this package.

WRT my statement above about "pro-actively rejecting" encumbered
filetypes, I feel the Fedora project has gone a step too far. Don't
include them, by all means; don't encourage their use, certainly;
extol the virtues of Free software, of course; but don't play this
Cold War game of cat and mouse, by turning the whole "encumbered
software" problem into a classified secret that must never be spoken
about. For God's sake tell people precisely *why* the file has been
rejected by the application and *what they can do to view it* if that
is their choice. And like I said ... *do not pretend to handle
filetypes that you do not support* by associating applications with
unsupported filetypes.

 > So, in this case, even totem shouldn't be bad mouthed.

I did vent my frustrations in the wrong direction, however something
does still need to be fixed to make the solution more obvious.

 > That should be reserved for the Music/Motion Picture Industry,
 > MicroSoft, and the purveyors of proprietary licensed closed source
 > formats.  Oh, and probably a few lawyers....  :-)

Oooh such foul language :)

 > One may say that the release notes should point this out...but I
 > suspect that legally fedora folks can't tell you how you go about
 > breaking the law as that is "illegal".

It's a sad day indeed, when Americans (of all people) lose their
constitutional right to free speech.

-
K.




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