MPEG LA Articles

MPEG LA, LLC, is a Denver-based firm that licenses patent pools covering essential patents required for use of the MPEG-2, MPEG-4 Visual (Part 2), IEEE 1394, VC-1, ATSC and AVC/H.264 standards. The firm is also working towards pooled licensing of LTE patents pertaining to 4th generation cellular telephony and patents essential for WebM.
MPEG LA is not affiliated with MPEG, the Moving Picture Experts Group.
MPEG LA has claimed that video codecs such as Theora and VP8 infringe on pa...

Google's New VP9 Codec: Better Video at Half the Bandwidth?

Google wants their new VP9 codec to be royalty-free, but patent disputes could prevent that from happening. Meanwhile, VP9 is supposed to have double the image quality using half the compression of H.264. In other news: H.264 could be H.265 soon, so there's that.

H.265 Video Codec Approved, Will it Revolutionize Video?

H.264 is pretty much the de facto codec for video compression online these days. WebM isn't even supported in Android, nor just about anywhere else. So Google seems to have moved on to other projects instead of pushing for that. Now, H.265 is ready to ...

H.265 High Efficiency Video Coding to be Help or Headache for Online Video?

H.264 is still, pretty much, the de facto for online video. But there could be a shift very soon as MPEG and VCEG have announced they've got H.265 in the works (still in draft) and could see it implemented for phones next year. Why? Because ...

Firefox to Stop Pushing WebM and Give in to H.264? What's that Mean to You

It's a dark day indeed for online video, H.264 has seemingly won the war without any real battles being fought. Google has yet to remove H.264 from Chrome and now someone high up at Firefox has pretty much stated that they're throwing in the towel ...

MPEG LA Publishes MVC 3D Video Codec Licensing Prices

MPEG LA have announced pricing for licenses on the Multiview Video Coding 3D codec. It covers everything from hardware that will use it to subscription services and prices range from one cent per disc to $300,000 for big subscription services. Currently, MPEG LA is dedicating ...

Open Web TV Standard in the Works: A Foundation for Web-TV

This week marks the deadline for Open Connected TV standard proposals. The goal: created an open source specification for software and standards for Internet-connected, Web-ready televisions. The driving force behind the specification for OCTV is the Digital Media Project. According to their website they want ...

HTML5 Video Codec War Explodes as MPEG-LA Openly Calls for VP8 Patent Claims

The HTML5 video codec war just exploded! MPEG-LA, who you will remember holds the H.264 patent pool, just invaded Googlonia with a call for patent claims on the VP8 video codec. You will remember that Apple is a member of the H.264 owners, along with ...

Google Chrome To Drop H264 - How Will This Affect You?

Just when it appeared that the online video industry was moving toward a video standard, with H.264 video playback in HTML5 – more chaos ensued with Google's announcement of its plans to phase out support for H.264 in its Chrome browser, in favor of open ...

Online Video Moves: 4G Film, Mpeg-2, Acquisitions and A Blackberry On Top

Life is sweet, like a well-made dessert. But we'll have to wait until the moment before it's ready to eat to find out about that Blackberry on top. If you've got a keen mind or a sharp eye, you already know what that ominous fruit ...

H.264 Codec Is Now FREE - for Free Video - MPEG LA Announces Royalty-Free License

I just ran across this most interesting of items.  MPEG LA has announced that they will not charge royalties on Internet Video using the AVC/H.264 codec, when that video is free to end-users, for the lifetime of that license. This goes beyond the previous December ...

HTML5's Dark Horse Video Codec, ON2 VP8 From Google

While Google didn't make the VP8 video codec, they did purchase it recently and now, they're announcing [allegedly] that it will be Open Source. What's this mean for HTML 5? It might finally have found a winner of the codec race and a savior, in ...

Brightcove Embraces HTML5, Passes On Theora Support

Brightcove recently announced that they're on the HTML 5 bandwagon (yah team!) and that they're now offering  HTML5 compatibility for their clients. They call HTML5 implementation cost-prohibitive which makes me wonder just how much work it would be to implement it. I think I smell ...

My Theora On H(TML5).264 Support

Microsoft showed off what some are calling the killer app (a lame term really), Internet Explorer 9. It's got HTML 5 support (to what extent remains to be seen) and MP3, MP4 and H.264 support built in. That could be enough to push the industry ...