MP3

MP3 is a popular digital audio encoding and lossy compression format invented and standardised in 1991 by a team of engineers working in the framework of the ISO/IEC MPEG audio committee under the chairmanship of Professor Hans Musmann (University of Hannover - Germany). It was designed to greatly reduce the amount of data required to represent audio, yet still sound like a faithful reproduction of the original uncompressed audio to most listeners. In popular usage, MP3 also refers to files of sound or music recordings stored in the MP3 format on computers.

Licensing and patent issues

Thomson Consumer Electronics controls licensing of the MPEG-1/2 Layer 3 patents in countries that recognize software patents, including the United States, Japan, and most EU countries. Thomson has been actively enforcing these patents.

Related Topics:
Thomson Consumer Electronics - Software patent - United States - Japan

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In September 1998, the Fraunhofer Institute sent a letter to several developers of MP3 software stating that a license was required to "distribute and/or sell decoders and/or encoders". The letter claimed that unlicensed products "infringe the patent rights of Fraunhofer and THOMSON. To make, sell and/or distribute products using the standard and thus our patents, you need to obtain a license under these patents from us."

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These patent issues significantly slowed the development of unlicensed MP3 software and led to increased focus on creating and popularising alternatives such as WMA and Ogg Vorbis. Microsoft, the makers of the Windows operating system, chose to move away from MP3 to their own proprietary Windows Media formats to avoid the licensing issues associated with the patents. Until the key patents expire, open source / free software encoders and players appear to be illegal for commercial use in countries that recognize software patents.

Related Topics:
WMA - Ogg Vorbis - Microsoft - Windows Media - Open source - Free software

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For information about licensing fees see here and here.

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In spite of the patent restrictions, the perpetuation of the MP3 format continues; the reasons for this appear to be the network effects caused by:

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• familiarity with the format, not knowing alternatives exist,
• the fact that these alternatives do not universally provide a definite advantage over MP3,
• the large quantity of music now available in the MP3 format,
• the wide variety of existing software and hardware that takes advantage of the file format,
• the lack of DRM-protection technology, which makes MP3 files easy to edit, copy and distribute over networks,
• the majority of home users not knowing or not caring about the software patent controversy, which is in general irrelevant to their choice of the MP3 format for personal use.