James P. Salsman (bovik@best.com)
Mon, 20 Nov 2000 14:24:14 -0800 (PST)
Glenn,
There are four reasons why Microsoft can't claim ownership of the
audio/wav;codec=31 GSM 06.10 format:
(1) From http://www.ema.org/vpimdir/specs/draft-ema-vpim-wav-00.txt :
> Microsoft further agrees that, upon adoption of this contribution
> as an Internet Standard, Microsoft will grant to any party a
> royalty-free license on other reasonable and non-discriminatory
> terms under applicable Microsoft intellectual property rights to
> implement and use the technology proposed in this contribution for
> the purpose of supporting the Internet Standard....
(2) Any attempt to patent the format would have had to issue by now.
Depending on the examiner category, the backlog is only two to four
years, and the format was published over five years ago.
(3) Even the worst of the examiners would be unlikely to accept the
simple field ordering of an established format as either novel or
non-obvious. That sort of thing would be more of a design patent
than a utility patent, and design patents take even less time to issue.
(4) Microsoft has made no attempt to collect license fees from those
who are using the format. In fact, they encourage its use by
providing support for the codec in their products.
I have read that some companies using GSM 06.10 have been approached
by Philips regarding licensing issues. Can those stories be confirmed
(and details provided) or are they apocryphal?
Cheers,
James
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