Berkeley CSUA MOTD:Entry 16447
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2024/12/24 [General] UID:1000 Activity:popular
12/24   

1999/9/1 [Computer/SW/WWW/Browsers, Computer/SW/OS/FreeBSD] UID:16447 Activity:very high
9/1     http://burnallgifs.org
        \_ Go read the slashdot update on Unisys's real position
           \_ Yeah- they just want to frighten people who don't
              know any better into paying them for a license they don't
              need. Funny, that doesn't make them look that much
              better.   -cdaveb
           \_ http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=99/08/31/0143246&mode=thread
2024/12/24 [General] UID:1000 Activity:popular
12/24   

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burnallgifs.org
Contact Us 10 Burn All GIFs Day mailing list archives 11 Subscribe to the Burn All GIFs Day mailing list 12 Please do not buy from Amazon. Amazon boycott page at the Free Software Foundation site. Bay Area Web developers march for software patent reform 20 June 2003: The LZW patent expires today in the United States. However, patents on LZW are still in force in other countries. In mail dated Monday, 23 June 2003, Unisys attorney Mark Starr asserts that LZW patents are still in force in Canada, France, Italy, Germany, the United Kingdom, and Japan. More importantly, do not allow your communications to be censored by patent holders. Oppose the expansion of software patents to your country, if such patents are not available there now. Insist that standards bodies in which you participate make an an "innovation compatible" (IC) license a requirement for any patents needed to implement a standard. Develop and support software that works with non-patented file formats and network protocols, instead of patent-encumbered ones. Please do not mail the maintainers of this site to ask if the LZW patent is still in effect in a certain country. If you are concerned about needing a patent license to do your work, please support patent reform. I'll just use GIFs without a license, and give those patent weasels the finger! By switching your site to PNG, you encourage users to upgrade to PNG-capable browsers, and 20 show big-budget sites that they don't have to pay multi-million-dollar royalties to Unisys. Helping make Unisys lose a GIF licensing deal is a better way to give them the finger than just using GIFs on your site. Web sites with GIFs on them have nothing to fear, right? Yes, but it wouldn't stand up in court, so ignore Forgent. Also read 25 PNG Tips for Cartoonists by Drake Emko, and check out some of the web comics in our 26 Spotlight on GIF-free sites section. Other, much better, methods of data compression are not covered by any patent. The Unisys LZW patent expires in the USA on June 20, 2003. However, according to Unisys, they hold LZW patents outside the USA that expire in 2004. LZW is used in an obsolete graphic format called GIF, which many web sites use in order to be compatible with old web browsers. Unisys 30 claimed that patents on LZW are in force in the United States, Japan, Canada, France, Germany, Italy and the United Kingdom. The catch is that it appears to be difficult or impossible to get a Unisys license to use LZW in free software that complies with the 31 Open Source Definition or in 32 low-volume proprietary software. The fact that Unisys was able to patent LZW is due to a flaw in the 34 US patent system that makes even 35 pencil-and-paper calculations patentable. You could violate some US patents just doing the story problems in a math or computer science textbook! However, Unisys's actions are legal under US law, so the only reasonable alternative to paying the "Unisys tax" on the web is to upgrade graphics from GIF to 36 PNG format, or 37 MNG format for animations. Despite the title, 38 PNG Tips for Cartoonists is a good intro for all web artists who want to use PNG effectively. A 39 A study conducted by James Bessen and Eric Maskin shows that: Through a sequence of court decisions, patent protection for computer programs was significantly strengthened. We will show that, far from unleashing a flurry of new innovative activity, these stronger property rights ushered in a period of stagnant, if not declining, R&D among those industries and firms that patented most. Unisys has changed their position on GIF licensing (see below) and they can change it again. Unisys does not require licensing, or fees to be paid, for non-commercial, non-profit GIF-based applications, including those for use on the on-line services. Concerning developers of software for the Internet network, the same principle applies. Unisys will not pursue previous inadvertent infringement by developers producing versions of software products for the Internet prior to 1995. The company does not require licensing, or fees to be paid for non-commercial, non-profit offerings on the Internet, including "Freeware". In all cases, a written license agreement or statement signed by an authorized Unisys representative is required from Unisys for all use, sale or distribution of any software (including so-called "freeware") and/or hardware providing LZW conversion capability (for example, downloaded software used for creating/displaying GIF images). The 46 Freedom Technology Center is an IT training facility in Mountain View, California. Find out how you can 51 pack 65,536 different colors into a 678-byte image, and learn other advantages of the PNG format. Protect your privacy with your favorite web filtering tool and a long list of 54 Ad server IP addresses. Includes full text of the world's first telephone directory published in New Haven, Connecticut, USA in 1878. Smokey Bear says extinguish GIFs before leaving your campsite: 74 Yosemite National Park is GIF-free. Here's another 76 GIF-free C64 page just because Commodore 64s rule. There may be some limitations of use if you are using a Jasc Software product to operate a web server, internet server or bulletin board, or if you are an on-line vendor using the software as a means to run your on-line service. If you have questions regarding this, please contact us our legal department at ADDRESS . For the lossless interchange of raster images that have no geospatial context and where none of the above cases apply, such as the exchange of still-images that can be viewed in sequence (also referred to as animation), the mandated standard is: * Graphics Interchange Format (GIF), Version 89a, 31 July 1990, CompuServe Incorporated. Unisys has had 14 years or so to develop their position on LZW licensing, and one more flame war won't change anything. Switch to a non-patented graphics format, burn your GIFs to call attention to the fact that you're doing so, and avoid patent minefields in the future. When it comes to the web, Unisys didn't just miss the boat, they missed the harbor and the ocean. Burn All GIFs Day is about getting out of patent problems, not about getting into flame wars. Burn All Gifs Software 82 gif2png is free, Open Source software to convert GIF images to PNG images under Linux, Unix, MS-DOS or Microsoft Windows. The gif2png distribution also includes a script, web2png, that can automatically convert an entire website, including patching references to the converted images in HTML and PHP pages. Available at no charge for unlimited use and noncommercial distribution. It can be run from a commandline in an MSDOS window, or from a UNIX or LINUX commandline. Its main purpose is to reduce the size of the PNG IDAT datastream by trying various compression levels an PNG filter methods. It also can be used to remove unwanted ancillary chunks, or to add certain chunks including gAMA, tRNS, and textual chunks. Microsoft IIS webmasters: read this document if PNG images on your site are visible from Microsoft Internet Explorer but not from Netscape browsers. Developer Information You can use freely available libraries to add PNG and MNG support to software you create. The libraries are under a 97 simple, non-copyleft OSI-approved free license. Read 101 PNG: The Definitive Guide by Greg Roelofs to learn how to create PNGs and write applications that use the PNG format. Burn All Gifs Graphics Visit 104 Burn All GIFs Graphics for PNG graphics you can use to show support for this site. Contact us If you haven't actually read this page, and just like GIFs or Unisys for some reason and want to tell us all about it, please don't waste your time. It feeds directly into an abuse reporting system and will not be read by a human being.
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slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=99/08/31/0143246&mode=thread
Shop ThinkGeek - 10 freshmeat - 11 Newsletters - 12 TechJobs - 13 Slashdot Broadband 14 Search 15 X 16 Click Here 17 Welcome to Slashdot 18 It's funny. Sections 26 Main 27 Apache 28 Apple 29 Askslashdot 30 Books 31 BSD 1 more 32 Developers 1 more 33 Games 10 more 34 Interviews 35 Science 2 more 36 YRO Help 37 FAQ 38 Bugs Stories 39 Old Stories 40 Old Polls 41 Topics 42 Hall of Fame 43 Submit Story 44 About 45 Supporters 46 Code 47 Awards Services 48 Broadband 49 Online Books 50 PriceGrabber 51 Product News 52 Tech Jobs Unisys Not Suing (most) Webmasters for Using GIFs 53 The Almighty Buck Posted by 54 Roblimo on Tue Aug 31, '99 10:00 AM from the straight-from-the-horse's-mouth dept. In the last week I have read (literally) over 1000 online attacks aimed at an alleged attempt by Unisys to make everyone who uses GIFs on a Web site pay $5000 in royalties. A story posted 55 here on Slashdot Sunday helped fan those flames. But nowhere, in any of the many "Unisys is evil" posts I read, here or elsewhere, did I see a single official statement from anyone at Unisys, so I decided to call Unisys and get their take on the matter. He said that even the "included" software packaged with most scanners and digital cameras is licensed. Use it, create all the GIFs you want with it, post those GIFs to your heart's content, and relax. If you use GIF graphics created with certain freeware programs, and your chosen program uses 56 LZW compression to create GIFs without a license to use it, you may be violating a Unisys patent. How would Unisys know what software you used to create a particular GIF? He had not heard of it, but said, "We give hundreds of licenses away to non-commercial, non-profit entities. And if you want to write a program that incorporates LZW compression technology in its code base, you'd better ask, because you'll be in trouble if you don't - and you may be in trouble even if you do, according to 58 these folks, but that's a whole 'nother kettle of fish we won't get into today. Do not expect Unisys to release LZW technology under the 59 GPL anytime soon. Starr said, "We do not use freeware in our own products as a matter of policy. He specifically described two common situations: 1) A company creates a $200,000 CAD package - then gives away a "free plug-in" that includes LZW. Should not Unisys charge a royalty under these circumstances? Isn't the freeness of the plug-in package that includes LZW somewhat of a sham, possibly made that way specifically to avoid paying royalties to Unisys? That's Their Story and They're Sticking to It The stack of e-mails Unisys has gotten this week from Slashdot readers and other free software boosters who disagree with the Unisys GIF patent policy hasn't done much to change Starr's mind. He and Unisys PR dude Oliver Picher both described the e-mail tirades with words like vile, vulgar, obscene, disgusting, and distasteful. Apparently, the dregs of the Open Source Community came out of the woodwork in full force, and, as usual, pissed off the people whose minds they might have had a chance to change if they had exercised a little courtesy. Those of you who sent those e-mails don't need to apologize. And the person to whom I apologized most humbly was not Starr, but Cheryl, the low-paid secretary who had to read all the filth. Cheryl does not set Unisys policy, and she does not own stock in the company, but she is the person whose job it is to read all the abusive e-mail sent to Unisys via 60 the e-mail address on the 61 relevant corporate Web page. All you do when you send her obscenities is make her - and by extension, her boss, Mark Starr - think that Open Source advocates are crackpots and idiots. But I am going to cut this potential tirade short, because Rob Malda has already given you 62 a similar lecture, Eric S. Raymond has given it, Bruce Perens has given it, and Richard M. Stallman has given it so many times that he probably mumbles it in his sleep. Meanwhile, if you want to use LZW-compressed GIFs on your Intranet or public Web site, and you created them with a Unisys-licensed piece of software, no one from Unisys is going to come around and demand money from you. And if you plan to create - or have already created - free image-processing software that uses Unisys-patented LZW technology, you might want to ask the company, very politely, for a giveaway license that would cover non-commercial use of your product. Starr (who has final judgement in such matters) might just give you one if you approach him correctly and you manage to convince him that you aren't trying to burn Unisys with some sort of bogus giveaway deal that is really meant to make you or your program's users rich while denying Unisys shareholders the licensing fees that - like it or not - they are legally entitled to collect if you try to earn a profit from your use of their intellectual property.