Thank you for your message.

I understand that no free codecs H.264 / AVC, convert (change) in Sony Vegas Pro for free codecs for commercial use, and do what I want

[I]" I understand that no free codecs H.264 / AVC, convert (change) in Sony Vegas Pro for free codecs for commercial use, and do what I want."[/I]

Then you understand incorrectly. You are free to use the H.264 / AVC codec to produce content for any purpose. SCS has paid a fee to MPEGLA so they can include software protected by multiple patents in Vegas. The same applies to the MPEG-2 and MP3 codecs.

Bob.

You know, you've made eight posts on exactly the same topic since you joined the forum yesterday. Do you not believe the answers you are receiving? I find that mildly disrespectful. This is getting to be a lot closer to spam than a request for support.

We don't have anyone here qualified to give you legal advice, or if we do, they're not talking.

What you will find on a peer forum is advice and direction based on experience. Whether you choose to accept that or not, be done, please.

FotoVideo has a very valid reason to be concerned and the advice he has been given here so far is not completely accurate.

In the PDF version of the Sony Vegas Pro manual, there has been a large section regarding patents and licenses and it specifically states that many of the codecs and technologies are for non-commercial use only. For example, this is what the manual said about Sony AVC MP4:

"This product is licensed under the AVC patent portfolio for the personal and non-commercial use of a consumer to encode video in compliance with the AVC standard and/or decode AVC video that was encoded by a consumer engaged in personal or non-commercial activity and/or was obtained from a video provider licensed to provide AVC video. No license is granted or shall be implied for any other use."

The same applies to using the MPEG2 codec and MP3, any of us that have been using these technologies for commercial purposes without obtaining our own license from MPEG-LA are indeed technically breaking the law. Various third-party codec likely have their own restrictions. As far as I can tell, DNxHD has been made open source and can be freely used for commercial purposes.

The legal section had been in the Vegas Pro manual up until version 13 but it got so big that it was removed from the PDF and posted separately on the SCS web site:

http://www.sonycreativesoftware.com/licensenotices

The link above is provided on page 2 of the Vegas Pro manual, even before the table of contents.

[I]"FotoVideo has a very valid reason to be concerned and the advice he has been given here so far is not completely accurate."[/I]

The information I have given is entirely accurate because I did do the unthinkable, contact MPEGLA and sent around 30 minutes on the phone talking to them.

[I]"any of us that have been using these technologies for commercial purposes without obtaining our own license from MPEG-LA are indeed technically breaking the law."[/I]

Ring MPEGLA and ask to buy a licence and tell us what happens.

[I]" As far as I can tell, DNxHD has been made open source and can be freely used for commercial purposes."[/I]

Not so. DNxHD is most definitely not open source.
Avid made DNxHD a SMPTE standard codec. Part of the arrangement with SMPTE requires Avid to grant anyone who requests the right to embed the code, a licence for a standard fee.

Avid are also using MPEGLA as a patent aggregator. That's where this whole thing gets messy and why the licence is so confusingly worded, multiple entities own IP embedded in just about every codec. MPEGLA is a not for profit organisation setup by the industry to pool patents. The wording is indeed grey but from what I can gather there's no other way they could issue a licence with a fence around it. Even when MPEGLA do issue a licence they do not and cannot warrant that the licence covers every possible patent holder.


Bob.

I said, "technically breaking the law" which is not to say that we don't all do it.MPEGLA has certainly not made it easy, or even possible, to comply with the law.

Even when the AVC encoders in Vegas are licensed, if you sell your AVC video you are required to pay a royalty. I believe this is the source of the non commercial terms listed by Sony and others in their legal speak.

Taken from MPEG-LA website

Where End User pays for AVC Video
1) Subscription (not limited by title) –
100,000 or fewer subscribers/yr = no royalty;
> 100,000 to 250,000 subscribers/yr = $25,000;
>250,000 to 500,000 subscribers/yr = $50,000;
>500,000 to 1M subscribers/yr = $75,000;
>1M subscribers/yr = $100,000

2) Title-by-Title
12 minutes or less = no royalty;
>12 minutes in length = lower of (a) 2% or (b) $0.02 per title

Where do I pay my 2 cents (or less)? :-)

farss so I know I'm asking a lot. But I'm not sure Sony Vegas Pro That is free codecs. I could not believe it. Sony seller assured me that the codecs are free. I feel cheated. I paid for the program from Which the output files with codecs are to pay a license for MPEG.LA

I have a question. If the video loading DSLR Canon, Sony, Nikon codec H.264 / AVC or can be converted to a free codec? The agreement SLR says that you 'can not decode H.264 / AVC codec or another format.
I know that a lot of people selling the format Quick Time Photo Jpg. Is it a free codec for commercial use?

How do people trade video from DSLR Canon, Sony, Nikon pages as pond5, videohive, etc? Everyone has to pay 2 cents for MPEG.LA from art sales?

[I]" I have a question. If the video loading DSLR Canon, Sony, Nikon codec H.264 / AVC or can be converted to a free codec?"[/I]

There is no such thing as a "free codec". Even the open source codecs such as X.264 probably violate someone's patent protected IP.

[I]"Everyone has to pay 2 cents for MPEG.LA from art sales?"[/I]

No. With only a few exceptions no one is paying for the use of codecs for anything beyond the licence they got to use it when they purchased software or hardware.

The only exceptions I know of are businesses doing DVD replication and some cable TV companies. MPEGLA sell licences in big blocks as noted above. They have no interest in collecting $0.02. if you send your video to a DVD Replicator they will include in their fee a proportion of what they paid MPEGLA for a block of say 100,000 licences. If you're duplicating DVDs yourself MPEGLA are not interested in your money.

Same goes for encoding video for YouTube or to sell to cable or over the air TV stations etc.

Bob.

The proper person to contact for this is Sony. I've done that before, it gets forwarded to legal, they get back to you with the response. The response I got years ago about Acid Music Studio from legal was that the "only for non-commercial use" clause meant you can't least/pay-per-use the software.

Since we're talking about the CAMERA codec license here, my ASSUMPTION (based on the SCS-Legal response to me) would be that SONY can't charge YOU per use of the codec. They can't sell you the camera & then say "Every video you record has a an $X fee".

Remember, those patent/copyright/legal notices might not have anything to do with you, they're required because the owner said the licensee must show them because it applies to them. IE lots of software these days using GPL parts & display the GPL license, but that is because the software creator needs to display that, not because the user must make everything they do GPL.

[I]"Remember, those patent/copyright/legal notices might not have anything to do with you, they're required because the owner said the licensee must show them because it applies to them."[/I]

Exactly.
Keeping in mind that we're talking mainly about licences that originate from MPEGLA who are pooling patents and I can see why they read as very restrictive. There's around eight stakeholders and their legal people who have to agree to the wording of the licence so the most restrictive prevails.

Another way to look the thing is based on something that was said to me years ago.
Say I, Bob, came up with an entirely new and brilliant way to encode video and got a patent for it. The question then is how to make money from my brilliant idea.
For every 1,000 content creators there's 1,000,000 content viewers. It makes commercial sense to let the content creators use my invention cheaply if not for free because that creates a demand for licences from the businesses that sell content viewers by the millions.

I could ask the 1,000 content creators to pay me $1,000 each or I could ask $1 for each content viewer box that's sold. Pretty obvious which approach is most likely to make me a millionaire :)

Bob.

I could ask the 1,000 content creators to pay me $1,000 each or I could ask $1 for each content viewer box that's sold. Pretty obvious which approach is most likely to make me a millionaire :)

Answer "C": sue everyone you can. :p

This whole mess starts already with the camera. Here a portion of the NX5U manual:

Notes on the License
ANY USE OF THIS PRODUCT OTHER THAN
CONSUMER PERSONAL USE IN ANY
MANNER THAT COMPLIES WITH THE
MPEG-2 STANDARD FOR ENCODING
VIDEO INFORMATION FOR PACKAGED
MEDIA IS EXPRESSLY PROHIBITED
WITHOUT A LICENSE UNDER APPLICABLE
PATENTS IN THE MPEG-2 PATENT
PORTFOLIO, WHICH LICENSE IS
AVAILABLE FROM MPEG LA, L.L.C., 250
STEELE STREET, SUITE 300, DENVER,
COLORADO 80206.
THIS PRODUCT IS LICENSED UNDER THE
AVC PATENT PORTFOLIO LICENSE FOR
THE PERSONAL AND NON-COMMERCIAL
USE OF A CONSUMER TO
(i) ENCODE VIDEO IN COMPLIANCE WITH
THE AVC STANDARD (“AVC VIDEO”) AND
/OR
(ii) DECODE AVC VIDEO THAT WAS
ENCODED BY A CONSUMER ENGAGED IN
A PERSONAL AND
NON-COMMERCIAL ACTIVITY AND/OR
WAS OBTAINED FROM A VIDEO
PROVIDER LICENSED TO PROVIDE AVC
VIDEO.
NO LICENSE IS GRANTED OR SHALL BE
IMPLIED FOR ANY OTHER USE.
ADDITIONAL INFORMATION MAY BE
OBTAINED FROM MPEG LA, L.L.C.
SEE <HTTP://MPEGLA.COM>

Methinks the OP doth protest too much.
There is a cloaked agenda here.

MPEG-LA wants money from everyone. Encoder, seller/distributor and decoder. At least literally speaking. Reality is that they do not care about the little guys as it is not worth their time and money.

Says right there: "COMPLIES WITH THE MPEG-2 STANDARD FOR ENCODING VIDEO INFORMATION FOR PACKAGED MEDIA"

1) Vegas already has a codec for mpeg-2, so we're covered.
2) Youtube already has their codec's covered, so no need to worry about that.
3) if you're handing out the origional video, you're still not using "packaged media".

Even w/o reading the rest, unless I'm making DVD/BD's to sell it doesn't effect me. And we already know that DVD/BD encoded files require a license to encode with anyway, so we're STILL covered. That's the big conditional statement. That's the important part. If you're making a packaged media with the camera you need a license for commercial use.

I think OP just simply seeks clarity. As you can see form the legal notice in the Z5U manual you would actually violate the law selling DVDs with video recorded from that camera.

I discussed this with my lawer friend and even he thinks this is a big mess.

Mad.

G

'mad'?

not if you're a lawyer ;-)

TheHappyFriar

You're wrong, MPEG-2, we have not covered

MPEG-LA MPEG-2
To the extent That the Software contains MPEG-2 functionality, the Help Us provisioning Applies:

ANY USE OF THIS PRODUCT IN ANY MANNER OTHER THAN PERSONAL USE THAT COMPLIES WITH THE MPEG-2 STANDARD FOR ENCODING VIDEO INFORMATION FOR PACKAGED MEDIA IS EXPRESSLY PROHIBITED WITHOUT A LICENSE UNDER APPLICABLE PATENTS IN THE MPEG-2 PATENT PORTFOLIO, WHICH LICENSE IS AVAILABLE FROM MPEG LA, LLC, 6312 S. Fiddlers Green Circle, Suite 400E, Greenwood Village, Colorado 80111 USA

http://www.sonycreativesoftware.com/licensenotices

I have a question for whom to Quick Time Photo .jpg? Is this codec is exempt from the license? He needs to save the raw material for sale. I do not care for H.264 / AVC

We sent an email to MPEG.LA and got the answer.

Hello,

I have a quick question. I record videos Nikon codec H.264/AVC. Do not want to violate the license H.264/AVC.

Can I change the free converters H.264/AVC on Quick Time Photo JPG for commercial purposes? Pond5 pages, VideoHive ...

For example, a free program Squared 5 MPEG Streamclip is doing the conversion.

I know that MPEG Streamclip Squared 5 is not a licensee MPEG.LA

http://www.mpegla.com/main/programs/AVC/Pages/Licensees.aspx

Pond5 recommends the program to convert videos MPEG Streamclip

http://help.pond5.com/hc/en-us/articles/200944183-Video-Upload-Specifications-

That's why I prefer to ask you and make sure it is compatible with the law.

I received a reply:

Thank you for your message. It’s good to hear from you again.

Although our Licenses do not directly provide coverage for an end user and anyone in the product chain has liability for an unlicensed product, a royalty paid for an end product by the end product supplier would render the product licensed in the hands of the end user. But, where a royalty has not been paid, such a product remains unlicensed. In that regard, and as you correctly noted, the party offering the software product you mentioned has not taken a License or paid the applicable royalties. As a result, their products are not licensed.

For that reason, we suggest that you choose a product from a licensed supplier (or insist that the supplier you use become licensed by paying the applicable royalties).

If I may be of further assistance, just let me know.

Does anyone understand English well. The authors of films we are required to pay a license for MPEG.LA?

Here I found the information

http://www.microstockgroup.com/newby-discussion/canon-nikon-sony-you-can-not-sell-movies-without-a-license/new/#new