MP3 playback finally legal on GNU/Linux!

Tsuroerusu · Post by **Tsuroerusu** » Fri Dec 23, 2005 9:06 am

http://www.osnews.com/story.php?news_id=13078
http://www.fluendo.com/press/releases/PR-2005-05.html
"In order to improve the GNU/Linux and Unix multimedia experience Fluendo announced today the immediate availability of their MP3 plug-in for the GStreamer multimedia framework. The MP3 decoder is available free of charge both for individual end users and GNU/Linux and Unix distribution makers.
In addition to making their licensed binary plug-in available to the public Fluendo also released the source code to this MP3 plug-in under the very permissive MIT license allowing all kind of developers and companies access to it."

CptnObvious999 · Post by **CptnObvious999** » Fri Dec 23, 2005 5:06 pm

holy crap untill now I didn't know it was illegal, oh well good news. Maybe most distros will ship with Mp3 support out-of-the-box now

Tsuroerusu · Post by **Tsuroerusu** » Fri Dec 23, 2005 5:11 pm

CptnObvious999 wrote:holy crap untill now I didn't know it was illegal, oh well good news. Maybe most distros will ship with Mp3 support out-of-the-box now

Let's hope so, a lot of distros seriously need better "out-of-the-box" multimedia support.

Wally Balljacker · Post by **Wally Balljacker** » Fri Dec 23, 2005 6:12 pm

I always thought MP3 playback was legal since Debian, the most strictly free distro out there has out of the box support for it. Good news in any case though.

Tsuroerusu · Post by **Tsuroerusu** » Fri Dec 23, 2005 6:59 pm

Wally Balljacker wrote:I always thought MP3 playback was legal since Debian, the most strictly free distro out there has out of the box support for it. Good news in any case though.

There are GPL'ed mp3 plugins out there, but the patents of mp3 hinders redistributions of it.

snarkout · Post by **snarkout** » Fri Dec 23, 2005 11:02 pm

MP3 playback on a linux box is legal. Distributing the codec freely is not. Or *wasn't* I should say.