What are Microsoft codecs?

[Frank Murphy (Frankly3D)]

On 07/08/09 06:53, gilpel at altern.org wrote:
--snip--
>
> 
> (1) Many thanks to Frank Murphy for a few helpful lines on the matter.
> 
> This said, I hope we can go on with determining if windows media codecs
> aren't, just as doc and xls formats, anything but a marketing scam.
> 

Windows media codecs, and indeed "patented" software in general,
are a way for various companies to make money.
You will notice as soon as a patent comes near it's end,
oh, suddenly this new codec appears, which will be flavour of the month.
This is just a method, keep the wallets full from a patent pov.

--snip--
> 
> The reason you can get a whole bootlegged movie on the internet that
> occupies much less than 4 GB, is because it's compressed. ( I suppose MP2
> on DVDs also offers some compression.)

Also what the "uploader" considers irrelevant is stripped from the
encoding, trailers etc..

> In order to provide video on the net, Real Media, Windows Media, Flash
> also compress video, but to different degrees. Also, if a program is very
> popular and thousands of people are asking for it, by waiting just a few
> seconds before beginning a stream, you will feed more than one viewer at a
> time. With video, bandwidth is a concern.
> 

All about making money.
If it was just about the content, they would make sure to use a really
free and open method, has not HTML5 video already no longer the shine in
the eye, due to objections from Apple.