Quote:
Originally Posted by pwalker8
I wonder what that mean? Hopefully not that my various mp3 files will no longer play.
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It just means that you can't license MP3-encoding or decoding software/algorithms from Fraunhofer anymore. There are many open source implementations though.
Have you heard of LAME, for example? It stands for: LAME Ain't (an) MP3 Encoder. And officially, it isn't. It's an 'educational implementation' of the MP3 algorithm, 'enhanced with some new features.' In the beginning, LAME wasn't even available as a binary. The reason is that it isn't a program, and thus doesn't infringe copyright, as long as it's not compiled. You had to do that yourself.
Still, later LAME became available as a binary, and has been, for many many years. Nobody ever got intro problems because of it, AFAIK. Never saw any news messages of people being arrested.
LAME is so good and mature that it hasn't been updated for five years. (Just like FLAC: the format is still the same as in 2007, and the first bugfix/code cleanup release came in 2013.) Probably, it'll never change, apart from making it compile with newer compilers or on different/newer platforms.
This is just the encoder part... there are also open source developed decoders for MP3.
In short, the industry will just go open source if they want to have MP3 support. Now they can, because all patents have expired.