Open-source Mplayer site closed for patent infringement

[Alexander Turcic]

When I visited the home page of the multimedia player MPlayer today, I was welcomed with the following shocking notice: "This site has been shut down because of numerous patent violations in MPlayer. The other free software multimedia players are next." It is not said in what ways the player is violating European patents, but I assume it has to do with the decoding of MPEG2 streams.

I wonder how this development might effect open-source players for mobile devices, such as Picard's outstanding software BetaPlayer...

Originally Posted by Alexander

When I visited the home page of the multimedia player MPlayer today, I was welcomed with the following shocking notice: "This site has been shut down because of numerous patent violations in MPlayer. The other free software multimedia players are next." It is not said in what ways the player is violating European patents, but I assume it has to do with the decoding of MPEG2 streams.

I wonder how this development might effect open-source players for mobile devices, such as Picard's outstanding software BetaPlayer...

How 'bout reading the entire message on the website ?

It's obviously a rather drastic action by the Mplayer author himself to point out the dangers of software patents.
The site even directs the readers at more information about this and finally gives a link to enter the real MPlayer site.

Another case of reading before posting...

[Alexander Turcic]

Ok I get your point. Nevertheless I just quoted what has been said on the frontpage, and it is obvious that MPlayer IS violating patents in the eyes of the patent holders (see MPEG LA's explanation of the MPEG2 patent).