Robert Scott Horning wrote:
Rob Church wrote:
On 23/08/06, Michael R. Irwin michael_irwin@verizon.net wrote:
I have a query into WikiCommons but I could not find any definitive procedure or policy regarding which file formats are accepted there and which are not.
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I wrote a reply to a similar thread on Foundation-l a little over a year ago, and I'd like to point out that video file formats are simply a licensing nightmare. While Ogg Vorbis is the "most free" of common video formats, it is hardly the most widely used. Another "animation" format is MNG, which is a variation of the PNG format, however that format is more for things like a free replacement of animated GIFs.... not what I think you have in mind.
Correct. I can get with a couple of stills in the lesson I am currently working on but a smooth nice animation would really grab the student's attention and show how engineering approximations move analysis from the intractable real world to properly simplied solvable analysis scenario.
I did have a long and hard discussion with the Ogg Vorbis creators back when they got started, where I complained about their licensing issues. They originally had a very pecular propritary license that was mostly free, but something more like the Microsoft "open source" license, that allowed you to look but any changes to the format specs had to be given back to the developers. They have since changed the spec licensing arrangements, and have dropped any royalty requirments.
I would urge a little bit of caution though with the Ogg Vorbis concept as there are apparently some patents that it might violate, and it is within the realm of possibility that this file format might have the same situation happen to it that also happened to the CompuServ GIF file format where a 3rd party can "claim" ownership of all content using this file format. This is one of the huge issues that is facing software developers with the proliferation of stupid patents jaming up the U.S. court system (and soon to be the EU court system as well).
Aha! Good to know. Thanks for valuable information.
Stay away from MPEG file formats if you want them to be free to use for students. The act of even hosting them on a web server can cause huge liabilities, even though there is a "non-commercial use" clause in some MPEG licensing agreements. These are completely incompatable with the GFDL, much as CC-by-SA-NC is also incompatable, and for the exact same reasons. MPEG also sucks the karma out of you if you have to ever deal with it, which is exactly why the motion picture industry is so supportive of the format. I speak from experience here.
Also valuable.
You seriously would not believe the money that has gone into the development of the MPEG file formats and related concepts like DVD-Video.... you would think it was some kind of Manhattan-style military project and other stuff that would just turn your stomach.
Actually I would. In the U.S. big business thrives on a diverse business ecology. I spent a lot of money producing a lot of multimedia content which is now encumbered by obsolete proprietary formats and difficult to use or resuse. A lot of other multimedia developers did the same. As a result of conflicting difficult multimedia formats much of the initial surge into this area has stalled. Eventually the big guys will find it a nonprofitable area (with exception of a couple of key areas like video games on ataria and xbox) and we will be back at square zero defining commonly available standard formats.
Other video file formats are even more propritary, such as Quicktime (owned by Apple), Windows Media (Microsoft), and RealVideo. We simply can't use these.
So just about all other alternatives are really messed up. I think this is one situation where some hard work is going to be needed and that Wikimedia projects, and perhaps Wikiversity in particular can play a huge role in helping to define the multimedia file formats that are going to be widely used. Believe it or not, this is bleeding edge technology and concepts here, where we are discussing "free content" video. It shouldn't be, but it is. I have spent over a decade in researching free (as in GPL, GFDL compatable) multimedia file formats and I am as close to a leading expert on the subject as can be found.
Thank you for the information Robert. I appreciate your sharing the expertise. Makes me feel less silly when google searches come up empty. Perhaps I shall need to establish a "Art of Illusion" portal or user group sooner rather than later. It is a java based open source animation package currently lower scale than 3DSMax but providing a similar type of development environment. Last time I checked it was not yet importing 3DSMax but the lead developer was very interested in assisting anyone who wanted to tackle a plugin for that purpose.
I will do some further research. Eventually this expensive animation I have will be used effectively for some purpose!
Regards, mirwin