What do you mean by "Resolve the licensing issue"? They don't own H.264, how do you want them to "resolve" something they don't own?
Some things are truly impossible (change the taste of the colour purple), some are technically impossible (fly by flapping your wings), and some are just impossible due to disagreements between people (release an open-source implementation of a closed codec).
If you can resolve the first, you're God. If you can resolve the second, you're a technological visionary. If you can resolve the third, you're a good politician. Only the first category can be really considered impossible to achieve. Resolving licensing issues with H.264 is hardly impossible in that respect.
You can't just throw around the word "resolve" things without understanding the complexity or nature of the possible solutions.
As a former management consultant, and now a start-up founder, believe me, I speak from experience when I say every problem of this kind is solvable if you want to do it badly enough.
The other stuff that I can think of is that they can use Ogg Theora, which is hardly a solution, considering (IMO) it is an inferior codec.
As the discussion around H.264/Theora etc has heated up I've started wondering about this. There are now at least 3 rather large players with relatively deep pockets that all have licensed h.264 for products they essentially give away. So what if Google, Apple, and Adobe all pooled together and purchased the patents for h.264 and licensed it for free (or possibly a free non-commercial license, and force any other big players using it to chip in). I wonder what the price tag on that would be.
That's half a trillion dollars in a year, and that's not even counting revenue they get from MPEG-4 or the audio codecs.
I stopped responding to this guy because his points are worthless. I'd rather the space on this page was used up by intelligent discussion rather than needless debate over a concept that is obvious to anyone who actually does any kind of ambiguous, difficult work (e.g. running a start-up, being a consultant, and generally being anything more than an employee who takes orders).
Please don't force me to waste space and energy arguing this stupid point.
"How do we fix this problem?" "Well, all problems can be fixed by fixing the problem." "Ok, so how do we do that?" "Simple, fix the problem." "Right."
Here are a few possible solutions, though, off the top of my head right now - I'm sure someone closer to the problem could find more, better potential solutions:
1) Release the player code without the codecs.
2) Obtain a special license from the people that own H.264 to be allowed to release the source code.
3) Get some kind of agreement that the owners of H.264 won't sue Adobe and release the source code.
4) Do so without getting the agreement - maybe they won't sue.
5) Transmit ownership of the code to a different legal entity and release the code via that entity.
6) Slowly migrate to a new codec that can be released (e.g. Ogg).
7) Release the code with Ogg support without the H.264 part.
8) Buy the code patent.
9) Start a public relations campaign to convince the owners to open up H.264 for everyone.
10) Start a public relations campaign to convince the courts to overturn H.264 (say, on grounds that it harms the public good).
That's just off the top of my head. Yes, they all have problems, but they're all starting points - and there's no evidence that Adobe explored any of those or any others. If you can't think of twice as many potential solutions, your brain is effectively the size of a pea when it comes to creative problem-solving.
And if "management-speak" language stops you from understanding a good point, you're a fucking retard.
Downvote away.
Of them all, #1 (the "plug your codec here") is the easiest. h.264 is not even protected in the whole world, so, those who can will enjoy it and those who don't will, perhaps, lobby their representatives.
#6 is also nice because with sufficient funding, Ogg can become a decent option and everyone would benefit.
What do you mean by "they don't own H.264"? What does "H.264" mean in your sentence? H.264 is a standard that defines how to decode an elementary video stream. You can't "own it". You can own rights to an implementation — but that's where things get interesting.
There are many H.264 decoders, some of which are open source and could be used by Adobe. So their argument is rather weak.
Well sure you can... you can patent it. In that case, making use of even an F/OSS implementation (such as x264) doesn't guarantee that you have not infringed upon MPEG LA's patents (where they are applicable/enforced).