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                <title>Petter Reinholdtsen - Entries tagged standard</title>
                <description>Entries tagged standard</description>
                <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/</link>

        
        <item>
                <title>OOXML og standardisering</title>
                <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/OOXML_og_standardisering.html</link>        
                <guid isPermaLink="true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/OOXML_og_standardisering.html</guid>
                <pubDate>Wed, 25 Jul 2012 21:10:00 +0200</pubDate>
                <description>&lt;p&gt;DIFI har
&lt;a href=&quot;http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/DIFI_foresl_r___kaste_ut_ODF_og_ta_inn_OOXML_fra_statens_standardkatalog.html&quot;&gt;en
høring gående&lt;/a&gt; om ny versjon av statens standardkatalog, med frist
2012-09-30, der det foreslås å fjerne ODF fra katalogen og ta inn ISO
OOXML.  I den anledning minnes jeg
&lt;a href=&quot;http://www.regjeringen.no/upload/FAD/Vedlegg/IKT-politikk/Refkat_v2.pdf&quot;&gt;notatet
FAD skrev&lt;/a&gt; da versjon 2 av standardkatalogen var under
utarbeidelse, da FAD og DIFI fortsatt forsto poenget med og verdien av
frie og åpne standarder.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Det er mange som tror at OOXML er ett spesifikt format, men det
brukes ofte som fellesbetegnelse for både formatet spesifisert av
ECMA, ISO, og formatet produsert av Microsoft Office (aka docx), som
dessverre ikke er det samme formatet.  Fra en av de som implementerte
støtte for docx-formatet i KDE fikk jeg høre at ISO-spesifikasjonen
var en nyttig referanse, men at det var mange avvik som gjorde at en
ikke kunne gå ut ifra at Microsoft Office produserte dokumenter i
henhold til ISO-spesifikasjonen.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;ISOs OOXML-spesifikasjon har (eller hadde, usikker på om
kommentaren er oppdatert) i følge
&lt;a href=&quot;http://surguy.net/articles/ooxml-validation-and-technical-review.xml&quot;&gt;Inigo
Surguy&lt;/a&gt; feil i mer enn 10% av eksemplene, noe som i tillegg gjør
det vanskelig å bruke spesifikasjonen til å implementere støtte for
ISO OOXML.  Jeg har ingen erfaring med å validere OOXML-dokumenter
selv, men ser at
&lt;a href=&quot;http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=5124&quot;&gt;Microsoft
har laget en validator&lt;/a&gt; som jeg ikke kan teste da den kun er
tilgjengelig på MS Windows.  Finner også en annen kalt
&lt;a href=&quot;http://code.google.com/p/officeotron/&quot;&gt;Office-O-Tron&lt;/A&gt; som
er oppdatert i fjor.  Lurer på om de validerer at dokumenter er i
formatet til Microsoft office, eller om de validerer at de er i
henhold til formatene spesifisert av ECMA og ISO. Det hadde også vært
interessant å se om docx-dokumentene publisert av det offentlige er
gyldige ISO OOXML-dokumenter.&lt;/p&gt;
</description>
        </item>
        
        <item>
                <title>Mer oppfølging fra MPEG-LA om avtale med dem for å kringkaste og publisere H.264-video</title>
                <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Mer_oppf_lging_fra_MPEG_LA_om_avtale_med_dem_for___kringkaste_og_publisere_H_264_video.html</link>        
                <guid isPermaLink="true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Mer_oppf_lging_fra_MPEG_LA_om_avtale_med_dem_for___kringkaste_og_publisere_H_264_video.html</guid>
                <pubDate>Thu, 5 Jul 2012 23:50:00 +0200</pubDate>
                <description>&lt;p&gt;I føljetongen om H.264
&lt;a href=&quot;http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/MPEG_LA_mener_NRK_m__ha_avtale_med_dem_for___kringkaste_og_publisere_H_264_video.html&quot;&gt;forlot
jeg leserne i undring&lt;/a&gt; om hvor pakken fra MPEG-LA tok veien, og om
hvilke selskaper i Norge som har avtale med MPEG-LA.  Da Ryan hos
MPEG-LA dro på ferie sendte jeg min melding videre til hans kollega,
og dagen etter fikk jeg følgende svar derfra:&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;blockquote&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Date: Fri, 29 Jun 2012 18:32:34 +0000
&lt;br&gt;From: Sidney Wolf &amp;lt;SWolf (at) mpegla.com&amp;gt;
&lt;br&gt;To: Petter Reinholdtsen &amp;lt;pere (at) hungry.com&amp;gt;
&lt;br&gt;Cc: Ryan Rodriguez &amp;lt;RRodriguez (at) mpegla.com&amp;gt;
&lt;br&gt;Subject: RE: Do NRK have a license agreement with MPEG-LA?&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Dear Mr. Reinholdtsen,&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Thank you for your message. As you know, Ryan is currently our of the
office, so it will be my pleasure to assist you.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Per your request, attached please find an electronic copy of the
AVC Patent Portfolio License. Please note that the electronic copy of
the License is provided as a convenience and for informational
purposes only. When concluding the Licenses, only the hard copies
provided by MPEG LA may be used.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;To your question, MPEG LA lists our Licensees on our website
according to each program.  The lists are in alphabetical order, so it
is very easy to search.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;I hope that this was helpful. If we can be of additional
assistance, please let me know.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Kind regards,&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Sidney A. Wolf
&lt;br&gt;Manager, Global Licensing
&lt;br&gt;MPEG LA&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;/blockquote&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Selv om et epostvedlegg er nyttig for mottakeren, så håpet jeg å få
et dokument jeg kunne dele med alle leserne av bloggen min, og ikke et
som må deles på individuell basis.  Opphavsretten krever godkjenning
fra rettighetsinnehaver før en kan gjøre slikt, så dermed fulgte jeg
opp med et spørsmål om dette var greit.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;blockquote&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Date: Wed, 4 Jul 2012 20:25:06 +0200
&lt;br&gt;From: Petter Reinholdtsen &amp;lt;pere (at) hungry.com&amp;gt;
&lt;br&gt;To: Sidney Wolf &amp;lt;SWolf (at) mpegla.com&amp;gt;
&lt;br&gt;Cc: Ryan Rodriguez &amp;lt;RRodriguez (at) mpegla.com&amp;gt;
&lt;br&gt;Subject: Re: Do NRK have a license agreement with MPEG-LA?&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Thank you for your reply.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;[Sidney Wolf]
&lt;br&gt;&amp;gt; Per your request, attached please find an electronic copy of the AVC
&lt;br&gt;&amp;gt; Patent Portfolio License. Please note that the electronic copy of
&lt;br&gt;&amp;gt; the License is provided as a convenience and for informational
&lt;br&gt;&amp;gt; purposes only. When concluding the Licenses, only the hard copies
&lt;br&gt;&amp;gt; provided by MPEG LA may be used.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;This is useful for me to learn, but the reason I asked for the
Internet address of the licensing document was to ensure I could
publish a link to it when I discuss the topic of H.264 licensing here
in Norway, and allow others to verify my observations.  I can not do
the same with an email attachment.  Thus I would like to ask you if it
is OK with MPEG LA that I publish this document on the Internet for
others to read?&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&amp;gt; To your question, MPEG LA lists our Licensees on our website
&lt;br&gt;&amp;gt; according to each program. The lists are in alphabetical order, so
&lt;br&gt;&amp;gt; it is very easy to search.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;I am afraid this do not help me locate Norwegian companies in the
list of Licensees.  I do not know the name of all companies and
organisations in Norway, and thus do not know how to locate the
Norwegian ones on that list.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&amp;gt; I hope that this was helpful. If we can be of additional assistance,
&lt;br&gt;&amp;gt; please let me know.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Absoutely helpful to learn more about how MPEG LA handle licensing.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;--
&lt;br&gt;Happy hacking
&lt;br&gt;Petter Reinholdtsen&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;/blockquote&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Jeg håpet også at det skulle være mulig å få vite hvilke av de
mange hundre som har avtale med MPEG-LA om bruk av H.264 som holdt til
i Norge.  Begge mine håp falt i grus med svaret fra MPEG-LA.

&lt;p&gt;&lt;blockquote&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Date: Thu, 5 Jul 2012 17:42:39 +0000
&lt;br&gt;From: Sidney Wolf &amp;lt;SWolf (at) mpegla.com&amp;gt;
&lt;br&gt;To: &#39;Petter Reinholdtsen&#39; &amp;lt;pere (at) hungry.com&amp;gt;
&lt;br&gt;Cc: Ryan Rodriguez &amp;lt;RRodriguez (at) mpegla.com&amp;gt;
&lt;br&gt;Subject: RE: Do NRK have a license agreement with MPEG-LA?&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Dear Mr. Reinholdtsen,&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Thank you for your reply.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;We appreciate the additional explanation you have provided and for
asking our permission to publish the electronic copy of the License in
advance of doing so.  Typically, MPEG LA prefers to distribute the
electronic copies of our Licenses to interested parties. Therefore,
please feel free to send interested parties to the AVC portion of our
website, http://www.mpegla.com/main/programs/AVC/Pages/Intro.aspx for
their further reference.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;As previously mentioned, MPEG LA maintains a list of Licensees in good
standing on our website according to each program. Due to the large
volume of Licensees, it would be administratively impractical to
provide this level of detail to interested parties.  Therefore, I am
afraid we are not in a position to assist you with your request.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Kind regards,&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Sidney A. Wolf
&lt;br&gt;Manager, Global Licensing
&lt;br&gt;MPEG LA&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;/blockquote&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Men takket være epostvedlegget kunne jeg søke på Google etter
setningen &quot;WHEREAS, a video standard commonly referred to as AVC has
been defined and is referred to in this Agreement as the “AVC
Standard” (as more fully defined herein below)&quot; som finnes i avtalen,
og lokalisere en kopi fra 2007 av
&lt;a href=&quot;http://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1342960/000119312509050004/dex1024.htm&quot;&gt;lisensavtalen
mellom MPEG-LA og DivX, Inc.&lt;/a&gt;, slik at mine lesere kan se hvordan
avtalen så ut da.  Jeg har ikke sammenlignet tekstene for å se om noe
har endret seg siden den tid, men satser på at teksten er representativ.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Jeg aner fortsatt ikke hvor FedEx tok veien med pakken fra
MPEG-LA.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Update 2012-07-06: Jeg er visst ikke den første som forsøker å få
klarhet i problemstillinger rundt H.264, og kom nettopp over en veldig
interessant bloggpost fra 2010 hos LibreVideo med tittelen
&quot;&lt;a href=&quot;http://www.librevideo.org/blog/2010/06/14/mpeg-la-answers-some-questions-about-avch-264-licensing/&quot;&gt;MPEG-LA
answers some questions about AVC/H.264 licensing&lt;/a&gt;.  Anbefales!&lt;/p&gt;
</description>
        </item>
        
        <item>
                <title>DIFI foreslår å kaste ut ODF og ta inn OOXML fra statens standardkatalog</title>
                <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/DIFI_foresl_r___kaste_ut_ODF_og_ta_inn_OOXML_fra_statens_standardkatalog.html</link>        
                <guid isPermaLink="true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/DIFI_foresl_r___kaste_ut_ODF_og_ta_inn_OOXML_fra_statens_standardkatalog.html</guid>
                <pubDate>Fri, 29 Jun 2012 18:00:00 +0200</pubDate>
                <description>&lt;p&gt;DIFI har nettopp annonsert høring om revisjon av
&lt;a href=&quot;http://www.standard.difi.no/forvaltningsstandarder&quot;&gt;standardkatalogen&lt;/a&gt;,
og endelig har Microsoft fått viljen sin.  Se
&lt;a href=&quot;http://www.standard.difi.no/hoyring/forslag-om-endring-av-forskrift-om-it-standarder-i-offentlig-forvaltning&quot;&gt;høringssiden&lt;/a&gt;
for hele teksten.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Her er forslaget i sin helhet:&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;blockquote&gt;
&lt;p&gt;3.2 Revisjon av krav til redigerbare dokumenter&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;I første versjon av referansekatalogen i 2007 ble det satt krav om
Open Document Format (ODF), versjon 1.1 (OASIS, 1.2.2007) for
redigerbare dokumenter. Kravet var obligatorisk for stat og sterkt
anbefalt for kommunal sektor. I 2009 ble kravet gjort obligatorisk for
hele offentlig sektor i
&lt;a href=&quot;http://www.lovdata.no/for/sf/fa/xa-20090925-1222.html&quot;&gt;forskrift
om IT-standarder i forvaltningen&lt;/a&gt;. Anvendelsesområdet for kravet
har vært begrenset til publisering av dokumenter som skal bearbeides
videre (§ 4 nr. 1 andre ledd). I 2011 ble anvendelsesområdet utvidet
til å omfatte utveksling av dokumenter beregnet for redigering som
vedlegg til e-post (§4 nr.  2).&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Office Open XML ISO/IEC 29500:2011 (OOXML) er et dokumentformat
opprinnelig utviklet av Microsoft med tilsvarende anvendelsesområde
som ODF. Formatet er blant annet tatt i bruk i nyere versjoner av
kontorstøtteprogamvaren MS Office.  Difi har foretatt en
&lt;a href=&quot;http://www.standard.difi.no/filearchive/revisjonsvurdering-standarder-for-redigerbare-dokumenter-v1-0.pdf&quot;&gt;revisjonsvurdering&lt;/a&gt;
av krav som stilles til redigerbare dokumenter i Forskrift om
IT-standarder i forvaltningen, og anbefaler at kravet til ODF
fjernes. Dette innebærer at det ikke stilles krav til dokumentformater
for redigerbare dokumenter ved publisering på offentlige virksomheters
nettsider og for redigerbare vedlegg til e-post som sendes fra
offentlige virksomheter til innbyggere og næringsliv. Offentlige
virksomheter vil dermed stå fritt til å publisere eller sende
redigerbare dokumenter i det format som ivaretar brukernes behov
best.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Forslaget innebærer at krav til ODF utgår § 4 nr. 1 tredje ledd og
§ 4 nr. 2 første ledd&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;P&gt;Imidlertid bør det stilles strengere krav til hvilke formater
offentlige virksomheter plikter å motta redigerbare dokumenter. Vi
mener at det ikke bør skilles mellom mottak av redigerbare dokumenter
som sendes i ODF eller OOXML3, som begge er åpne standarder. Dette
medfører at innbyggere og næringsliv skal kunne basere sitt valg av
programvare på egne behov og ikke på de valg offentlige virksomheter
tar. Kravet vil omfatte hele offentlig sektor, herunder
utdanningssektoren, hvor det kanskje er størst bruk av ODF. Kravet er
foreslått som ny § 4 nr.2 andre ledd&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;/blockquote&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;P&gt;De satser vel på at det hele blir glemt over sommeren, og at de
fleste har glemt Standard Norge og ISOs fallitt fra da OOXML ble
jukset igjennom som ISO-standard.  Jeg håper mine lesere sender inn
høringsuttalelser til høringen.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Anbefaler alle å friske opp sine argumenter ved å lese
&lt;a href=&quot;http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/The_reply_from_Edgar_Villanueva_to_Microsoft_in_Peru.html&quot;&gt;svaret
fra senator Edgar Villanueva til Microsoft i Peru&lt;/a&gt;.  Det er en
klassisk tekst som er like gyldig i dag som da det ble skrevet.&lt;/p&gt;

</description>
        </item>
        
        <item>
                <title>Departementenes servicesenter har ingen avtale om bruk av H.264 med MPEG-LA</title>
                <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Departementenes_servicesenter_har_ingen_avtale_om_bruk_av_H_264_med_MPEG_LA.html</link>        
                <guid isPermaLink="true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Departementenes_servicesenter_har_ingen_avtale_om_bruk_av_H_264_med_MPEG_LA.html</guid>
                <pubDate>Fri, 29 Jun 2012 09:40:00 +0200</pubDate>
                <description>&lt;p&gt;Da fikk jeg nettopp svar fra
&lt;a href=&quot;http://www.dss.dep.no/&quot;&gt;Departementenes servicesenter&lt;/a&gt;
(DSS) på
&lt;a href=&quot;http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Trenger_en_avtale_med_MPEG_LA_for___publisere_og_kringkaste_H_264_video_.html&quot;&gt;mitt
spørsmål om avtale rundt bruk av H.264&lt;/a&gt;.  De har ingen avtale med
MPEG LA eller dets representanter.  Her er svaret.

&lt;p&gt;&lt;blockquote&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Date: Fri, 29 Jun 2012 07:04:42 +0000
&lt;br&gt;From: Nielsen Mette Haga &amp;lt;Mette-Haga.Nielsen (at) dss.dep.no&amp;gt;
&lt;br&gt;To: Petter Reinholdtsen &amp;lt;petter.reinholdtsen (at) ...&amp;gt;
&lt;br&gt;CC: Postmottak &amp;lt;Postmottak (at) dss.dep.no&amp;gt;
&lt;br&gt;Subject: SV: Innsynsbegjæring om MPEG/H.264-relaterte avtaler&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;DSS har ikke inngått noen egen lisensavtale med MPEG-LA eller noen som
representerer MPEG-LA i Norge. Videoløsningen på regjeringen.no er
levert av Smartcom:tv. Lisensforholdet rundt H.264 er ikke omtalt i
vår avtale med Smartcom.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Vennlig hilsen&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Mette Haga Nielsen
&lt;br&gt;Fung. seksjonssjef&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Departementenes servicesenter&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Informasjonsforvaltning

&lt;p&gt;Mobil 93 09 83 51
&lt;br&gt;E-post mette-haga.nielsen (at) dss.dep.no&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;/blockquote&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Hvis den norske regjeringen representert ved DSS ikke har slik
avtale, så kan en kanskje konkludere med at det ikke trengs?  Jeg er
ikke trygg på at det er god juridisk grunn å stå på, men det er i det
minste interessant å vite at hverken NRK eller DSS har funnet det
nødvendig å ha avtale om bruk av H.264.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Det forklarer ikke hvordan de kan ignorere bruksvilkårene knyttet
til bruk av opphavsrettsbeskyttet materiale de bruker til
videoproduksjon, med mindre slike vilkår kan ignoreres av selskaper og
privatpersoner i Norge.  Har de lov til å bryte vilkårene, eller har
de brutt dem og så langt sluppet unna med det?  Jeg aner ikke.&lt;/p&gt;
</description>
        </item>
        
        <item>
                <title>MPEG-LA mener NRK må ha avtale med dem for å kringkaste og publisere H.264-video</title>
                <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/MPEG_LA_mener_NRK_m__ha_avtale_med_dem_for___kringkaste_og_publisere_H_264_video.html</link>        
                <guid isPermaLink="true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/MPEG_LA_mener_NRK_m__ha_avtale_med_dem_for___kringkaste_og_publisere_H_264_video.html</guid>
                <pubDate>Thu, 28 Jun 2012 20:00:00 +0200</pubDate>
                <description>&lt;p&gt;Etter at NRK
&lt;a href=&quot;http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/NRK_nekter___finne_og_utlevere_eventuell_avtale_med_MPEG_LA.html&quot;&gt;nektet
å spore opp eventuell avtale med MPEG-LA&lt;/a&gt; eller andre om bruk av
MPEG/H.264-video etter at jeg &lt;a
href=&quot;http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Trenger_en_avtale_med_MPEG_LA_for___publisere_og_kringkaste_H_264_video_.html&quot;&gt;ba
om innsyn i slike avtaler&lt;/a&gt;, tenkte jeg at i stedet for å forsøke å
få NRK til å finne en slik avtale, så burde det være like enkelt å
spørre MPEG-LA om de hadde avtale med NRK.  Spørsmålet ble sendt før
jeg fikk tips fra Kieran Kunhya om hvor listen over lisensinnehavere
&quot;in Good Standing&quot; befant seg.  MPEG-LA svarte meg i dag, og kan
fortelle at NRK ikke har noen avtale med dem, så da er i det minste det
slått fast.  Ikke overraskende mener MPEG-LA at det trengs en avtale
med MPEG-LA for å streame H.264, men deres rammer er jo
rettstilstanden i USA og ikke Norge.  Jeg tar dermed den delen av
svaret med en klype salt.  Jeg er dermed fortsatt ikke klok på om det
trengs en avtale, og hvis det trengs en avtale her i Norge, heller
ikke sikker på om NRK har en avtale med noen andre enn MPEG-LA som
gjør at de ikke trenger avtale direkte med MPEG-LA.  Jeg håper NRKs
jurister har vurdert dette, og at det er mulig å få tilgang til
vurderingen uansett om de trenger en avtale eller ikke.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Her er epostutvekslingen med MPEG-LA så langt.  Håper ikke
utvekslingen fører til NRK plutselig får en litt uventet pakke fra
MPEG-LA.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;blockquote&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Date: Mon, 25 Jun 2012 15:29:37 +0200
&lt;br&gt;From: Petter Reinholdtsen &amp;lt;pere (at) hungry.com&amp;gt;
&lt;br&gt;To: licensing-web (at) mpegla.com
&lt;br&gt;Subject: Do NRK have a license agreement with MPEG-LA?&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Hi.  I have a small question for you, that I hope it is OK that I
ask.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Is there any license agreements between MPEG-LA and NRK, &amp;lt;URL:
&lt;a href=&quot;http://www.nrk.no/&quot;&gt;http://www.nrk.no/&lt;/a&gt; &amp;gt;, the
Norwegian national broadcasting cooperation?  I am not sure if they
need one, and am just curious if such agreeement exist.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;The postal address is&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;blockquote&gt;
  NRK
  &lt;br&gt;Postbox 8500, Majorstuen
  &lt;br&gt;0340 Oslo
  &lt;br&gt;Norway
&lt;/blockquote&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;if it make it easier for you to locate such agreement.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Can you tell me how many entities in Norway have an agreement with
MPEG-LA, and the name of these entities?&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;--
&lt;br&gt;Happy hacking
&lt;br&gt;Petter Reinholdtsen
&lt;/blockquote&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;I dag, to dager senere, fikk jeg følgende svar:&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;blockquote&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Date: Thu, 28 Jun 2012 14:11:17 +0000
&lt;br&gt;From: Ryan Rodriguez &amp;lt;RRodriguez (at) mpegla.com&gt;
&lt;br&gt;To: Petter Reinholdtsen &amp;lt;pere (at) hungry.com&gt;
&lt;br&gt;CC: MD Administration &amp;lt;MDAdministration (at) mpegla.com&gt;
&lt;br&gt;Subject: RE: Do NRK have a license agreement with MPEG-LA?&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Dear Mr. Reinholdtsen,&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Thank you for your message and for your interest in MPEG LA. We
appreciate hearing from you and I will be happy to assist you.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;To begin, I will assume that you are referring to AVC/H.264
technology in your message below, as this technology is commonly used
in the transmission of video content.  In that case, please allow me
to briefly summarize the coverage provided by our AVC Patent Portfolio
License.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;P&gt;Our AVC License provides coverage for end products and video
services that make use of AVC/H.264 technology.  Accordingly, the
party offering such end products and video to End Users concludes the
AVC License and is responsible for paying the applicable royalties
associated with the end products/video they offer.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;While the Norwegian Broadcast Corporation (NRK) is not currently a
Licensee to MPEG LA&#39;s AVC License (or any other Portfolio License
offered by MPEG LA), if NRK offers AVC Video to End Users for
remuneration (for example, Title-by-Title, Subscription, Free
Television, or Internet Broadcast AVC Video), then NRK will need to
conclude the AVC License and may be responsible for paying applicable
royalties associated with the AVC Video it distributes.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Today I will send you a FedEx package containing a copy of our AVC
License for your review.  You should receive the License document
within the next few days.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Meanwhile, MPEG LA currently has several Norwegian Licensees that
can be found under the &quot;Licensees&quot; header within the respective
portion of our website.  For example, you may find our list of
Licensees in Good Standing to our AVC License in the AVC portion of
our website,
&lt;a href=&quot;http://www.mpegla.com/main/programs/AVC/Pages/Licensees.aspx&quot;&gt;http://www.mpegla.com/main/programs/AVC/Pages/Licensees.aspx&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;I hope the above information is helpful.  If you have additional
questions or need further assistance with the AVC License, please feel
free to contact me directly.  I look forward to hearing from you again
soon.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Best regards,&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Ryan&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Ryan M. Rodriguez
&lt;br&gt;Licensing Associate
&lt;br&gt;MPEG LA
&lt;br&gt;5425 Wisconsin Avenue
&lt;br&gt;Suite 801
&lt;br&gt;Chevy Chase, MD 20815
&lt;br&gt;U.S.A.
&lt;br&gt;Phone:  +1 (301) 986-6660 x211
&lt;br&gt;Fax:    +1 (301) 986-8575
&lt;br&gt;Email: rrodriguez (at) mpegla.com&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;/blockquote&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Meldingen om utsendt FedEx-pakke var så merkelig at jeg
øyeblikkelig sendte svar tilbake og spurte hva i alle dager han mente,
da han jo ikke hadde fått noen postadresse som nådde meg.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;blockquote&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Date: Thu, 28 Jun 2012 16:36:15 +0200
&lt;br&gt;From: Petter Reinholdtsen &amp;lt;pere (at) hungry.com&amp;gt;
&lt;br&gt;To: Ryan Rodriguez &amp;lt;RRodriguez (at) mpegla.com&amp;gt;
&lt;br&gt;Cc: MD Administration &amp;lt;MDAdministration (at) mpegla.com&amp;gt;
&lt;br&gt;Subject: Re: Do NRK have a license agreement with MPEG-LA?&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;[Ryan Rodriguez]
&lt;br&gt;&amp;gt; Dear Mr. Reinholdtsen,&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Thank you for your quick reply.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&amp;gt; Today I will send you a FedEx package containing a copy of our AVC
&lt;br&gt;&amp;gt; License for your review.  You should receive the License document
&lt;br&gt;&amp;gt; within the next few days.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;The part about sending a FedEx package confused me, though.  I did not
&lt;br&gt;give you my address, nor am I associated with NRK in any way, so I hope
&lt;br&gt;you did not try to send me a package using the address of NRK.  If you
&lt;br&gt;would send me the Internet address of to the document, it would be more
&lt;br&gt;useful to me to be able to download it as an electronic document.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&amp;gt; Meanwhile, MPEG LA currently has several Norwegian Licensees that can
&lt;br&gt;&amp;gt; be found under the &quot;Licensees&quot; header within the respective portion
&lt;br&gt;&amp;gt; of our website.  For example, you may find our list of Licensees in
&lt;br&gt;&amp;gt; Good Standing to our AVC License in the AVC portion of our website,
&lt;br&gt;&amp;gt; http://www.mpegla.com/main/programs/AVC/Pages/Licensees.aspx&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;How can I recognize the Norwegian licensees?&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;--
&lt;br&gt;Happy hacking
&lt;br&gt;Petter Reinholdtsen&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;/blockquote&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Selv om jeg svarte kun noen minutter etter at jeg fikk eposten fra
MPEG-LA, fikk jeg eposten under som automatisk var beskjed på min
siste epost.  Får håpe noen likevel følger opp &quot;FedEx-pakken&quot;.  For å
øke sjansen for at noen revurderer utsending av pakke uten mottaker,
videresendte jeg min epost til swolf (at) mpegla.com, så får vi se.
Har ikke hørt noe mer 3 timer senere, så jeg mistenker at ingen leste
min epost tidsnok.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;blockquote&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Date: Thu, 28 Jun 2012 14:36:20 +0000
&lt;br&gt;From: Ryan Rodriguez &amp;lt;RRodriguez (at) mpegla.com&amp;gt;
&lt;br&gt;To: Petter Reinholdtsen &amp;lt;pere (at) hungry.com&amp;gt;
&lt;br&gt;Subject: Automatic reply: Do NRK have a license agreement with MPEG-LA?&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Thank you for your message.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;I will be out of the office until Thursday, July 5 and will respond
to all messages upon my return.  If this is a matter that requires
immediate attention, please contact Sidney Wolf (swolf (at)
mpegla.com)&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Best regards,&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Ryan&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Ryan M. Rodriguez
&lt;br&gt;Licensing Associate
&lt;br&gt;MPEG LA&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;/blockquote&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Litt klokere, men fortsatt ikke klok på mitt opprinnelige spørsmål,
som er om en trenger avtale med MPEG-LA for å publisere eller
kringkaste H.264-video i Norge.&lt;/p&gt;
</description>
        </item>
        
        <item>
                <title>NRK nekter å finne og utlevere eventuell avtale med MPEG-LA</title>
                <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/NRK_nekter___finne_og_utlevere_eventuell_avtale_med_MPEG_LA.html</link>        
                <guid isPermaLink="true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/NRK_nekter___finne_og_utlevere_eventuell_avtale_med_MPEG_LA.html</guid>
                <pubDate>Mon, 25 Jun 2012 15:10:00 +0200</pubDate>
                <description>&lt;p&gt;Jeg fikk nettopp svar fra NRK på
&lt;a href=&quot;http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Trenger_en_avtale_med_MPEG_LA_for___publisere_og_kringkaste_H_264_video_.html&quot;&gt;min
forespørsel om kopi av avtale&lt;/a&gt; med MPEG-LA eller andre om bruk av
MPEG og/eller H.264.  Svaret har fått saksreferanse 2011/371 (mon tro
hva slags sak fra 2011 dette er?) hos NRK og lyder som følger:&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;blockquote&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Svar på innsynsbegjæring i MPEG / H.264-relaterte
avtaler&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Viser til innsynsbegjæring av 19. juni 2012. Kravet om innsyn
gjelder avtale som gjør at NRK «ikke er begrenset av de generelle
bruksvilkårene som gjelder for utstyr som bruker MPEG og/eller
H.264».&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;I henhold til offentleglova § 28 annet ledd må innsynskravet gjelde
en bestemt sak eller i rimelig utstrekning saker av en bestemt
sak. Det er på det rene at det aktuelle innsynskravet ikke gjelder en
bestemt sak. Spørsmålet som reiser seg er om identifiseringsgraden er
tilstrekkelig. I Justisdepartementets «Rettleiar til offentleglova»
står følgende:&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;«Kravet om at innsynskravet må gjelde ei bestemt sak er til hinder
for at eit innsynskrav kan gjelde alle saker av ein bestemt art, utan
at den enkelte saka blir identifisert.  Ein kan med andre ord i
utgangspunktet ikkje krevje innsyn i til dømes alle saker om
utsleppsløyve hos Statens forureiningstilsyn frå dei siste tre åra,
med mindre ein identifiserer kvar enkelt sak, til dømes med tilvising
til dato, partar eller liknande.»&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Vedrørende denne begrensningen har Justisdepartementet uttalt
følgende (Lovavdelingens uttalelser JDLOV-2010-3295):&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;em&gt;«Bakgrunnen for avgrensinga av kva innsynskravet kan gjelde,
er fyrst og fremst at meir generelle innsynskrav, utan noka form for
identifikasjon av kva ein eigentleg ynskjer, ville vere svært
vanskelege å handsame for forvaltninga.»&lt;/em&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;I samme sak uttaler Lovavdelingen følgende:&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;em&gt;«Det følgjer vidare av offentleglova § 28 andre ledd at det `i
rimeleg utstrekning&#39; kan krevjast innsyn i `saker av ein bestemt
art&#39;. Vilkåret om at eit innsynskrav berre `i rimeleg utstrekning&#39; kan
gjelde saker av ein bestemt art, er i hovudsak knytt til kor
arbeidskrevjande det vil vere å finne fram til dei aktuelle
dokumenta. I tillegg reknar vi med at vilkåret kan gje grunnlag for å
nekte innsyn i tilfelle der innsynskravet er så omfattande (gjeld så
mange dokument) at arbeidsmengda som ville gått med til å handsame
det, er større enn det ein `i rimeleg utstrekning&#39; kan krevje (sjølv
om det nok skal mykje til).»&lt;/em&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;NRK har ikke noen egen sammenstilling over avtaler innenfor
bestemte områder som omtales i innsynsbegjæringen. De måtte søkes på
vanlig måte. I tillegg finnes ikke noen automatisert måte å finne
avtaler som «ikke er begrenset av de generelle bruksvilkårene som
gjelder for utstyr som bruker MPEG og/eller H.264». En slik
gjennomgang av avtaler måtte gjøres manuelt av en person med
spesialistkunnskap. Dette vil kreve at NRK avsetter omfattende
ressurser for å finne frem relevante avtaler og for deretter å vurdere
om de dekkes av det innsynsbegjæringen omfattes.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;På bakgrunn av dette nekter NRK innsyn, med den begrunnelsen at
innsynskravet er så omfattende at arbeidsmengden for å håndtere kravet
vil være langt større enn det som i rimelig utstrekning kan kreves i
henhold til offentleglova § 28 annet ledd.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Avslag på deres innsynsbegjæring kan påklages til Kultur- og
kirkedepartementet innen tre uker fra det tidspunkt avslaget kommer
frem til mottakeren, i henhold til reglene i offentleglova § 32,
jf. forvaltningsloven kapittel VI. Klagen skal stiles til Kultur- og
kirkedepartementet, og sendes til NRK.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;NRK er imidlertid etter Offentleglova forpliktet å gi ut journaler,
slik at en eventuell søknad om innsyn kan tydeligere identifisere
hvilke dokumenter som det ønskes innsyn i. NRKs offentlige journaler
for inneværende og forrige måned ligger ute på
NRK.no/innsyn. Journaler som går lengre tilbake i tid, kan sendes ut
på forespørsel til innsyn (at) nrk.no.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Med hilsen
&lt;br&gt;Dokumentarkivet i NRK
&lt;br&gt;v/ Elin Brandsrud
&lt;br&gt;Tel. direkte: 23 04 29 29
&lt;br&gt;Post: RBM3, Postboks 8500 Majorstuen, 0340 Oslo
&lt;br&gt;innsyn (at) nrk.no&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;/blockquote&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Svaret kom
&lt;a href=&quot;http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2012-06-25-video-mpegla-nrk.pdf&quot;&gt;i
PDF-form som vedlegg på epost&lt;/a&gt;.  Jeg er litt usikker på hvordan jeg
best går videre for å bli klok, men jeg har jo i hvert fall tre uker
på å vurdere om jeg skal klage.  Enten må nok forespørselen
reformuleres eller så må jeg vel klage.  Synes jo det er merkelig at
NRK ikke har bedre kontroll med hvilke avtaler de har inngått.  Det
burde jo være noen i ledelsen som vet om de har signert en avtale med
MPEG-LA eller ikke...&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Oppdatering 2012-06-25 20:20: Et google-søk på &quot;2011/371 nrk&quot;
sendte meg til postjournalen for
&lt;a href=&quot;http://nrk.no/contentfile/file/1.8212365!offentligjournal19062012.pdf&quot;&gt;2012-06-19&lt;/a&gt;
og
&lt;a href=&quot;http://nrk.no/contentfile/file/1.8214156!offentligjournal20062012.pdf&quot;&gt;2012-06-20&lt;/a&gt;
hos NRK som viser mine forespørsler og viser at sakens tittel hos NRK
er &quot;Graphic Systems Regions MA 2378/10E&quot;.  Videre søk etter &quot;Graphic
Systems Regions&quot; viser at dette er saken til et anbud om
&quot;&lt;a href=&quot;http://no.mercell.com/m/mts/Tender/27179412.aspx&quot;&gt;a graphics
system for 12 or 13 sites broadcasting regional news&lt;/a&gt;&quot; hos Mercell
Sourcing Service, også omtalt på
&lt;a href=&quot;http://www.publictenders.net/tender/595705&quot;&gt;Public
Tenders&lt;/a&gt; og
&lt;a href=&quot;http://www.doffin.no/search/show/search_view.aspx?ID=JAN155521&quot;&gt;Doffin&lt;/a&gt;.
Jeg er dog usikker på hvordan dette er relatert til min
forespørsel.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Oppdatering 2012-06-25 22:40: Ble tipset av Kieran Kunhya, fra
miljøet rundt
&lt;a href=&quot;http://code.google.com/p/open-broadcast-encoder/&quot;&gt;Open
Broadcast Encoder&lt;/a&gt;, at listen over de som har lisensavtale med
MPEG-LA er
&lt;a href=&quot;http://www.mpeg-la.com/main/programs/AVC/Pages/Licensees.aspx&quot;&gt;tilgjengelig
på web&lt;/a&gt;.  Veldig fint å oppdage hvor den finnes, da jeg må ha lett
etter feil ting da jeg forsøke å finne den.  Der står ikke NRK, men
flere andre &quot;Broadcasting Company&quot;-oppføringer.  Lurer på om det betyr
at NRK ikke trenger avtale, eller noe helt annet?&lt;/p&gt;
</description>
        </item>
        
        <item>
                <title>Trenger en avtale med MPEG-LA for å publisere og kringkaste H.264-video?</title>
                <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Trenger_en_avtale_med_MPEG_LA_for___publisere_og_kringkaste_H_264_video_.html</link>        
                <guid isPermaLink="true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Trenger_en_avtale_med_MPEG_LA_for___publisere_og_kringkaste_H_264_video_.html</guid>
                <pubDate>Thu, 21 Jun 2012 13:40:00 +0200</pubDate>
                <description>&lt;p&gt;Trengs det avtale med MPEG-LA for å ha lovlig rett til å
distribuere og kringkaste video i MPEG4 eller med videokodingen H.264?
&lt;a href=&quot;http://webmink.com/essays/h-264/&quot;&gt;H.264 og MPEG4 er jo ikke en
fri og åpen standard&lt;/a&gt; i henhold til
&lt;a href=&quot;http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Fri_og__pen_standard__slik_Digistan_ser_det.html&quot;&gt;definisjonen
til Digistan&lt;/a&gt;, så i enkelte land er det ingen tvil om at du må ha
en slik avtale, men jeg må innrømme at jeg ikke vet om det også
gjelder Norge.  Det ser uansett ut til å være en juridisk interessant
problemstilling.  Men jeg tenkte her om dagen som så, at hvis det er
nødvendig, så har store aktører som
&lt;a href=&quot;http://www.nrk.no/&quot;&gt;NRK&lt;/a&gt; og
&lt;a href=&quot;http://www.regjeringen.no/&quot;&gt;regjeringen&lt;/a&gt; skaffet seg en
slik avtale.  Jeg har derfor sendt forespørsel til begge (for
regjeringen sin del er det Departementenes Servicesenter som gjør
jobben), og bedt om kopi av eventuelle avtaler de har om bruk av MPEG
og/eller H.264 med MPEG-LA eller andre aktører som opererer på vegne
av MPEG-LA.  Her er kopi av eposten jeg har sendt til
&lt;a href=&quot;http://www.dss.dep.no/&quot;&gt;Departementenes Servicesenter&lt;/a&gt;.
Forespørselen til NRK er veldig lik.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;blockquote&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Date: Tue, 19 Jun 2012 15:18:33 +0200
&lt;br&gt;From: Petter Reinholdtsen
&lt;br&gt;To: postmottak@dss.dep.no
&lt;br&gt;Subject: Innsynsbegjæring om MPEG/H.264-relaterte avtaler
 
&lt;p&gt;Hei.  Jeg ber herved om innsyn og kopi av dokumenter i DSS relatert
til avtaler rundt bruk av videoformatene MPEG og H.264.  Jeg er
spesielt interessert i å vite om DSS har lisensavtale med MPEG-LA
eller noen som representerer MPEG-LA i Norge.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;MPEG og H.264 er videoformater som brukes både til kringkasting
(f.eks. i bakkenett og kabel-TV) og videopublisering på web, deriblant
via Adobe Flash.  MPEG-LA, &amp;lt;URL:
&lt;a href=&quot;http://www.mpeg-la.com/&quot;&gt;http://www.mpeg-la.com/&lt;/a&gt; &amp;gt;, er
en organisasjon som har fått oppgaven, av de kjente rettighetshavere
av immaterielle rettigheter knyttet til MPEG og H.264, å selge
bruksrett for MPEG og H.264.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Via regjeringen.no kringkastes med MPEG og H.264-baserte
videoformater, og dette ser ut til å være organisert av DSS.  Jeg
antar dermed at DSS har avtale med en eller annen aktør om dette.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;F.eks. har Adobe Premiere Pro har følgende klausul i følge &amp;lt;URL:
&lt;a href=&quot;http://news.cnet.com/8301-30685_3-20000101-264.html&quot;&gt;http://news.cnet.com/8301-30685_3-20000101-264.html&lt;/a&gt;
&amp;gt;:&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;blockquote&gt;

  &lt;p&gt;6.17. AVC DISTRIBUTION. The following notice applies to software
  containing AVC import and export functionality: THIS PRODUCT IS
  LICENSED UNDER THE AVC PATENT PORTFOLIO LICENSE FOR THE PERSONAL AND
  NON-COMMERCIAL USE OF A CONSUMER TO (a) ENCODE VIDEO IN COMPLIANCE
  WITH THE AVC STANDARD (&quot;AVC VIDEO&quot;) AND/OR (b) DECODE AVC VIDEO THAT
  WAS ENCODED BY A CONSUMER ENGAGED IN A PERSONAL AND NON-COMMERCIAL
  ACTIVITY AND/OR AVC VIDEO THAT 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
  &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.mpegla.com&quot;&gt;http://www.mpegla.com&lt;/a&gt;.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;/blockquote&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Her er det kun &quot;non-commercial&quot; og &quot;personal and non-commercial&quot;
aktivitet som er tillatt uten ekstra avtale med MPEG-LA.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Et annet tilsvarende eksempel er Apple Final Cut Pro, som har
følgende klausul i følge &amp;lt;URL:
&lt;a href=&quot;http://images.apple.com/legal/sla/docs/finalcutstudio2.pdf&quot;&gt;http://images.apple.com/legal/sla/docs/finalcutstudio2.pdf&lt;/a&gt;
&amp;gt;:&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;blockquote&gt;

  &lt;p&gt;15. Merknad om H.264/AVC. Hvis Apple-programvaren inneholder
  funksjonalitet for AVC-koding og/eller AVC-dekoding, krever
  kommersiell bruk ekstra lisensiering og følgende gjelder:
  AVC-FUNKSJONALITETEN I DETTE PRODUKTET KAN KUN ANVENDES AV
  FORBRUKERE OG KUN FOR PERSONLIG OG IKKE- KOMMERSIELL BRUK TIL (i)
  KODING AV VIDEO I OVERENSSTEMMELSE MED AVC-STANDARDEN (&quot;AVC-VIDEO&quot;)
  OG/ELLER (ii) DEKODING AV AVC-VIDEO SOM ER KODET AV EN FORBRUKER TIL
  PERSONLIG OG IKKE-KOMMERSIELL BRUK OG/ELLER DEKODING AV AVC-VIDEO
  FRA EN VIDEOLEVERANDØR SOM HAR LISENS TIL Å TILBY
  AVC-VIDEO. INFORMASJON OM ANNEN BRUK OG LISENSIERING KAN INNHENTES
  FRA MPEG LA L.L.C. SE HTTP://WWW.MPEGLA.COM.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;/blockquote&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
  
&lt;p&gt;Tilsvarende gjelder for andre programvarepakker, kamera, etc som
bruker MPEG og H.264, at en må ha en avtale med MPEG-LA for å ha lov
til å bruke programmet/utstyret hvis en skal lage noe annet enn
private filmer og i ikke-kommersiell virksomhet.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Jeg er altså interessert i kopi av avtaler DSS har som gjør at en
ikke er begrenset av de generelle bruksvilkårene som gjelder for
utstyr som bruker MPEG og/eller H.264.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;/blockquote&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Nå venter jeg spent på svaret.  Jeg planlegger å blogge om svaret
her.&lt;/p&gt;
</description>
        </item>
        
        <item>
                <title>The cost of ODF and OOXML</title>
                <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/The_cost_of_ODF_and_OOXML.html</link>        
                <guid isPermaLink="true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/The_cost_of_ODF_and_OOXML.html</guid>
                <pubDate>Sat, 26 May 2012 18:00:00 +0200</pubDate>
                <description>&lt;p&gt;I just come across a blog post from Glyn Moody reporting the
claimed cost from Microsoft on requiring ODF to be used by the UK
government.  I just sent him an email to let him know that his
assumption are most likely wrong.  Sharing it here in case some of my
blog readers have seem the same numbers float around in the UK.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;blockquote&gt; &lt;p&gt;Hi.  I just noted your
&lt;a href=&quot;http://blogs.computerworlduk.com/open-enterprise/2012/04/does-microsoft-office-lock-in-cost-the-uk-government-500-million/index.htm&quot;&gt;http://blogs.computerworlduk.com/open-enterprise/2012/04/does-microsoft-office-lock-in-cost-the-uk-government-500-million/index.htm&lt;/a&gt;
comment:&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;blockquote&gt;&quot;They&#39;re all in Danish, not unreasonably, but even
with the help of Google Translate I can&#39;t find any figures about the
savings of &quot;moving to a flexible two standard&quot; as claimed by the
Microsoft email. But I assume it is backed up somewhere, so let&#39;s take
it, and the £500 million figure for the UK, on trust.&quot;
&lt;/blockquote&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;I can tell you that the Danish reports are inflated.  I believe it is
the same reports that were used in the Norwegian debate around 2007,
and Gisle Hannemyr (a well known IT commentator in Norway) had a look
at the content.  In short, the reason it is claimed that using ODF
will be so costly, is based on the assumption that this mean every
existing document need to be converted from one of the MS Office
formats to ODF, transferred to the receiver, and converted back from
ODF to one of the MS Office formats, and that the conversion will cost
10 minutes of work time for both the sender and the receiver.  In
reality the sender would have a tool capable of saving to ODF, and the
receiver would have a tool capable of reading it, and the time spent
would at most be a few seconds for saving and loading, not 20 minutes
of wasted effort.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Microsoft claimed all these costs were saved by allowing people to
transfer the original files from MS Office instead of spending 10
minutes converting to ODF. :)&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;See
&lt;a href=&quot;http://hannemyr.com/no/ms12_vl02.php&quot;&gt;http://hannemyr.com/no/ms12_vl02.php&lt;/a&gt;
and
&lt;a href=&quot;http://hannemyr.com/no/ms12.php&quot;&gt;http://hannemyr.com/no/ms12.php&lt;/a&gt;
for background information.  Norwegian only, sorry. :)&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;/blockquote&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
</description>
        </item>
        
        <item>
                <title>OpenOffice.org fungerer da fint for blinde?</title>
                <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/OpenOffice_org_fungerer_da_fint_for_blinde_.html</link>        
                <guid isPermaLink="true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/OpenOffice_org_fungerer_da_fint_for_blinde_.html</guid>
                <pubDate>Mon, 21 May 2012 23:20:00 +0200</pubDate>
                <description>&lt;p&gt;De siste dagene har høringsuttalelsene om DIFIs forslag til
standardkatalog v3.1 blitt
&lt;a href=&quot;http://www.standard.difi.no/hoyring/hoyring-om-nye-anbefalte-it-standarder?tab=comments&quot;&gt;publisert
på DIFIs nettside&lt;/a&gt;, og jeg kunne der glede meg over at
&lt;a href=&quot;http://wiki.nuug.no/uttalelser/201204-standardkatalog-v3.1&quot;&gt;NUUGs&lt;/a&gt;
uttalelse er kommet med.  En uttalelse som overrasker og forvirrer meg
er
&lt;a href=&quot;http://www.standard.difi.no/filearchive/norges-blindeforbund.pdf&quot;&gt;den
fra Norges Blindeforbund&lt;/a&gt;, som 5 år etter at Klaus Knopper sammen
med sin blinde kone blant annet
&lt;a href=&quot;http://www.nuug.no/aktiviteter/20071211-accessibility/&quot;&gt;demonstrerte
høyttalende OpenOffice.org på nynorsk for blinde&lt;/a&gt; på et NUUG-møte.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;https://www.blindeforbundet.no/&quot;&gt;Norges Blindeforbund&lt;/a&gt;
skriver følgende, som for meg virker å være formulert på sviktende
grunnlag:&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;blockquote&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Bruk av fri programvare

&lt;p&gt;I FRIPROGSENTERET, RAPPORT 2009-02: Universell utforming
&lt;a href=&quot;http://www.kunnskapsbazaren.no/filer/Friprogsenteret-Rapport-Universell_utforming.pdf&quot;&gt;http://www.kunnskapsbazaren.no/filer/Friprogsenteret-Rapport-Universell_utforming.pdf&lt;/a&gt;
sies det &quot;Det finnes i dag ikke mange fri programvare-rammeverk eller
generelle løsninger som støtter tilgjengelighet eller som er
universelt utformet.&quot;&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Til tross for at det gjennom prinsippene i fri programvare åpnes
for større frihet til selv å påvirke programvareløsninger i retning av
universell utforming viser praksis at virkeligheten er en annen.
Mange av de mest alminnelige frie programvarepakkene mangler delvis
eller fullstendig tilgjengelighet for mennesker med nedsatt
syn. Eksempler på dette er OpenOffice og LibreOffice m.fl.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;En annen utfordring ved bruk av fri programvare kan være manglende
kundestøtte og muligheter til opplæring i bruk av løsningen. Svaksynte
og blinde har et høyere behov for denne typen støtte enn andre brukere
ettersom mange av dem har behov for tilleggsprogramvare som skal
fungere sammen med den opprinnelige programvaren, og ettersom man ikke
har de samme muligheter for overblikk over grensesnittet som en seende
bruker. I tillegg til dette kommer de mer tilgjengelighetstekniske
utfordringene som ofte må løses i samarbeid med
programvareleverandør/produsent.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Fri programvare er ikke på samme måte underlagt lovgivning gjennom
for eksempel diskriminerings og tilgjengelighetsloven ettersom det
ikke alltid finnes en produsent/tilbyder av tjenesten eller produktet.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Norges Blindeforbund krever at universell utforming og
brukskvalitet tas med som viktige hensyn i utredninger som ligger til
grunn for valg av standarder som primært leder brukeren mot fri
programvare. Et eksempel på dette er bruk av dokumentformatet ODF som
leder brukeren i retning av OpenOffice, som er helt eller delvis
utilgjengelig for svaksynte og blinde – noe avhengig av plattform og
hjelpemiddelprogramvare.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;/blockquote&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Jeg håper noen involvert i OpenOffice.org og/eller LibreOffice tar
kontakt med Norges Blindeforbund og oppklarer det som for meg virker å
være en misforståelse, i og med at OpenOffice.org så vidt jeg vet
fungerer fint også for blinde.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Jeg ble minnet på problemstillingen da jeg leste Slashdot-saken om
&quot;&lt;a href=&quot;http://linux.slashdot.org/story/12/05/21/1417221/the-state-of-linux-accessibility&quot;&gt;The
State of Linux Accessibility&lt;/a&gt;&quot;, som også hevder at Linux fungerer
utmerket for blinde.&lt;/p&gt;
</description>
        </item>
        
        <item>
                <title>NUUGs leverer høringsuttalelse om v3.1 av statens referansekatalog</title>
                <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/NUUGs_leverer_h_ringsuttalelse_om_v3_1_av_statens_referansekatalog.html</link>        
                <guid isPermaLink="true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/NUUGs_leverer_h_ringsuttalelse_om_v3_1_av_statens_referansekatalog.html</guid>
                <pubDate>Fri, 27 Apr 2012 15:30:00 +0200</pubDate>
                <description>&lt;p&gt;NUUG-styremedlem Hans-Petter Fjeld
&lt;a href=&quot;https://plus.google.com/u/0/110394259537201279374/posts/AGzRmAuFdW1&quot;&gt;meldte
nettopp&lt;/a&gt; at han har sendt inn &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.nuug.no/&quot;&gt;NUUG&lt;/a&gt;s
høringsuttalelse angående Difi sin standardkatalog v3.1.  Jeg er veldig
glad for at så mange bidro og sikret at vår stemme blir hørt i denne
høringen.  Anbefaler alle å lese våre
&lt;a href=&quot;http://wiki.nuug.no/uttalelser/201204-standardkatalog-v3.1&quot;&gt;to
sider med innspill&lt;/a&gt;.&lt;/p&gt;
</description>
        </item>
        
        <item>
                <title>HTC One X - Your video?  What do you mean?</title>
                <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/HTC_One_X___Your_video___What_do_you_mean_.html</link>        
                <guid isPermaLink="true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/HTC_One_X___Your_video___What_do_you_mean_.html</guid>
                <pubDate>Thu, 26 Apr 2012 13:20:00 +0200</pubDate>
                <description>&lt;p&gt;In &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.idg.no/computerworld/article243690.ece&quot;&gt;an
article today&lt;/a&gt; published by Computerworld Norway, the photographer
&lt;a href=&quot;http://www.urke.com/eirik/&quot;&gt;Eirik Helland Urke&lt;/a&gt; reports
that the video editor application included with
&lt;a href=&quot;http://www.htc.com/www/smartphones/htc-one-x/#specs&quot;&gt;HTC One
X&lt;/a&gt; have some quite surprising terms of use.  The article is mostly
based on the twitter message from mister Urke, stating:

&lt;p&gt;&lt;blockquote&gt;
&quot;&lt;a href=&quot;http://twitter.com/urke/status/194062269724897280&quot;&gt;Drøy
brukeravtale: HTC kan bruke MINE redigerte videoer kommersielt. Selv
kan jeg KUN bruke dem privat.&lt;/a&gt;&quot;
&lt;/blockquote&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;I quickly translated it to this English message:&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;blockquote&gt;
&quot;Arrogant user agreement: HTC can use MY edited videos
commercially.  Although I can ONLY use them privately.&quot;
&lt;/blockquote&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;I&#39;ve been unable to find the text of the license term myself, but
suspect it is a variation of the MPEG-LA terms I
&lt;a href=&quot;http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Terms_of_use_for_video_produced_by_a_Canon_IXUS_130_digital_camera.html&quot;&gt;discovered
with my Canon IXUS 130&lt;/a&gt;.  The HTC One X specification specifies that
the recording format of the phone is .amr for audio and .mp3 for
video.  AMR is
&lt;a href=&quot;http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adaptive_Multi-Rate_audio_codec#Licensing_and_patent_issues&quot;&gt;Adaptive
Multi-Rate audio codec&lt;/a&gt; with patents which according to the
Wikipedia article require an license agreement with
&lt;a href=&quot;http://www.voiceage.com/&quot;&gt;VoiceAge&lt;/a&gt;.  MP4 is
&lt;a href=&quot;http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/H.264/MPEG-4_AVC#Patent_licensing&quot;&gt;MPEG4 with
H.264&lt;/a&gt;, which according to Wikipedia require a licence agreement
with &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.mpegla.com/&quot;&gt;MPEG-LA&lt;/a&gt;.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;I know why I prefer
&lt;a href=&quot;http://www.digistan.org/open-standard:definition&quot;&gt;free and open
standards&lt;/a&gt; also for video.&lt;/p&gt;
</description>
        </item>
        
        <item>
                <title>RAND terms - non-reasonable and discriminatory</title>
                <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/RAND_terms___non_reasonable_and_discriminatory.html</link>        
                <guid isPermaLink="true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/RAND_terms___non_reasonable_and_discriminatory.html</guid>
                <pubDate>Thu, 19 Apr 2012 22:20:00 +0200</pubDate>
                <description>&lt;p&gt;Here in Norway, the
&lt;a href=&quot;http://www.regjeringen.no/nb/dep/fad.html?id=339&quot;&gt; Ministry of
Government Administration, Reform and Church Affairs&lt;/a&gt; is behind
a &lt;a href=&quot;http://standard.difi.no/forvaltningsstandarder&quot;&gt;directory of
standards&lt;/a&gt; that are recommended or mandatory for use by the
government.  When the directory was created, the people behind it made
an effort to ensure that everyone would be able to implement the
standards and compete on equal terms to supply software and solutions
to the government.  Free software and non-free software could compete
on the same level.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;But recently, some standards with RAND
(&lt;a href=&quot;http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reasonable_and_non-discriminatory_licensing&quot;&gt;Reasonable
And Non-Discriminatory&lt;/a&gt;) terms have made their way into the
directory.  And while this might not sound too bad, the fact is that
standard specifications with RAND terms often block free software from
implementing them.  The reasonable part of RAND mean that the cost per
user/unit is low,and the non-discriminatory part mean that everyone
willing to pay will get a license.  Both sound great in theory.  In
practice, to get such license one need to be able to count users, and
be able to pay a small amount of money per unit or user.  By
definition, users of free software do not need to register their use.
So counting users or units is not possible for free software projects.
And given that people will use the software without handing any money
to the author, it is not really economically possible for a free
software author to pay a small amount of money to license the rights
to implement a standard when the income available is zero.  The result
in these situations is that free software are locked out from
implementing standards with RAND terms.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Because of this, when I see someone claiming the terms of a
standard is reasonable and non-discriminatory, all I can think of is
how this really is non-reasonable and discriminatory.  Because free
software developers are working in a global market, it does not really
help to know that software patents are not supposed to be enforceable
in Norway.  The patent regimes in other countries affect us even here.
I really hope the people behind the standard directory will pay more
attention to these issues in the future.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;You can find more on the issues with RAND, FRAND and RAND-Z terms
from Simon Phipps
(&lt;a href=&quot;http://blogs.computerworlduk.com/simon-says/2010/11/rand-not-so-reasonable/&quot;&gt;RAND:
Not So Reasonable?&lt;/a&gt;).&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Update 2012-04-21: Just came across a
&lt;a href=&quot;http://blogs.computerworlduk.com/open-enterprise/2012/04/of-microsoft-netscape-patents-and-open-standards/index.htm&quot;&gt;blog
post from Glyn Moody&lt;/a&gt; over at Computer World UK warning about the
same issue, and urging people to speak out to the UK government.  I
can only urge Norwegian users to do the same for
&lt;a href=&quot;http://www.standard.difi.no/hoyring/hoyring-om-nye-anbefalte-it-standarder&quot;&gt;the
hearing taking place at the moment&lt;/a&gt; (respond before 2012-04-27).
It proposes to require video conferencing standards including
specifications with RAND terms.&lt;/p&gt;
</description>
        </item>
        
        <item>
                <title>The video format most supported in web browsers?</title>
                <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/The_video_format_most_supported_in_web_browsers_.html</link>        
                <guid isPermaLink="true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/The_video_format_most_supported_in_web_browsers_.html</guid>
                <pubDate>Sun, 16 Jan 2011 00:20:00 +0100</pubDate>
                <description>&lt;p&gt;The video format struggle on the web continues, and the three
contenders seem to be Ogg Theora, H.264 and WebM.  Most video sites
seem to use H.264, while others use Ogg Theora.  Interestingly enough,
the comments I see give me the feeling that a lot of people believe
H.264 is the most supported video format in browsers, but according to
the Wikipedia article on
&lt;a href=&quot;http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HTML5_video&quot;&gt;HTML5 video&lt;/a&gt;,
this is not true.  Check out the nice table of supprted formats in
different browsers there.  The format supported by most browsers is
Ogg Theora, supported by released versions of Mozilla Firefox, Google
Chrome, Chromium, Opera, Konqueror, Epiphany, Origyn Web Browser and
BOLT browser, while not supported by Internet Explorer nor Safari.
The runner up is WebM supported by released versions of Google Chrome
Chromium Opera and Origyn Web Browser, and test versions of Mozilla
Firefox.  H.264 is supported by released versions of Safari, Origyn
Web Browser and BOLT browser, and the test version of Internet
Explorer.  Those wanting Ogg Theora support in Internet Explorer and
Safari can install plugins to get it.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;To me, the simple conclusion from this is that to reach most users
without any extra software installed, one uses Ogg Theora with the
HTML5 video tag.   Of course to reach all those without a browser
handling HTML5, one need fallback mechanisms.  In
&lt;a href=&quot;http://www.nuug.no/&quot;&gt;NUUG&lt;/a&gt;, we provide first fallback to a
plugin capable of playing MPEG1 video, and those without such support
we have a second fallback to the Cortado java applet playing Ogg
Theora.  This seem to work quite well, as can be seen in an &lt;a
href=&quot;http://www.nuug.no/aktiviteter/20110111-semantic-web/&quot;&gt;example
from last week&lt;/a&gt;.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;The reason Ogg Theora is the most supported format, and H.264 is
the least supported is simple.  Implementing and using H.264
require royalty payment to MPEG-LA, and the terms of use from MPEG-LA
are incompatible with free software licensing.  If you believed H.264
was without royalties and license terms, check out
&quot;&lt;a href=&quot;http://webmink.com/essays/h-264/&quot;&gt;H.264 – Not The Kind Of
Free That Matters&lt;/a&gt;&quot; by Simon Phipps.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;A incomplete list of sites providing video in Ogg Theora is
available from
&lt;a href=&quot;http://wiki.xiph.org/index.php/List_of_Theora_videos&quot;&gt;the
Xiph.org wiki&lt;/a&gt;, if you want to have a look.  I&#39;m not aware of a
similar list for WebM nor H.264.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Update 2011-01-16 09:40: A question from Tollef on IRC made me
realise that I failed to make it clear enough this text is about the
&amp;lt;video&amp;gt; tag support in browsers and not the video support
provided by external plugins like the Flash plugins.&lt;/p&gt;
</description>
        </item>
        
        <item>
                <title>Chrome plan to drop H.264 support for HTML5 &amp;lt;video&amp;gt;</title>
                <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Chrome_plan_to_drop_H_264_support_for_HTML5__lt_video_gt_.html</link>        
                <guid isPermaLink="true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Chrome_plan_to_drop_H_264_support_for_HTML5__lt_video_gt_.html</guid>
                <pubDate>Wed, 12 Jan 2011 22:10:00 +0100</pubDate>
                <description>&lt;p&gt;Today I discovered
&lt;a href=&quot;http://www.digi.no/860070/google-dropper-h264-stotten-i-chrome&quot;&gt;via
digi.no&lt;/a&gt; that the Chrome developers, in a surprising announcement,
&lt;a href=&quot;http://blog.chromium.org/2011/01/html-video-codec-support-in-chrome.html&quot;&gt;yesterday
announced&lt;/a&gt; plans to drop H.264 support for HTML5 &amp;lt;video&amp;gt; in
the browser.  The argument used is that H.264 is not a &quot;completely
open&quot; codec technology.  If you believe H.264 was free for everyone
to use, I recommend having a look at the essay
&quot;&lt;a href=&quot;http://webmink.com/essays/h-264/&quot;&gt;H.264 – Not The Kind Of
Free That Matters&lt;/a&gt;&quot;.  It is not free of cost for creators of video
tools, nor those of us that want to publish on the Internet, and the
terms provided by MPEG-LA excludes free software projects from
licensing the patents needed for H.264.  Some background information
on the Google announcement is available from
&lt;a href=&quot;http://www.osnews.com/story/24243/Google_To_Drop_H264_Support_from_Chrome&quot;&gt;OSnews&lt;/a&gt;.
A good read. :)&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Personally, I believe it is great that Google is taking a stand to
promote equal terms for everyone when it comes to video publishing on
the Internet.  This can only be done by publishing using free and open
standards, which is only possible if the web browsers provide support
for these free and open standards.  At the moment there seem to be two
camps in the web browser world when it come to video support.  Some
browsers support H.264, and others support
&lt;a href=&quot;http://www.theora.org/&quot;&gt;Ogg Theora&lt;/a&gt; and
&lt;a href=&quot;http://www.webmproject.org/&quot;&gt;WebM&lt;/a&gt;
(&lt;a href=&quot;http://www.diracvideo.org/&quot;&gt;Dirac&lt;/a&gt; is not really an option
yet), forcing those of us that want to publish video on the Internet
and which can not accept the terms of use presented by MPEG-LA for
H.264 to not reach all potential viewers.
Wikipedia keep &lt;a href=&quot;http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HTML5_video&quot;&gt;an
updated summary&lt;/a&gt; of the current browser support.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Not surprising, several people would prefer Google to keep
promoting H.264, and John Gruber
&lt;a href=&quot;http://daringfireball.net/2011/01/simple_questions&quot;&gt;presents
the mind set&lt;/a&gt; of these people quite well.  His rhetorical questions
provoked a reply from Thom Holwerda with another set of questions
&lt;a href=&quot;http://www.osnews.com/story/24245/10_Questions_for_John_Gruber_Regarding_H_264_WebM&quot;&gt;presenting
the issues with H.264&lt;/a&gt;. Both are worth a read.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Some argue that if Google is dropping H.264 because it isn&#39;t free,
they should also drop support for the Adobe Flash plugin.  This
argument was covered by Simon Phipps in
&lt;a href=&quot;http://blogs.computerworlduk.com/simon-says/2011/01/google-and-h264---far-from-hypocritical/index.htm&quot;&gt;todays
blog post&lt;/a&gt;, which I find to put the issue in context.  To me it
make perfect sense to drop native H.264 support for HTML5 in the
browser while still allowing plugins.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;I suspect the reason this announcement make so many people protest,
is that all the users and promoters of H.264 suddenly get an uneasy
feeling that they might be backing the wrong horse.  A lot of TV
broadcasters have been moving to H.264 the last few years, and a lot
of money has been invested in hardware based on the belief that they
could use the same video format for both broadcasting and web
publishing.  Suddenly this belief is shaken.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;An interesting question is why Google is doing this.  While the
presented argument might be true enough, I believe Google would only
present the argument if the change make sense from a business
perspective.  One reason might be that they are currently negotiating
with MPEG-LA over royalties or usage terms, and giving MPEG-LA the
feeling that dropping H.264 completely from Chroome, Youtube and
Google Video would improve the negotiation position of Google.
Another reason might be that Google want to save money by not having
to pay the video tax to MPEG-LA at all, and thus want to move to a
video format not requiring royalties at all.  A third reason might be
that the Chrome development team simply want to avoid the
Chrome/Chromium split to get more help with the development of Chrome.
I guess time will tell.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Update 2011-01-15: The Google Chrome team provided
&lt;a href=&quot;http://blog.chromium.org/2011/01/more-about-chrome-html-video-codec.html&quot;&gt;more
background and information on the move&lt;/a&gt; it a blog post yesterday.&lt;/p&gt;
</description>
        </item>
        
        <item>
                <title>What standards are Free and Open as defined by Digistan?</title>
                <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/What_standards_are_Free_and_Open_as_defined_by_Digistan_.html</link>        
                <guid isPermaLink="true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/What_standards_are_Free_and_Open_as_defined_by_Digistan_.html</guid>
                <pubDate>Thu, 30 Dec 2010 23:15:00 +0100</pubDate>
                <description>&lt;p&gt;After trying to
&lt;a href=&quot;http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Is_Ogg_Theora_a_free_and_open_standard_.html&quot;&gt;compare
Ogg Theora&lt;/a&gt; to
&lt;a href=&quot;http://www.digistan.org/open-standard:definition&quot;&gt;the Digistan
definition&lt;/a&gt; of a free and open standard, I concluded that this need
to be done for more standards and started on a framework for doing
this.  As a start, I want to get the status for all the standards in
the Norwegian reference directory, which include UTF-8, HTML, PDF, ODF,
JPEG, PNG, SVG and others.  But to be able to complete this in a
reasonable time frame, I will need help.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;If you want to help out with this work, please visit
&lt;a href=&quot;http://wiki.nuug.no/grupper/standard/digistan-analyse&quot;&gt;the
wiki pages I have set up for this&lt;/a&gt;, and let me know that you want
to help out.  The IRC channel #nuug on irc.freenode.net is a good
place to coordinate this for now, as it is the IRC channel for the
NUUG association where I have created the framework (I am the leader
of the Norwegian Unix User Group).&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;The framework is still forming, and a lot is left to do.  Do not be
scared by the sketchy form of the current pages. :)&lt;/p&gt;
</description>
        </item>
        
        <item>
                <title>The many definitions of a open standard</title>
                <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/The_many_definitions_of_a_open_standard.html</link>        
                <guid isPermaLink="true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/The_many_definitions_of_a_open_standard.html</guid>
                <pubDate>Mon, 27 Dec 2010 14:45:00 +0100</pubDate>
                <description>&lt;p&gt;One of the reasons I like the Digistan definition of
&quot;&lt;a href=&quot;http://www.digistan.org/open-standard:definition&quot;&gt;Free and
Open Standard&lt;/a&gt;&quot; is that this is a new term, and thus the meaning of
the term has been decided by Digistan.  The term &quot;Open Standard&quot; has
become so misunderstood that it is no longer very useful when talking
about standards.  One end up discussing which definition is the best
one and with such frame the only one gaining are the proponents of
de-facto standards and proprietary solutions.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;But to give us an idea about the diversity of definitions of open
standards, here are a few that I know about.  This list is not
complete, but can be a starting point for those that want to do a
complete survey.  More definitions are available on the
&lt;a href=&quot;http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open_standard&quot;&gt;wikipedia
page&lt;/a&gt;.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;First off is my favourite, the definition from the European
Interoperability Framework version 1.0.  Really sad to notice that BSA
and others has succeeded in getting it removed from version 2.0 of the
framework by stacking the committee drafting the new version with
their own people.  Anyway, the definition is still available and it
include the key properties needed to make sure everyone can use a
specification on equal terms.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;blockquote&gt;

&lt;p&gt;The following are the minimal characteristics that a specification
and its attendant documents must have in order to be considered an
open standard:&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;ul&gt;

&lt;li&gt;The standard is adopted and will be maintained by a not-for-profit
organisation, and its ongoing development occurs on the basis of an
open decision-making procedure available to all interested parties
(consensus or majority decision etc.).&lt;/li&gt;

&lt;li&gt;The standard has been published and the standard specification
document is available either freely or at a nominal charge. It must be
permissible to all to copy, distribute and use it for no fee or at a
nominal fee.&lt;/li&gt;

&lt;li&gt;The intellectual property - i.e. patents possibly present - of
(parts of) the standard is made irrevocably available on a royalty-
free basis.&lt;/li&gt;

&lt;li&gt;There are no constraints on the re-use of the standard.&lt;/li&gt;

&lt;/ul&gt;
&lt;/blockquote&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Another one originates from my friends over at
&lt;a href=&quot;http://www.dkuug.dk/&quot;&gt;DKUUG&lt;/a&gt;, who coined and gathered
support for &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.aaben-standard.dk/&quot;&gt;this
definition&lt;/a&gt; in 2004.  It even made it into the Danish parlament as
&lt;a href=&quot;http://www.ft.dk/dokumenter/tingdok.aspx?/samling/20051/beslutningsforslag/B103/som_fremsat.htm&quot;&gt;their
definition of a open standard&lt;/a&gt;.  Another from a different part of
the Danish government is available from the wikipedia page.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;blockquote&gt;

&lt;p&gt;En åben standard opfylder følgende krav:&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;ol&gt;

&lt;li&gt;Veldokumenteret med den fuldstændige specifikation offentligt
tilgængelig.&lt;/li&gt;

&lt;li&gt;Frit implementerbar uden økonomiske, politiske eller juridiske
begrænsninger på implementation og anvendelse.&lt;/li&gt;

&lt;li&gt;Standardiseret og vedligeholdt i et åbent forum (en såkaldt
&quot;standardiseringsorganisation&quot;) via en åben proces.&lt;/li&gt;

&lt;/ol&gt;

&lt;/blockquote&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Then there is &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.fsfe.org/projects/os/def.html&quot;&gt;the
definition&lt;/a&gt; from Free Software Foundation Europe.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;blockquote&gt;

&lt;p&gt;An Open Standard refers to a format or protocol that is&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;ol&gt;

&lt;li&gt;subject to full public assessment and use without constraints in a
manner equally available to all parties;&lt;/li&gt;

&lt;li&gt;without any components or extensions that have dependencies on
formats or protocols that do not meet the definition of an Open
Standard themselves;&lt;/li&gt;

&lt;li&gt;free from legal or technical clauses that limit its utilisation by
any party or in any business model;&lt;/li&gt;

&lt;li&gt;managed and further developed independently of any single vendor
in a process open to the equal participation of competitors and third
parties;&lt;/li&gt;

&lt;li&gt;available in multiple complete implementations by competing
vendors, or as a complete implementation equally available to all
parties.&lt;/li&gt;

&lt;/ol&gt;

&lt;/blockquote&gt;

&lt;p&gt;A long time ago, SUN Microsystems, now bought by Oracle, created
its
&lt;a href=&quot;http://blogs.sun.com/dennisding/resource/Open%20Standard%20Definition.pdf&quot;&gt;Open
Standards Checklist&lt;/a&gt; with a fairly detailed description.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;blockquote&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Creation and Management of an Open Standard

&lt;ul&gt;

&lt;li&gt;Its development and management process must be collaborative and
  democratic:

         &lt;ul&gt;

         &lt;li&gt;Participation must be accessible to all those who wish to
            participate and can meet fair and reasonable criteria
            imposed by the organization under which it is developed
            and managed.&lt;/li&gt;

         &lt;li&gt;The processes must be documented and, through a known
            method, can be changed through input from all
            participants.&lt;/li&gt;

         &lt;li&gt;The process must be based on formal and binding commitments for
            the disclosure and licensing of intellectual property rights.&lt;/li&gt;

         &lt;li&gt;Development and management should strive for consensus,
            and an appeals process must be clearly outlined.&lt;/li&gt;

         &lt;li&gt;The standard specification must be open to extensive
            public review at least once in its life-cycle, with
            comments duly discussed and acted upon, if required.&lt;/li&gt;

         &lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;/li&gt;

&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Use and Licensing of an Open Standard&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;ul&gt;

&lt;li&gt;The standard must describe an interface, not an implementation,
  and the industry must be capable of creating multiple, competing
  implementations to the interface described in the standard without
  undue or restrictive constraints.  Interfaces include APIs,
  protocols, schemas, data formats and their encoding.&lt;/li&gt;

&lt;li&gt; The standard must not contain any proprietary &quot;hooks&quot; that create
  a technical or economic barriers&lt;/li&gt;

&lt;li&gt;Faithful implementations of the standard must
  interoperate. Interoperability means the ability of a computer
  program to communicate and exchange information with other computer
  programs and mutually to use the information which has been
  exchanged. This includes the ability to use, convert, or exchange
  file formats, protocols, schemas, interface information or
  conventions, so as to permit the computer program to work with other
  computer programs and users in all the ways in which they are
  intended to function.&lt;/li&gt;

&lt;li&gt;It must be permissible for anyone to copy, distribute and read the
  standard for a nominal fee, or even no fee. If there is a fee, it
  must be low enough to not preclude widespread use.&lt;/li&gt;

&lt;li&gt;It must be possible for anyone to obtain free (no royalties or
  fees; also known as &quot;royalty free&quot;), worldwide, non-exclusive and
  perpetual licenses to all essential patent claims to make, use and
  sell products based on the standard.  The only exceptions are
  terminations per the reciprocity and defensive suspension terms
  outlined below. Essential patent claims include pending, unpublished
  patents, published patents, and patent applications. The license is
  only for the exact scope of the standard in question.

      &lt;ul&gt;

      &lt;li&gt; May be conditioned only on reciprocal licenses to any of
        licensees&#39; patent claims essential to practice that standard
        (also known as a reciprocity clause)&lt;/li&gt;

      &lt;li&gt; May be terminated as to any licensee who sues the licensor
        or any other licensee for infringement of patent claims
        essential to practice that standard (also known as a
        &quot;defensive suspension&quot; clause)&lt;/li&gt;

      &lt;li&gt; The same licensing terms are available to every potential
        licensor&lt;/li&gt;

      &lt;/ul&gt;
&lt;/li&gt;

&lt;li&gt;The licensing terms of an open standards must not preclude
  implementations of that standard under open source licensing terms
  or restricted licensing terms&lt;/li&gt;

&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;/blockquote&gt;

&lt;p&gt;It is said that one of the nice things about standards is that
there are so many of them.  As you can see, the same holds true for
open standard definitions.  Most of the definitions have a lot in
common, and it is not really controversial what properties a open
standard should have, but the diversity of definitions have made it
possible for those that want to avoid a level marked field and real
competition to downplay the significance of open standards.  I hope we
can turn this tide by focusing on the advantages of Free and Open
Standards.&lt;/p&gt;
</description>
        </item>
        
        <item>
                <title>Is Ogg Theora a free and open standard?</title>
                <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Is_Ogg_Theora_a_free_and_open_standard_.html</link>        
                <guid isPermaLink="true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Is_Ogg_Theora_a_free_and_open_standard_.html</guid>
                <pubDate>Sat, 25 Dec 2010 20:25:00 +0100</pubDate>
                <description>&lt;p&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;http://www.digistan.org/open-standard:definition&quot;&gt;The
Digistan definition&lt;/a&gt; of a free and open standard reads like this:&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;blockquote&gt;

&lt;p&gt;The Digital Standards Organization defines free and open standard
as follows:&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;ol&gt;

&lt;li&gt;A free and open standard is immune to vendor capture at all stages
in its life-cycle. Immunity from vendor capture makes it possible to
freely use, improve upon, trust, and extend a standard over time.&lt;/li&gt;

&lt;li&gt;The standard is adopted and will be maintained by a not-for-profit
organisation, and its ongoing development occurs on the basis of an
open decision-making procedure available to all interested
parties.&lt;/li&gt;

&lt;li&gt;The standard has been published and the standard specification
document is available freely. It must be permissible to all to copy,
distribute, and use it freely.&lt;/li&gt;

&lt;li&gt;The patents possibly present on (parts of) the standard are made
irrevocably available on a royalty-free basis.&lt;/li&gt;

&lt;li&gt;There are no constraints on the re-use of the standard.&lt;/li&gt;

&lt;/ol&gt;

&lt;p&gt;The economic outcome of a free and open standard, which can be
measured, is that it enables perfect competition between suppliers of
products based on the standard.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;/blockquote&gt;

&lt;p&gt;For a while now I have tried to figure out of Ogg Theora is a free
and open standard according to this definition.  Here is a short
writeup of what I have been able to gather so far.  I brought up the
topic on the Xiph advocacy mailing list
&lt;a href=&quot;http://lists.xiph.org/pipermail/advocacy/2009-July/001632.html&quot;&gt;in
July 2009&lt;/a&gt;, for those that want to see some background information.
According to Ivo Emanuel Gonçalves and Monty Montgomery on that list
the Ogg Theora specification fulfils the Digistan definition.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Free from vendor capture?&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;As far as I can see, there is no single vendor that can control the
Ogg Theora specification.  It can be argued that the
&lt;a href=&quot;http://www.xiph.org/&quot;&gt;Xiph foundation&lt;/A&gt; is such vendor, but
given that it is a non-profit foundation with the expressed goal
making free and open protocols and standards available, it is not
obvious that this is a real risk.  One issue with the Xiph
foundation is that its inner working (as in board member list, or who
control the foundation) are not easily available on the web.  I&#39;ve
been unable to find out who is in the foundation board, and have not
seen any accounting information documenting how money is handled nor
where is is spent in the foundation.  It is thus not obvious for an
external observer who control The Xiph foundation, and for all I know
it is possible for a single vendor to take control over the
specification.  But it seem unlikely.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Maintained by open not-for-profit organisation?&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Assuming that the Xiph foundation is the organisation its web pages
claim it to be, this point is fulfilled.  If Xiph foundation is
controlled by a single vendor, it isn&#39;t, but I have not found any
documentation indicating this.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;According to
&lt;a href=&quot;http://media.hiof.no/diverse/fad/rapport_4.pdf&quot;&gt;a report&lt;/a&gt;
prepared by Audun Vaaler og Børre Ludvigsen for the Norwegian
government, the Xiph foundation is a non-commercial organisation and
the development process is open, transparent and non-Discrimatory.
Until proven otherwise, I believe it make most sense to believe the
report is correct.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Specification freely available?&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;The specification for the &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.xiph.org/ogg/doc/&quot;&gt;Ogg
container format&lt;/a&gt; and both the
&lt;a href=&quot;http://www.xiph.org/vorbis/doc/&quot;&gt;Vorbis&lt;/a&gt; and
&lt;a href=&quot;http://theora.org/doc/&quot;&gt;Theora&lt;/a&gt; codeces are available on
the web.  This are the terms in the Vorbis and Theora specification:

&lt;blockquote&gt;

Anyone may freely use and distribute the Ogg and [Vorbis/Theora]
specifications, whether in private, public, or corporate
capacity. However, the Xiph.Org Foundation and the Ogg project reserve
the right to set the Ogg [Vorbis/Theora] specification and certify
specification compliance.

&lt;/blockquote&gt;

&lt;p&gt;The Ogg container format is specified in IETF
&lt;a href=&quot;http://www.xiph.org/ogg/doc/rfc3533.txt&quot;&gt;RFC 3533&lt;/a&gt;, and
this is the term:&lt;p&gt;

&lt;blockquote&gt;

&lt;p&gt;This document and translations of it may be copied and furnished to
others, and derivative works that comment on or otherwise explain it
or assist in its implementation may be prepared, copied, published and
distributed, in whole or in part, without restriction of any kind,
provided that the above copyright notice and this paragraph are
included on all such copies and derivative works.  However, this
document itself may not be modified in any way, such as by removing
the copyright notice or references to the Internet Society or other
Internet organizations, except as needed for the purpose of developing
Internet standards in which case the procedures for copyrights defined
in the Internet Standards process must be followed, or as required to
translate it into languages other than English.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;The limited permissions granted above are perpetual and will not be
revoked by the Internet Society or its successors or assigns.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;/blockquote&gt;

&lt;p&gt;All these terms seem to allow unlimited distribution and use, an
this term seem to be fulfilled.  There might be a problem with the
missing permission to distribute modified versions of the text, and
thus reuse it in other specifications.  Not quite sure if that is a
requirement for the Digistan definition.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Royalty-free?&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;There are no known patent claims requiring royalties for the Ogg
Theora format.
&lt;a href=&quot;http://www.streamingmedia.com/Articles/ReadArticle.aspx?ArticleID=65782&quot;&gt;MPEG-LA&lt;/a&gt;
and
&lt;a href=&quot;http://yro.slashdot.org/story/10/04/30/237238/Steve-Jobs-Hints-At-Theora-Lawsuit&quot;&gt;Steve
Jobs&lt;/a&gt; in Apple claim to know about some patent claims (submarine
patents) against the Theora format, but no-one else seem to believe
them.  Both Opera Software and the Mozilla Foundation have looked into
this and decided to implement Ogg Theora support in their browsers
without paying any royalties.  For now the claims from MPEG-LA and
Steve Jobs seem more like FUD to scare people to use the H.264 codec
than any real problem with Ogg Theora.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;No constraints on re-use?&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;I am not aware of any constraints on re-use.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Conclusion&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;3 of 5 requirements seem obviously fulfilled, and the remaining 2
depend on the governing structure of the Xiph foundation.  Given the
background report used by the Norwegian government, I believe it is
safe to assume the last two requirements are fulfilled too, but it
would be nice if the Xiph foundation web site made it easier to verify
this.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;It would be nice to see other analysis of other specifications to
see if they are free and open standards.&lt;/p&gt;
</description>
        </item>
        
        <item>
                <title>The reply from Edgar Villanueva to Microsoft in Peru</title>
                <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/The_reply_from_Edgar_Villanueva_to_Microsoft_in_Peru.html</link>        
                <guid isPermaLink="true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/The_reply_from_Edgar_Villanueva_to_Microsoft_in_Peru.html</guid>
                <pubDate>Sat, 25 Dec 2010 10:50:00 +0100</pubDate>
                <description>&lt;p&gt;A few days ago
&lt;a href=&quot;http://www.idg.no/computerworld/article189879.ece&quot;&gt;an
article&lt;/a&gt; in the Norwegian Computerworld magazine about how version
2.0 of
&lt;a href=&quot;http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/European_Interoperability_Framework&quot;&gt;European
Interoperability Framework&lt;/a&gt; has been successfully lobbied by the
proprietary software industry to remove the focus on free software.
Nothing very surprising there, given
&lt;a href=&quot;http://news.slashdot.org/story/10/03/29/2115235/Open-Source-Open-Standards-Under-Attack-In-Europe&quot;&gt;earlier
reports&lt;/a&gt; on how Microsoft and others have stacked the committees in
this work.  But I find this very sad.   The definition of
&lt;a href=&quot;http://www.nuug.no/dokumenter/standard-presse-def-200506.txt&quot;&gt;an
open standard from version 1&lt;/a&gt; was very good, and something I
believe should be used also in the future, alongside
&lt;a href=&quot;http://www.digistan.org/open-standard:definition&quot;&gt;the
definition from Digistan&lt;/A&gt;.  Version 2 have removed the open
standard definition from its content.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Anyway, the news reminded me of the great reply sent by Dr. Edgar
Villanueva, congressman in Peru at the time, to Microsoft as a reply
to Microsofts attack on his proposal regarding the use of free software
in the public sector in Peru.  As the text was not available from a
few of the URLs where it used to be available, I copy it here from
&lt;a href=&quot;http://gnuwin.epfl.ch/articles/en/reponseperou/villanueva_to_ms.html&quot;&gt;my
source&lt;/a&gt; to ensure it is available also in the future.  Some
background information about that story is available in
&lt;a href=&quot;http://www.linuxjournal.com/article/6099&quot;&gt;an article&lt;/a&gt; from
Linux Journal in 2002.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;blockquote&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Lima, 8th of April, 2002&lt;br&gt; 
To: Señor JUAN ALBERTO GONZÁLEZ&lt;br&gt;
General Manager of Microsoft Perú&lt;/p&gt; 

&lt;p&gt;Dear Sir:&lt;/p&gt; 

&lt;p&gt;First of all, I thank you for your letter of March 25, 2002 in which you state the official position of Microsoft relative to Bill Number 1609, Free Software in Public Administration, which is indubitably inspired by the desire for Peru to find a suitable place in the global technological context. In the same spirit, and convinced that we will find the best solutions through an exchange of clear and open ideas, I will take this opportunity to reply to the commentaries included in your letter.&lt;/p&gt; 

&lt;p&gt;While acknowledging that opinions such as yours constitute a significant contribution, it would have been even more worthwhile for me if, rather than formulating objections of a general nature (which we will analyze in detail later) you had gathered solid arguments for the advantages that proprietary software could bring to the Peruvian State, and to its citizens in general, since this would have allowed a more enlightening exchange in respect of each of our positions.&lt;/p&gt; 

&lt;p&gt;With the aim of creating an orderly debate, we will assume that what you call &quot;open source software&quot; is what the Bill defines as &quot;free software&quot;, since there exists software for which the source code is distributed together with the program, but which does not fall within the definition established by the Bill; and that what you call &quot;commercial software&quot; is what the Bill defines as &quot;proprietary&quot; or &quot;unfree&quot;, given that there exists free software which is sold in the market for a price like any other good or service.&lt;/p&gt; 

&lt;p&gt;It is also necessary to make it clear that the aim of the Bill we are discussing is not directly related to the amount of direct savings that can by made by using free software in state institutions. That is in any case a marginal aggregate value, but in no way is it the chief focus of the Bill. The basic principles which inspire the Bill are linked to the basic guarantees of a state of law, such as:&lt;/p&gt; 

&lt;p&gt;
&lt;ul&gt;
&lt;li&gt;Free access to public information by the citizen. &lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;Permanence of public data. &lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;Security of the State and citizens.&lt;/li&gt; 
&lt;/ul&gt;
&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;To guarantee the free access of citizens to public information, it is indispensable that the encoding of data is not tied to a single provider. The use of standard and open formats gives a guarantee of this free access, if necessary through the creation of compatible free software.&lt;/p&gt; 

&lt;p&gt;To guarantee the permanence of public data, it is necessary that the usability and maintenance of the software does not depend on the goodwill of the suppliers, or on the monopoly conditions imposed by them. For this reason the State needs systems the development of which can be guaranteed due to the availability of the source code.&lt;/p&gt; 

&lt;p&gt;To guarantee national security or the security of the State, it is indispensable to be able to rely on systems without elements which allow control from a distance or the undesired transmission of information to third parties. Systems with source code freely accessible to the public are required to allow their inspection by the State itself, by the citizens, and by a large number of independent experts throughout the world. Our proposal brings further security, since the knowledge of the source code will eliminate the growing number of programs with *spy code*. &lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;In the same way, our proposal strengthens the security of the citizens, both in their role as legitimate owners of information managed by the state, and in their role as consumers. In this second case, by allowing the growth of a widespread availability of free software not containing *spy code* able to put at risk privacy and individual freedoms.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;In this sense, the Bill is limited to establishing the conditions under which the state bodies will obtain software in the future, that is, in a way compatible with these basic principles.&lt;/p&gt; 


&lt;p&gt;From reading the Bill it will be clear that once passed:&lt;br&gt; 
&lt;li&gt;the law does not forbid the production of proprietary software&lt;/li&gt; 
&lt;li&gt;the law does not forbid the sale of proprietary software&lt;/li&gt; 
&lt;li&gt;the law does not specify which concrete software to use&lt;/li&gt; 
&lt;li&gt;the law does not dictate the supplier from whom software will be bought&lt;/li&gt; 
&lt;li&gt;the law does not limit the terms under which a software product can be licensed.&lt;/li&gt; 

&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;What the Bill does express clearly, is that, for software to be acceptable for the state it is not enough that it is technically capable of fulfilling a task, but that further the contractual conditions must satisfy a series of requirements regarding the license, without which the State cannot guarantee the citizen adequate processing of his data, watching over its integrity, confidentiality, and accessibility throughout time, as these are very critical aspects for its normal functioning.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;We agree, Mr. Gonzalez, that information and communication technology have a significant impact on the quality of life of the citizens (whether it be positive or negative). We surely also agree that the basic values I have pointed out above are fundamental in a democratic state like Peru. So we are very interested to know of any other way of guaranteeing these principles, other than through the use of free software in the terms defined by the Bill.&lt;/p&gt; 

&lt;p&gt;As for the observations you have made, we will now go on to analyze them in detail:&lt;/p&gt; 

&lt;p&gt;Firstly, you point out that: &quot;1. The bill makes it compulsory for all public bodies to use only free software, that is to say open source software, which breaches the principles of equality before the law, that of non-discrimination and the right of free private enterprise, freedom of industry and of contract, protected by the constitution.&quot;&lt;/p&gt; 

&lt;p&gt;This understanding is in error. The Bill in no way affects the rights you list; it limits itself entirely to establishing conditions for the use of software on the part of state institutions, without in any way meddling in private sector transactions. It is a well established principle that the State does not enjoy the wide spectrum of contractual freedom of the private sector, as it is limited in its actions precisely by the requirement for transparency of public acts; and in this sense, the preservation of the greater common interest must prevail when legislating on the matter.&lt;/p&gt; 

&lt;p&gt;The Bill protects equality under the law, since no natural or legal person is excluded from the right of offering these goods to the State under the conditions defined in the Bill and without more limitations than those established by the Law of State Contracts and Purchasing (T.U.O. by Supreme Decree No. 012-2001-PCM).&lt;/p&gt; 

&lt;p&gt;The Bill does not introduce any discrimination whatever, since it only establishes *how* the goods have to be provided (which is a state power) and not *who* has to provide them (which would effectively be discriminatory, if restrictions based on national origin, race religion, ideology, sexual preference etc. were imposed). On the contrary, the Bill is decidedly antidiscriminatory. This is so because by defining with no room for doubt the conditions for the provision of software, it prevents state bodies from using software which has a license including discriminatory conditions.&lt;/p&gt; 

&lt;p&gt;It should be obvious from the preceding two paragraphs that the Bill does not harm free private enterprise, since the latter can always choose under what conditions it will produce software; some of these will be acceptable to the State, and others will not be since they contradict the guarantee of the basic principles listed above. This free initiative is of course compatible with the freedom of industry and freedom of contract (in the limited form in which the State can exercise the latter). Any private subject can produce software under the conditions which the State requires, or can refrain from doing so. Nobody is forced to adopt a model of production, but if they wish to provide software to the State, they must provide the mechanisms which guarantee the basic principles, and which are those described in the Bill.&lt;/p&gt; 

&lt;p&gt;By way of an example: nothing in the text of the Bill would prevent your company offering the State bodies an office &quot;suite&quot;, under the conditions defined in the Bill and setting the price that you consider satisfactory. If you did not, it would not be due to restrictions imposed by the law, but to business decisions relative to the method of commercializing your products, decisions with which the State is not involved.&lt;/p&gt; 

&lt;p&gt;To continue; you note that:&quot; 2. The bill, by making the use of open source software compulsory, would establish discriminatory and non competitive practices in the contracting and purchasing by public bodies...&quot;&lt;/p&gt; 

&lt;p&gt;This statement is just a reiteration of the previous one, and so the response can be found above. However, let us concern ourselves for a moment with your comment regarding &quot;non-competitive ... practices.&quot;&lt;/p&gt; 

&lt;p&gt;Of course, in defining any kind of purchase, the buyer sets conditions which relate to the proposed use of the good or service. From the start, this excludes certain manufacturers from the possibility of competing, but does not exclude them &quot;a priori&quot;, but rather based on a series of principles determined by the autonomous will of the purchaser, and so the process takes place in conformance with the law. And in the Bill it is established that *no one* is excluded from competing as far as he guarantees the fulfillment of the basic principles.&lt;/p&gt; 

&lt;p&gt;Furthermore, the Bill *stimulates* competition, since it tends to generate a supply of software with better conditions of usability, and to better existing work, in a model of continuous improvement.&lt;/p&gt; 

&lt;p&gt;On the other hand, the central aspect of competivity is the chance to provide better choices to the consumer. Now, it is impossible to ignore the fact that marketing does not play a neutral role when the product is offered on the market (since accepting the opposite would lead one to suppose that firms&#39; expenses in marketing lack any sense), and that therefore a significant expense under this heading can influence the decisions of the purchaser. This influence of marketing is in large measure reduced by the bill that we are backing, since the choice within the framework proposed is based on the *technical merits* of the product and not on the effort put into commercialization by the producer; in this sense, competitiveness is increased, since the smallest software producer can compete on equal terms with the most powerful corporations.&lt;/p&gt; 

&lt;p&gt;It is necessary to stress that there is no position more anti-competitive than that of the big software producers, which frequently abuse their dominant position, since in innumerable cases they propose as a solution to problems raised by users: &quot;update your software to the new version&quot; (at the user&#39;s expense, naturally); furthermore, it is common to find arbitrary cessation of technical help for products, which, in the provider&#39;s judgment alone, are &quot;old&quot;; and so, to receive any kind of technical assistance, the user finds himself forced to migrate to new versions (with non-trivial costs, especially as changes in hardware platform are often involved). And as the whole infrastructure is based on proprietary data formats, the user stays &quot;trapped&quot; in the need to continue using products from the same supplier, or to make the huge effort to change to another environment (probably also proprietary).&lt;/p&gt; 

&lt;p&gt;You add: &quot;3. So, by compelling the State to favor a business model based entirely on open source, the bill would only discourage the local and international manufacturing companies, which are the ones which really undertake important expenditures, create a significant number of direct and indirect jobs, as well as contributing to the GNP, as opposed to a model of open source software which tends to have an ever weaker economic impact, since it mainly creates jobs in the service sector.&quot;&lt;/p&gt; 

&lt;p&gt;I do not agree with your statement. Partly because of what you yourself point out in paragraph 6 of your letter, regarding the relative weight of services in the context of software use. This contradiction alone would invalidate your position. The service model, adopted by a large number of companies in the software industry, is much larger in economic terms, and with a tendency to increase, than the licensing of programs.&lt;/p&gt; 

&lt;p&gt;On the other hand, the private sector of the economy has the widest possible freedom to choose the economic model which best suits its interests, even if this freedom of choice is often obscured subliminally by the disproportionate expenditure on marketing by the producers of proprietary software.&lt;/p&gt; 

&lt;p&gt;In addition, a reading of your opinion would lead to the conclusion that the State market is crucial and essential for the proprietary software industry, to such a point that the choice made by the State in this bill would completely eliminate the market for these firms. If that is true, we can deduce that the State must be subsidizing the proprietary software industry. In the unlikely event that this were true, the State would have the right to apply the subsidies in the area it considered of greatest social value; it is undeniable, in this improbable hypothesis, that if the State decided to subsidize software, it would have to do so choosing the free over the proprietary, considering its social effect and the rational use of taxpayers money.&lt;/p&gt; 

&lt;p&gt;In respect of the jobs generated by proprietary software in countries like ours, these mainly concern technical tasks of little aggregate value; at the local level, the technicians who provide support for proprietary software produced by transnational companies do not have the possibility of fixing bugs, not necessarily for lack of technical capability or of talent, but because they do not have access to the source code to fix it. With free software one creates more technically qualified employment and a framework of free competence where success is only tied to the ability to offer good technical support and quality of service, one stimulates the market, and one increases the shared fund of knowledge, opening up alternatives to generate services of greater total value and a higher quality level, to the benefit of all involved: producers, service organizations, and consumers.&lt;/p&gt; 

&lt;p&gt;It is a common phenomenon in developing countries that local software industries obtain the majority of their takings in the service sector, or in the creation of &quot;ad hoc&quot; software. Therefore, any negative impact that the application of the Bill might have in this sector will be more than compensated by a growth in demand for services (as long as these are carried out to high quality standards). If the transnational software companies decide not to compete under these new rules of the game, it is likely that they will undergo some decrease in takings in terms of payment for licenses; however, considering that these firms continue to allege that much of the software used by the State has been illegally copied, one can see that the impact will not be very serious. Certainly, in any case their fortune will be determined by market laws, changes in which cannot be avoided; many firms traditionally associated with proprietary software have already set out on the road (supported by copious expense) of providing services associated with free software, which shows that the models are not mutually exclusive.&lt;/p&gt; 

&lt;p&gt;With this bill the State is deciding that it needs to preserve certain fundamental values. And it is deciding this based on its sovereign power, without affecting any of the constitutional guarantees. If these values could be guaranteed without having to choose a particular economic model, the effects of the law would be even more beneficial. In any case, it should be clear that the State does not choose an economic model; if it happens that there only exists one economic model capable of providing software which provides the basic guarantee of these principles, this is because of historical circumstances, not because of an arbitrary choice of a given model.&lt;/p&gt; 

&lt;p&gt;Your letter continues: &quot;4. The bill imposes the use of open source software without considering the dangers that this can bring from the point of view of security, guarantee, and possible violation of the intellectual property rights of third parties.&quot;&lt;/p&gt; 

&lt;p&gt;Alluding in an abstract way to &quot;the dangers this can bring&quot;, without specifically mentioning a single one of these supposed dangers, shows at the least some lack of knowledge of the topic. So, allow me to enlighten you on these points.&lt;/p&gt; 

&lt;p&gt;On security:&lt;/p&gt; 

&lt;p&gt;National security has already been mentioned in general terms in the initial discussion of the basic principles of the bill. In more specific terms, relative to the security of the software itself, it is well known that all software (whether proprietary or free) contains errors or &quot;bugs&quot; (in programmers&#39; slang). But it is also well known that the bugs in free software are fewer, and are fixed much more quickly, than in proprietary software. It is not in vain that numerous public bodies responsible for the IT security of state systems in developed countries require the use of free software for the same conditions of security and efficiency.&lt;/p&gt; 

&lt;p&gt;What is impossible to prove is that proprietary software is more secure than free, without the public and open inspection of the scientific community and users in general. This demonstration is impossible because the model of proprietary software itself prevents this analysis, so that any guarantee of security is based only on promises of good intentions (biased, by any reckoning) made by the producer itself, or its contractors.&lt;/p&gt; 

&lt;p&gt;It should be remembered that in many cases, the licensing conditions include Non-Disclosure clauses which prevent the user from publicly revealing security flaws found in the licensed proprietary product.&lt;/p&gt; 

&lt;p&gt;In respect of the guarantee:&lt;/p&gt; 

&lt;p&gt;As you know perfectly well, or could find out by reading the &quot;End User License Agreement&quot; of the products you license, in the great majority of cases the guarantees are limited to replacement of the storage medium in case of defects, but in no case is compensation given for direct or indirect damages, loss of profits, etc... If as a result of a security bug in one of your products, not fixed in time by yourselves, an attacker managed to compromise crucial State systems, what guarantees, reparations and compensation would your company make in accordance with your licensing conditions? The guarantees of proprietary software, inasmuch as programs are delivered ``AS IS&#39;&#39;, that is, in the state in which they are, with no additional responsibility of the provider in respect of function, in no way differ from those normal with free software.&lt;/p&gt; 

&lt;p&gt;On Intellectual Property:&lt;/p&gt; 

&lt;p&gt;Questions of intellectual property fall outside the scope of this bill, since they are covered by specific other laws. The model of free software in no way implies ignorance of these laws, and in fact the great majority of free software is covered by copyright. In reality, the inclusion of this question in your observations shows your confusion in respect of the legal framework in which free software is developed. The inclusion of the intellectual property of others in works claimed as one&#39;s own is not a practice that has been noted in the free software community; whereas, unfortunately, it has been in the area of proprietary software. As an example, the condemnation by the Commercial Court of Nanterre, France, on 27th September 2001 of Microsoft Corp. to a penalty of 3 million francs in damages and interest, for violation of intellectual property (piracy, to use the unfortunate term that your firm commonly uses in its publicity).&lt;/p&gt; 

&lt;p&gt;You go on to say that: &quot;The bill uses the concept of open source software incorrectly, since it does not necessarily imply that the software is free or of zero cost, and so arrives at mistaken conclusions regarding State savings, with no cost-benefit analysis to validate its position.&quot;&lt;/p&gt; 

&lt;p&gt;This observation is wrong; in principle, freedom and lack of cost are orthogonal concepts: there is software which is proprietary and charged for (for example, MS Office), software which is proprietary and free of charge (MS Internet Explorer), software which is free and charged for (Red Hat, SuSE etc GNU/Linux distributions), software which is free and not charged for (Apache, Open Office, Mozilla), and even software which can be licensed in a range of combinations (MySQL).&lt;/p&gt; 

&lt;p&gt;Certainly free software is not necessarily free of charge. And the text of the bill does not state that it has to be so, as you will have noted after reading it. The definitions included in the Bill state clearly *what* should be considered free software, at no point referring to freedom from charges. Although the possibility of savings in payments for proprietary software licenses are mentioned, the foundations of the bill clearly refer to the fundamental guarantees to be preserved and to the stimulus to local technological development. Given that a democratic State must support these principles, it has no other choice than to use software with publicly available source code, and to exchange information only in standard formats.&lt;/p&gt; 

&lt;p&gt;If the State does not use software with these characteristics, it will be weakening basic republican principles. Luckily, free software also implies lower total costs; however, even given the hypothesis (easily disproved) that it was more expensive than proprietary software, the simple existence of an effective free software tool for a particular IT function would oblige the State to use it; not by command of this Bill, but because of the basic principles we enumerated at the start, and which arise from the very essence of the lawful democratic State.&lt;/p&gt; 

&lt;p&gt;You continue: &quot;6. It is wrong to think that Open Source Software is free of charge. Research by the Gartner Group (an important investigator of the technological market recognized at world level) has shown that the cost of purchase of software (operating system and applications) is only 8% of the total cost which firms and institutions take on for a rational and truly beneficial use of the technology. The other 92% consists of: installation costs, enabling, support, maintenance, administration, and down-time.&quot;&lt;/p&gt; 

&lt;p&gt;This argument repeats that already given in paragraph 5 and partly contradicts paragraph 3. For the sake of brevity we refer to the comments on those paragraphs. However, allow me to point out that your conclusion is logically false: even if according to Gartner Group the cost of software is on average only 8% of the total cost of use, this does not in any way deny the existence of software which is free of charge, that is, with a licensing cost of zero.&lt;/p&gt; 

&lt;p&gt;In addition, in this paragraph you correctly point out that the service components and losses due to down-time make up the largest part of the total cost of software use, which, as you will note, contradicts your statement regarding the small value of services suggested in paragraph 3. Now the use of free software contributes significantly to reduce the remaining life-cycle costs. This reduction in the costs of installation, support etc. can be noted in several areas: in the first place, the competitive service model of free software, support and maintenance for which can be freely contracted out to a range of suppliers competing on the grounds of quality and low cost. This is true for installation, enabling, and support, and in large part for maintenance. In the second place, due to the reproductive characteristics of the model, maintenance carried out for an application is easily replicable, without incurring large costs (that is, without paying more than once for the same thing) since modifications, if one wishes, can be incorporated in the common fund of knowledge. Thirdly, the huge costs caused by non-functioning software (&quot;blue screens of death&quot;, malicious code such as virus, worms, and trojans, exceptions, general protection faults and other well-known problems) are reduced considerably by using more stable software; and it is well known that one of the most notable virtues of free software is its stability.&lt;/p&gt; 

&lt;p&gt;You further state that: &quot;7. One of the arguments behind the bill is the supposed freedom from costs of open-source software, compared with the costs of commercial software, without taking into account the fact that there exist types of volume licensing which can be highly advantageous for the State, as has happened in other countries.&quot;&lt;/p&gt; 

&lt;p&gt;I have already pointed out that what is in question is not the cost of the software but the principles of freedom of information, accessibility, and security. These arguments have been covered extensively in the preceding paragraphs to which I would refer you.&lt;/p&gt; 

&lt;p&gt;On the other hand, there certainly exist types of volume licensing (although unfortunately proprietary software does not satisfy the basic principles). But as you correctly pointed out in the immediately preceding paragraph of your letter, they only manage to reduce the impact of a component which makes up no more than 8% of the total.&lt;/p&gt; 

&lt;p&gt;You continue: &quot;8. In addition, the alternative adopted by the bill (I) is clearly more expensive, due to the high costs of software migration, and (II) puts at risk compatibility and interoperability of the IT platforms within the State, and between the State and the private sector, given the hundreds of versions of open source software on the market.&quot;&lt;/p&gt; 

&lt;p&gt;Let us analyze your statement in two parts. Your first argument, that migration implies high costs, is in reality an argument in favor of the Bill. Because the more time goes by, the more difficult migration to another technology will become; and at the same time, the security risks associated with proprietary software will continue to increase. In this way, the use of proprietary systems and formats will make the State ever more dependent on specific suppliers. Once a policy of using free software has been established (which certainly, does imply some cost) then on the contrary migration from one system to another becomes very simple, since all data is stored in open formats. On the other hand, migration to an open software context implies no more costs than migration between two different proprietary software contexts, which invalidates your argument completely.&lt;/p&gt; 

&lt;p&gt;The second argument refers to &quot;problems in interoperability of the IT platforms within the State, and between the State and the private sector&quot; This statement implies a certain lack of knowledge of the way in which free software is built, which does not maximize the dependence of the user on a particular platform, as normally happens in the realm of proprietary software. Even when there are multiple free software distributions, and numerous programs which can be used for the same function, interoperability is guaranteed as much by the use of standard formats, as required by the bill, as by the possibility of creating interoperable software given the availability of the source code.&lt;/p&gt; 

&lt;p&gt;You then say that: &quot;9. The majority of open source code does not offer adequate levels of service nor the guarantee from recognized manufacturers of high productivity on the part of the users, which has led various public organizations to retract their decision to go with an open source software solution and to use commercial software in its place.&quot;&lt;/p&gt; 

&lt;p&gt;This observation is without foundation. In respect of the guarantee, your argument was rebutted in the response to paragraph 4. In respect of support services, it is possible to use free software without them (just as also happens with proprietary software), but anyone who does need them can obtain support separately, whether from local firms or from international corporations, again just as in the case of proprietary software.&lt;/p&gt; 

&lt;p&gt;On the other hand, it would contribute greatly to our analysis if you could inform us about free software projects *established* in public bodies which have already been abandoned in favor of proprietary software. We know of a good number of cases where the opposite has taken place, but not know of any where what you describe has taken place.&lt;/p&gt; 

&lt;p&gt;You continue by observing that: &quot;10. The bill discourages the creativity of the Peruvian software industry, which invoices 40 million US$/year, exports 4 million US$ (10th in ranking among non-traditional exports, more than handicrafts) and is a source of highly qualified employment. With a law that encourages the use of open source, software programmers lose their intellectual property rights and their main source of payment.&quot;&lt;/p&gt; 

&lt;p&gt;It is clear enough that nobody is forced to commercialize their code as free software. The only thing to take into account is that if it is not free software, it cannot be sold to the public sector. This is not in any case the main market for the national software industry. We covered some questions referring to the influence of the Bill on the generation of employment which would be both highly technically qualified and in better conditions for competition above, so it seems unnecessary to insist on this point.&lt;/p&gt; 

&lt;p&gt;What follows in your statement is incorrect. On the one hand, no author of free software loses his intellectual property rights, unless he expressly wishes to place his work in the public domain. The free software movement has always been very respectful of intellectual property, and has generated widespread public recognition of its authors. Names like those of Richard Stallman, Linus Torvalds, Guido van Rossum, Larry Wall, Miguel de Icaza, Andrew Tridgell, Theo de Raadt, Andrea Arcangeli, Bruce Perens, Darren Reed, Alan Cox, Eric Raymond, and many others, are recognized world-wide for their contributions to the development of software that is used today by millions of people throughout the world. On the other hand, to say that the rewards for authors rights make up the main source of payment of Peruvian programmers is in any case a guess, in particular since there is no proof to this effect, nor a demonstration of how the use of free software by the State would influence these payments.&lt;/p&gt; 

&lt;p&gt;You go on to say that: &quot;11. Open source software, since it can be distributed without charge, does not allow the generation of income for its developers through exports. In this way, the multiplier effect of the sale of software to other countries is weakened, and so in turn is the growth of the industry, while Government rules ought on the contrary to stimulate local industry.&quot;&lt;/p&gt; 

&lt;p&gt;This statement shows once again complete ignorance of the mechanisms of and market for free software. It tries to claim that the market of sale of non- exclusive rights for use (sale of licenses) is the only possible one for the software industry, when you yourself pointed out several paragraphs above that it is not even the most important one. The incentives that the bill offers for the growth of a supply of better qualified professionals, together with the increase in experience that working on a large scale with free software within the State will bring for Peruvian technicians, will place them in a highly competitive position to offer their services abroad.&lt;/p&gt; 

&lt;p&gt;You then state that: &quot;12. In the Forum, the use of open source software in education was discussed, without mentioning the complete collapse of this initiative in a country like Mexico, where precisely the State employees who founded the project now state that open source software did not make it possible to offer a learning experience to pupils in the schools, did not take into account the capability at a national level to give adequate support to the platform, and that the software did not and does not allow for the levels of platform integration that now exist in schools.&quot;&lt;/p&gt; 

&lt;p&gt;In fact Mexico has gone into reverse with the Red Escolar (Schools Network) project. This is due precisely to the fact that the driving forces behind the Mexican project used license costs as their main argument, instead of the other reasons specified in our project, which are far more essential. Because of this conceptual mistake, and as a result of the lack of effective support from the SEP (Secretary of State for Public Education), the assumption was made that to implant free software in schools it would be enough to drop their software budget and send them a CD ROM with Gnu/Linux instead. Of course this failed, and it couldn&#39;t have been otherwise, just as school laboratories fail when they use proprietary software and have no budget for implementation and maintenance. That&#39;s exactly why our bill is not limited to making the use of free software mandatory, but recognizes the need to create a viable migration plan, in which the State undertakes the technical transition in an orderly way in order to then enjoy the advantages of free software.&lt;/p&gt; 

&lt;p&gt;You end with a rhetorical question: &quot;13. If open source software satisfies all the requirements of State bodies, why do you need a law to adopt it? Shouldn&#39;t it be the market which decides freely which products give most benefits or value?&quot;&lt;/p&gt; 

&lt;p&gt;We agree that in the private sector of the economy, it must be the market that decides which products to use, and no state interference is permissible there. However, in the case of the public sector, the reasoning is not the same: as we have already established, the state archives, handles, and transmits information which does not belong to it, but which is entrusted to it by citizens, who have no alternative under the rule of law. As a counterpart to this legal requirement, the State must take extreme measures to safeguard the integrity, confidentiality, and accessibility of this information. The use of proprietary software raises serious doubts as to whether these requirements can be fulfilled, lacks conclusive evidence in this respect, and so is not suitable for use in the public sector.&lt;/p&gt; 

&lt;p&gt;The need for a law is based, firstly, on the realization of the fundamental principles listed above in the specific area of software; secondly, on the fact that the State is not an ideal homogeneous entity, but made up of multiple bodies with varying degrees of autonomy in decision making. Given that it is inappropriate to use proprietary software, the fact of establishing these rules in law will prevent the personal discretion of any state employee from putting at risk the information which belongs to citizens. And above all, because it constitutes an up-to-date reaffirmation in relation to the means of management and communication of information used today, it is based on the republican principle of openness to the public.&lt;/p&gt; 

&lt;p&gt;In conformance with this universally accepted principle, the citizen has the right to know all information held by the State and not covered by well- founded declarations of secrecy based on law. Now, software deals with information and is itself information. Information in a special form, capable of being interpreted by a machine in order to execute actions, but crucial information all the same because the citizen has a legitimate right to know, for example, how his vote is computed or his taxes calculated. And for that he must have free access to the source code and be able to prove to his satisfaction the programs used for electoral computations or calculation of his taxes.&lt;/p&gt; 

&lt;p&gt;I wish you the greatest respect, and would like to repeat that my office will always be open for you to expound your point of view to whatever level of detail you consider suitable.&lt;/p&gt; 

&lt;p&gt;Cordially,&lt;br&gt; 
DR. EDGAR DAVID VILLANUEVA NUÑEZ&lt;br&gt; 
Congressman of the Republic of Perú.&lt;/p&gt; 
&lt;/blockquote&gt;
</description>
        </item>
        
        <item>
                <title>Officeshots still going strong</title>
                <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Officeshots_still_going_strong.html</link>        
                <guid isPermaLink="true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Officeshots_still_going_strong.html</guid>
                <pubDate>Sat, 25 Dec 2010 09:40:00 +0100</pubDate>
                <description>&lt;p&gt;Half a year ago I
&lt;a href=&quot;http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Officeshots_taking_shape.html&quot;&gt;wrote
a bit&lt;/a&gt; about &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.officeshots.org/&quot;&gt;OfficeShots&lt;/a&gt;,
a web service to allow anyone to test how ODF documents are handled by
the different programs reading and writing the ODF format.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;I just had a look at the service, and it seem to be going strong.
Very interesting to see the results reported in the gallery, how
different Office implementations handle different ODF features.  Sad
to see that KOffice was not doing it very well, and happy to see that
LibreOffice has been tested already (but sadly not listed as a option
for OfficeShots users yet).  I am glad to see that the ODF community
got such a great test tool available.&lt;/p&gt;
</description>
        </item>
        
        <item>
                <title>Best å ikke fortelle noen at streaming er nedlasting...</title>
                <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Best___ikke_fortelle_noen_at_streaming_er_nedlasting___.html</link>        
                <guid isPermaLink="true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Best___ikke_fortelle_noen_at_streaming_er_nedlasting___.html</guid>
                <pubDate>Sat, 30 Oct 2010 11:20:00 +0200</pubDate>
                <description>&lt;p&gt;I dag la jeg inn en kommentar på en sak hos NRKBeta
&lt;a href=&quot;http://nrkbeta.no/2010/10/27/bakom-blindpassasjer-del-1/&quot;&gt;om
hvordan TV-serien Blindpassasjer ble laget&lt;/a&gt; i forbindelse med at
filmene NRK la ut ikke var tilgjengelig i et
&lt;a href=&quot;http://www.digistan.org/open-standard:definition&quot;&gt;fritt og
åpent format&lt;/a&gt;.  Dette var det jeg skrev publiserte der 07:39.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;blockquote&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&quot;Vi fikk en kommentar rundt måten streamet innhold er beskyttet fra
nedlasting.  Mange av oss som kan mer enn gjennomsnittet om systemer
som dette, vet at det stort sett er mulig å lure ut ting med den
nødvendige forkunnskapen.&quot;&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Haha.  Å streame innhold er det samme som å laste ned innhold, så å
beskytte en stream mot nedlasting er ikke mulig.  Å skrive noe slikt
er å forlede leseren.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Med den bakgrunn blir forklaringen om at noen rettighetshavere kun
vil tillate streaming men ikke nedlasting meningsløs.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Anbefaler forresten å lese
&lt;a href=&quot;http://blogs.computerworlduk.com/simon-says/2010/10/drm-is-toxic-to-culture/index.htm&quot;&gt;http://blogs.computerworlduk.com/simon-says/2010/10/drm-is-toxic-to-culture/index.htm&lt;/a&gt;
om hva som ville være konsekvensen hvis digitale avspillingssperrer
(DRM) fungerte.  Det gjør de naturligvis ikke teknisk - det er jo
derfor de må ha totalitære juridiske beskyttelsesmekanismer på plass,
men det er skremmende hva samfunnet tillater og NRK er med på å bygge
opp under.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;/blockquote&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Ca. 20 minutter senere får jeg følgende epost fra Anders Hofseth i
NRKBeta:&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;blockquote&gt;
&lt;p&gt;From: Anders Hofseth &amp;lt;XXX@gmail.com&gt;
&lt;br&gt;To: &quot;pere@hungry.com&quot; &amp;lt;pere@hungry.com&gt;
&lt;br&gt;Cc: Eirik Solheim &amp;lt;XXX@gmail.com&gt;, Jon Ståle Carlsen &amp;lt;XXX@gmail.com&gt;, Henrik Lied &amp;lt;XXX@gmail.com&gt;
&lt;br&gt;Subject: Re: [NRKbeta] Kommentar: &quot;Bakom Blindpassasjer: del 1&quot;
&lt;br&gt;Date: Sat, 30 Oct 2010 07:58:44 +0200&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Hei Petter.
&lt;br&gt;Det du forsøker dra igang er egentlig en interessant diskusjon,
men om vi skal kjøre den i kommentarfeltet her, vil vi kunne bli bedt
om å fjerne blindpassasjer fra nett- tv og det vil heller ikke bli
særlig lett å klarere ut noe annet arkivmateriale på lang tid.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Dette er en situasjon NRKbeta ikke ønsker, så kommentaren er
fjernet og den delen av diskusjonen er avsluttet på nrkbeta, vi antar
konsekvensene vi beskriver ikke er noe du ønsker heller...&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Med hilsen,
&lt;br&gt;-anders&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Ring meg om noe er uklart: 95XXXXXXX&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;/blockquote&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Ble så fascinert over denne holdningen, at jeg forfattet og sendte
over følgende svar.  I og med at debatten er fjernet fra NRK Betas
kommentarfelt, så velger jeg å publisere her på bloggen min i stedet.
Har fjernet epostadresser og telefonnummer til de involverte, for å
unngå at de tiltrekker seg uønskede direkte kontaktforsøk.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;blockquote&gt;
&lt;p&gt;From: Petter Reinholdtsen &amp;lt;pere@hungry.com&gt;
&lt;br&gt;To: Anders Hofseth &amp;lt;XXX@gmail.com&gt;
&lt;br&gt;Cc: Eirik Solheim &amp;lt;XXX@gmail.com&gt;,
&lt;br&gt;        Jon Ståle Carlsen &amp;lt;XXX@gmail.com&gt;,
&lt;br&gt;        Henrik Lied &amp;lt;XXX@gmail.com&gt;
&lt;br&gt;Subject: Re: [NRKbeta] Kommentar: &quot;Bakom Blindpassasjer: del 1&quot;
&lt;br&gt;Date: Sat, 30 Oct 2010 08:24:34 +0200&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;[Anders Hofseth]
&lt;br&gt;&gt; Hei Petter.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Hei.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&gt; Det du forsøker dra igang er egentlig en interessant diskusjon, men
&lt;br&gt;&gt; om vi skal kjøre den i kommentarfeltet her, vil vi kunne bli bedt om
&lt;br&gt;&gt; å fjerne blindpassasjer fra nett- tv og det vil heller ikke bli
&lt;br&gt;&gt; særlig lett å klarere ut noe annet arkivmateriale på lang tid.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Godt å se at du er enig i at dette er en interessant diskusjon.  Den
vil nok fortsette en stund til.  :)&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Må innrømme at jeg synes det er merkelig å lese at dere i NRK med
vitende og vilje ønsker å forlede rettighetshaverne for å kunne
fortsette å legge ut arkivmateriale.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Kommentarer og diskusjoner i bloggene til NRK Beta påvirker jo ikke
faktum, som er at streaming er det samme som nedlasting, og at innhold
som er lagt ut på nett kan lagres lokalt for avspilling når en ønsker
det.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Det du sier er jo at klarering av arkivmateriale for publisering på
web krever at en holder faktum skjult fra debattfeltet på NRKBeta.
Det er ikke et argument som holder vann. :)&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&gt; Dette er en situasjon NRKbeta ikke ønsker, så kommentaren er fjernet
&lt;br&gt;&gt; og den delen av diskusjonen er avsluttet på nrkbeta, vi antar
&lt;br&gt;&gt; konsekvensene vi beskriver ikke er noe du ønsker heller...&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Personlig ønsker jeg at NRK skal slutte å stikke hodet i sanden og
heller være åpne på hvordan virkeligheten fungerer, samt ta opp kampen
mot de som vil låse kulturen inne.  Jeg synes det er en skam at NRK
godtar å forlede publikum.  Ville heller at NRK krever at innhold som
skal sendes skal være uten bruksbegresninger og kan publiseres i
formater som heller ikke har bruksbegresninger (bruksbegresningene til
H.264 burde få varselbjellene i NRK til å ringe).&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;At NRK er med på DRM-tåkeleggingen og at det kommer feilaktive
påstander om at &quot;streaming beskytter mot nedlasting&quot; som bare er egnet
til å bygge opp om en myte som er skadelig for samfunnet som helhet.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Anbefaler &amp;lt;URL:&lt;a href=&quot;http://webmink.com/2010/09/03/h-264-and-foss/&quot;&gt;http://webmink.com/2010/09/03/h-264-and-foss/&lt;/a&gt;&gt; og en
titt på
&amp;lt;URL: &lt;a href=&quot;http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Terms_of_use_for_video_produced_by_a_Canon_IXUS_130_digital_camera.html&quot;&gt;http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Terms_of_use_for_video_produced_by_a_Canon_IXUS_130_digital_camera.html&lt;/a&gt; &gt;.
for å se hva slags bruksbegresninger H.264 innebærer.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Hvis dette innebærer at NRK må være åpne med at arkivmaterialet ikke
kan brukes før rettighetshaverene også innser at de er med på å skade
samfunnets kultur og kollektive hukommelse, så får en i hvert fall
synliggjort konsekvensene og antagelig mer flammer på en debatt som er
langt på overtid.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&gt; Ring meg om noe er uklart: XXX&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Intet uklart, men ikke imponert over måten dere håndterer debatten på.
Hadde du i stedet kommet med et tilsvar i kommentarfeltet der en
gjorde det klart at blindpassasjer-blogpostingen ikke var riktig sted
for videre diskusjon hadde dere i mine øyne kommet fra det med
ryggraden på plass.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;PS: Interessant å se at NRK-ansatte ikke bruker NRK-epostadresser.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Som en liten avslutning, her er noen litt morsomme innslag om temaet.
&amp;lt;URL: &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.archive.org/details/CopyingIsNotTheft&quot;&gt;http://www.archive.org/details/CopyingIsNotTheft&lt;/a&gt; &gt; og
&amp;lt;URL: &lt;a href=&quot;http://patentabsurdity.com/&quot;&gt;http://patentabsurdity.com/&lt;/a&gt; &gt; hadde vært noe å kringkaste på
NRK1. :)&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Vennlig hilsen,
&lt;br&gt;--
&lt;br&gt;Petter Reinholdtsen&lt;/p&gt;
</description>
        </item>
        
        <item>
                <title>Standardkrav inn i anbudstekster?</title>
                <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Standardkrav_inn_i_anbudstekster_.html</link>        
                <guid isPermaLink="true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Standardkrav_inn_i_anbudstekster_.html</guid>
                <pubDate>Sun, 17 Oct 2010 19:30:00 +0200</pubDate>
                <description>&lt;p&gt;Hvis det å følge standarder skal ha noen effekt overfor
leverandører, så må slike krav og ønsker komme inn i anbudstekster når
systemer kjøpes inn.  Har ikke sett noen slike formuleringer i anbud
så langt, men har tenkt litt på hva som bør inn.  Her er noen ideer og
forslag.  Min drøm er at en kan sette krav til slik støtte i
anbudstekster, men så langt er det nok mer sannsynlig at en må nøye
seg med å skrive at det er en fordel om slik støtte er tilstede i
leveranser.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Som systemadministrator på Universitetet er det typisk to områder
som er problematiske for meg.  Det ene er admin-grensesnittene på
tjenermaskiner, som vi ønsker å bruke via ssh.  Det andre er nettsider
som vi ønsker å bruke via en nettleser.  For begge deler er det viktig
at protokollene og formatene som brukes følger standarder våre verktøy
støtter.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;De fleste har nå støtte for SSH som overføringsprotkoll for
admin-grensesnittet, men det er ikke tilstrekkelig for å kunne stille
inn f.eks BIOS og RAID-kontroller via ssh-forbindelsen.  Det er flere
aktuelle protokoller for fremvisning av BIOS-oppsett og
oppstartmeldinger, og min anbefaling ville være å kreve
VT100-kompatibel protokoll, for å sikre at flest mulig
terminalemulatorer kan forstå hva som kommer fra admin-grensesnittet
via ssh.  Andre aktuelle alternativer er ANSI-terminalemulering og
VT220.  Kanskje en formulering ala dette i anbudsutlysninger vil
fungere:&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;blockquote&gt;
BIOS og oppstartmeldinger i administrasjonsgrensesnittet til maskinen
bør/skal være tilgjengelig via SSH-protokollen som definert av IETF
(RFC 4251 mfl.) og følge terminalfremvisningprotokollen VT100 (ref?)
når en kobler seg til oppstart via ssh.
&lt;/blockquote&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Har ikke lykkes med å finne en god referanse for
VT100-spesifikasjonen.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Når det gjelder nettsider, så er det det HTML, CSS og
JavaScript-spesifikasjonen til W3C som gjelder.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;blockquote&gt;
Alle systemets nettsider bør/skal være i henhold til statens
standardkatalogs krav om nettsider og følge HTML-standarden som
definert av W3C, og validere uten feil hos W3Cs HTML-validator
(http://validator.w3.org).  Hvis det brukes CSS så bør/skal denne
validere uten feil hos W3Cs CSS-validator
(http://jigsaw.w3.org/css-validator/).  Eventuelle JavaScript skal
være i henhold til EcmaScript-standarden.  I tillegg til å følge de
overnevnte standardene skal websidene fungere i nettleserne (fyll inn
relevant liste for organisasjonen) Firefox 3.5, Internet Explorer 8,
Opera 9, etc.
&lt;/blockquote&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Vil et slikt avsnitt være konkret nok til å få leverandørene til å
lage nettsider som følger standardene og fungerer i flere
nettlesere?&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Tar svært gjerne imot innspill på dette temaet til aktive (at)
nuug.no, og er spesielt interessert i hva andre skriver i sine anbud
for å oppmuntre leverandører til å følge standardene.  Kanskje NUUG
burde lage et dokument med forslag til standardformuleringer å ta med
i anbudsutlysninger?&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Oppdatering 2010-12-03: I følge Wikipedias oppføring om
&lt;a href=&quot;http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ANSI_escape_code&quot;&gt;ANSI escape
code&lt;/a&gt;, så bruker VT100-terminaler ECMA-48-spesifikasjonen som
basis for sin oppførsel.  Det kan dermed være et alternativ når en
skal spesifisere hvordan seriell-konsoll skal fungere.&lt;/p&gt;
</description>
        </item>
        
        <item>
                <title>Terms of use for video produced by a Canon IXUS 130 digital camera</title>
                <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Terms_of_use_for_video_produced_by_a_Canon_IXUS_130_digital_camera.html</link>        
                <guid isPermaLink="true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Terms_of_use_for_video_produced_by_a_Canon_IXUS_130_digital_camera.html</guid>
                <pubDate>Thu, 9 Sep 2010 23:55:00 +0200</pubDate>
                <description>&lt;p&gt;A few days ago I had the mixed pleasure of bying a new digital
camera, a Canon IXUS 130.  It was instructive and very disturbing to
be able to verify that also this camera producer have the nerve to
specify how I can or can not use the videos produced with the camera.
Even thought I was aware of the issue, the options with new cameras
are limited and I ended up bying the camera anyway.  What is the
problem, you might ask?  It is software patents, MPEG-4, H.264 and the
MPEG-LA that is the problem, and our right to record our experiences
without asking for permissions that is at risk.

&lt;p&gt;On page 27 of the Danish instruction manual, this section is
written:&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;blockquote&gt;
&lt;p&gt;This product is licensed under AT&amp;T patents for the MPEG-4 standard
and may be used for encoding MPEG-4 compliant video and/or decoding
MPEG-4 compliant video that was encoded only (1) for a personal and
non-commercial purpose or (2) by a video provider licensed under the
AT&amp;T patents to provide MPEG-4 compliant video.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;No license is granted or implied for any other use for MPEG-4
standard.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;/blockquote&gt;

&lt;p&gt;In short, the camera producer have chosen to use technology
(MPEG-4/H.264) that is only provided if I used it for personal and
non-commercial purposes, or ask for permission from the organisations
holding the knowledge monopoly (patent) for technology used.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;This issue has been brewing for a while, and I recommend you to
read
&quot;&lt;a href=&quot;http://www.osnews.com/story/23236/Why_Our_Civilization_s_Video_Art_and_Culture_is_Threatened_by_the_MPEG-LA&quot;&gt;Why
Our Civilization&#39;s Video Art and Culture is Threatened by the
MPEG-LA&lt;/a&gt;&quot; by Eugenia Loli-Queru and
&quot;&lt;a href=&quot;http://webmink.com/2010/09/03/h-264-and-foss/&quot;&gt;H.264 Is Not
The Sort Of Free That Matters&lt;/a&gt;&quot; by Simon Phipps to learn more about
the issue.  The solution is to support the
&lt;a href=&quot;http://www.digistan.org/open-standard:definition&quot;&gt;free and
open standards&lt;/a&gt; for video, like &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.theora.org/&quot;&gt;Ogg
Theora&lt;/a&gt;, and avoid MPEG-4 and H.264 if you can.&lt;/p&gt;
</description>
        </item>
        
        <item>
                <title>Officeshots taking shape</title>
                <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Officeshots_taking_shape.html</link>        
                <guid isPermaLink="true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Officeshots_taking_shape.html</guid>
                <pubDate>Sun, 13 Jun 2010 11:40:00 +0200</pubDate>
                <description>&lt;p&gt;For those of us caring about document exchange and
interoperability, &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.officeshots.org/&quot;&gt;OfficeShots&lt;/a&gt;
is a great service.  It is to ODF documents what
&lt;a href=&quot;http://browsershots.org/&quot;&gt;BrowserShots&lt;/a&gt; is for web
pages.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;A while back, I was contacted by Knut Yrvin at the part of Nokia
that used to be Trolltech, who wanted to help the OfficeShots project
and wondered if the University of Oslo where I work would be
interested in supporting the project.  I helped him to navigate his
request to the right people at work, and his request was answered with
a spot in the machine room with power and network connected, and Knut
arranged funding for a machine to fill the spot.  The machine is
administrated by the OfficeShots people, so I do not have daily
contact with its progress, and thus from time to time check back to
see how the project is doing.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Today I had a look, and was happy to see that the Dell box in our
machine room now is the host for several virtual machines running as
OfficeShots factories, and the project is able to render ODF documents
in 17 different document processing implementation on Linux and
Windows.  This is great.&lt;/p&gt;
</description>
        </item>
        
        <item>
                <title>A manual for standards wars...</title>
                <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/A_manual_for_standards_wars___.html</link>        
                <guid isPermaLink="true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/A_manual_for_standards_wars___.html</guid>
                <pubDate>Sun, 6 Jun 2010 14:15:00 +0200</pubDate>
                <description>&lt;p&gt;Via the
&lt;a href=&quot;http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/robweir/antic-atom/~3/QzU4RgoAGMg/weekly-links-10.html&quot;&gt;blog
of Rob Weir&lt;/a&gt; I came across the very interesting essay named
&lt;a href=&quot;http://faculty.haas.berkeley.edu/shapiro/wars.pdf&quot;&gt;The Art of
Standards Wars&lt;/a&gt; (PDF 25 pages).  I recommend it for everyone
following the standards wars of today.&lt;/p&gt;
</description>
        </item>
        
        <item>
                <title>Danmark går for ODF?</title>
                <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Danmark_g_r_for_ODF_.html</link>        
                <guid isPermaLink="true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Danmark_g_r_for_ODF_.html</guid>
                <pubDate>Fri, 29 Jan 2010 12:00:00 +0100</pubDate>
                <description>&lt;p&gt;Ble nettopp gjort oppmerksom på en
&lt;a href=&quot;http://www.version2.dk/artikel/13690-breaking-odf-vinder-dokumentformat-krigen &quot;&gt;nyhet fra Version2&lt;/a&gt;
fra Danmark, der det hevdes at Folketinget har vedtatt at ODF skal
brukes som dokumentutvekslingsformat i Staten.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Hyggelig lesning, spesielt hvis det viser seg at de av vedtatt
kravlisten for hva som skal aksepteres som referert i kommentarfeltet
til artikkelen og
&lt;a href=&quot;http://www.version2.dk/artikel/13693-er-ooxml-doemt-ude-her-er-kravene-til-en-offentlig-dokumentstandard&quot;&gt;en
annen artikkel&lt;/a&gt; i samme nett-avis.  Liker spesielt godt denne:&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;blockquote&gt; Det skal demonstreres, at standarden i sin helhed kan
implementeres af alle direkte i sin helhed på flere
platforme.&lt;/blockquote&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Noe slikt burde være et krav også i Norge.&lt;/p&gt;
</description>
        </item>
        
        <item>
                <title>Relative popularity of document formats (MS Office vs. ODF)</title>
                <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Relative_popularity_of_document_formats__MS_Office_vs__ODF_.html</link>        
                <guid isPermaLink="true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Relative_popularity_of_document_formats__MS_Office_vs__ODF_.html</guid>
                <pubDate>Wed, 12 Aug 2009 15:50:00 +0200</pubDate>
                <description>&lt;p&gt;Just for fun, I did a search right now on Google for a few file ODF
and MS Office based formats (not to be mistaken for ISO or ECMA
OOXML), to get an idea of their relative usage.  I searched using
&#39;filetype:odt&#39; and equvalent terms, and got these results:&lt;/P&gt;

&lt;table&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;th&gt;Type&lt;/th&gt;&lt;th&gt;ODF&lt;/th&gt;&lt;th&gt;MS Office&lt;/th&gt;&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;Tekst&lt;/td&gt; &lt;td&gt;odt:282000&lt;/td&gt; &lt;td&gt;docx:308000&lt;/td&gt;&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;Presentasjon&lt;/td&gt; &lt;td&gt;odp:75600&lt;/td&gt; &lt;td&gt;pptx:183000&lt;/td&gt;&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;Regneark&lt;/td&gt; &lt;td&gt;ods:26500     &lt;/td&gt; &lt;td&gt;xlsx:145000&lt;/td&gt;&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Next, I added a &#39;site:no&#39; limit to get the numbers for Norway, and
got these numbers:&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;table&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;th&gt;Type&lt;/th&gt;&lt;th&gt;ODF&lt;/th&gt;&lt;th&gt;MS Office&lt;/th&gt;&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;Tekst&lt;/td&gt; &lt;td&gt;odt:2480 &lt;/td&gt; &lt;td&gt;docx:4460&lt;/td&gt;&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;Presentasjon&lt;/td&gt; &lt;td&gt;odp:299   &lt;/td&gt; &lt;td&gt;pptx:741&lt;/td&gt;&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;Regneark&lt;/td&gt; &lt;td&gt;ods:187       &lt;/td&gt; &lt;td&gt;xlsx:372&lt;/td&gt;&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;

&lt;p&gt;I wonder how these numbers change over time.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;I am aware of Google returning different results and numbers based
on where the search is done, so I guess these numbers will differ if
they are conduced in another country.  Because of this, I did the same
search from a machine in California, USA, a few minutes after the
search done from a machine here in Norway.&lt;/p&gt;


&lt;table&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;th&gt;Type&lt;/th&gt;&lt;th&gt;ODF&lt;/th&gt;&lt;th&gt;MS Office&lt;/th&gt;&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;Tekst&lt;/td&gt; &lt;td&gt;odt:129000&lt;/td&gt; &lt;td&gt;docx:308000&lt;/td&gt;&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;Presentasjon&lt;/td&gt; &lt;td&gt;odp:44200&lt;/td&gt; &lt;td&gt;pptx:93900&lt;/td&gt;&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;Regneark&lt;/td&gt; &lt;td&gt;ods:26500     &lt;/td&gt; &lt;td&gt;xlsx:82400&lt;/td&gt;&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;

&lt;p&gt;And with &#39;site:no&#39;:

&lt;table&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;th&gt;Type&lt;/th&gt;&lt;th&gt;ODF&lt;/th&gt;&lt;th&gt;MS Office&lt;/th&gt;&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;Tekst&lt;/td&gt; &lt;td&gt;odt:2480&lt;/td&gt; &lt;td&gt;docx:3410&lt;/td&gt;&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;Presentasjon&lt;/td&gt; &lt;td&gt;odp:175&lt;/td&gt; &lt;td&gt;pptx:604&lt;/td&gt;&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;Regneark&lt;/td&gt; &lt;td&gt;ods:186       &lt;/td&gt; &lt;td&gt;xlsx:296&lt;/td&gt;&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Interesting difference, not sure what to conclude from these
numbers.&lt;/p&gt;
</description>
        </item>
        
        <item>
                <title>ISO still hope to fix OOXML</title>
                <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/ISO_still_hope_to_fix_OOXML.html</link>        
                <guid isPermaLink="true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/ISO_still_hope_to_fix_OOXML.html</guid>
                <pubDate>Sat, 8 Aug 2009 14:00:00 +0200</pubDate>
                <description>&lt;p&gt;According to &lt;a
href=&quot;http://twerner.blogspot.com/2009/08/defects-of-office-open-xml.html&quot;&gt;a
blog post from Torsten Werner&lt;/a&gt;, the current defect report for ISO
29500 (ISO OOXML) is 809 pages.  His interesting point is that the
defect report is 71 pages more than the full ODF 1.1 specification.
Personally I find it more interesting that ISO still believe ISO OOXML
can be fixed in ISO.  Personally, I believe it is broken beyon repair,
and I completely lack any trust in ISO for being able to get anywhere
close to solving the problems.  I was part of the Norwegian committee
involved in the OOXML fast track process, and was not impressed with
Standard Norway and ISO in how they handled it.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;These days I focus on ODF instead, which seem like a specification
with the future ahead of it.  We are working in NUUG to organise a ODF
seminar this autumn.&lt;/p&gt;
</description>
        </item>
        
        <item>
                <title>Regjerningens oppsummering av høringen om standardkatalogen versjon 2</title>
                <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Regjerningens_oppsummering_av_h_ringen_om_standardkatalogen_versjon_2.html</link>        
                <guid isPermaLink="true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Regjerningens_oppsummering_av_h_ringen_om_standardkatalogen_versjon_2.html</guid>
                <pubDate>Thu, 9 Jul 2009 14:40:00 +0200</pubDate>
                <description>&lt;p&gt;For å forstå mer om hvorfor standardkatalogens versjon 2 ble som
den ble, har jeg bedt om kopi fra FAD av dokumentene som ble lagt frem
for regjeringen da de tok sin avgjørelse.  De er nå lagt ut på NUUGs
wiki, direkte tilgjengelig via &quot;&lt;a
href=&quot;http://wiki.nuug.no/uttalelser/200901-standardkatalog-v2?action=AttachFile&amp;do=get&amp;target=kongelig-resolusjon.pdf&quot;&gt;Referansekatalogen
v2.0 - Oppsummering av høring&lt;/a&gt;&quot; og &quot;&lt;a
href=&quot;http://wiki.nuug.no/uttalelser/200901-standardkatalog-v2?action=AttachFile&amp;do=get&amp;target=kongelig-resolusjon-katalogutkast.pdf&quot;&gt;Referansekatalog
for IT-standarder i offentlig sektor Versjon 2.0, dd.mm.åååå -
UTKAST&lt;/a&gt;&quot;.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Det er tre ting jeg merker meg i oppsummeringen fra
høringsuttalelsen da jeg skummet igjennom den.  Det første er at
forståelsen av hvordan programvarepatenter påvirker fri
programvareutvikling også i Norge når en argumenterer med at
royalty-betaling ikke er et relevant problem i Norge.  Det andre er at
FAD ikke har en prinsipiell forståelse av verdien av en enkelt
standard innenfor hvert område.  Det siste er at påstander i
høringsuttalelsene ikke blir etterprøvd (f.eks. påstanden fra
Microsoft om hvordan Ogg blir standardisert og påstanden fra
politidirektoratet om patentproblemer i Theora).&lt;/p&gt;
</description>
        </item>
        
        <item>
                <title>Regjerningen forlater prinsippet om ingen royalty-betaling i standardkatalogen versjon 2</title>
                <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Regjerningen_forlater_prinsippet_om_ingen_royalty_betaling_i_standardkatalogen_versjon_2.html</link>        
                <guid isPermaLink="true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Regjerningen_forlater_prinsippet_om_ingen_royalty_betaling_i_standardkatalogen_versjon_2.html</guid>
                <pubDate>Mon, 6 Jul 2009 21:00:00 +0200</pubDate>
                <description>&lt;p&gt;Jeg ble glad da regjeringen
&lt;a href=&quot;http://www.digi.no/817635/her-er-statens-nye-it-standarder&quot;&gt;annonserte&lt;/a&gt;
versjon 2 av
&lt;a href=&quot;http://www.regjeringen.no/upload/FAD/Vedlegg/IKT-politikk/Referansekatalogen_versjon2.pdf&quot;&gt;statens
referansekatalog over standarder&lt;/a&gt;, men trist da jeg leste hva som
faktisk var vedtatt etter
&lt;a href=&quot;http://www.regjeringen.no/nb/dep/fad/dok/horinger/horingsdokumenter/2009/horing---referansekatalog-versjon-2.html&quot;&gt;høringen&lt;/a&gt;.
De fleste av de valgte åpne standardene er gode og vil bidra til at
alle kan delta på like vilkår i å lage løsninger for staten, men
noen av dem blokkerer for de som ikke har anledning til å benytte
spesifikasjoner som krever betaling for bruk (såkalt
royalty-betaling).  Det gjelder spesifikt for H.264 for video og MP3
for lyd.  Så lenge bruk av disse var valgfritt mens Ogg Theora og Ogg
Vorbis var påkrevd, kunne alle som ønsket å spille av video og lyd
fra statens websider gjøre dette uten å måtte bruke programmer der
betaling for bruk var nødvendig.  Når det nå er gjort valgfritt for
de statlige etatene å bruke enten H.264 eller Theora (og MP3 eler
Vorbis), så vil en bli tvunget til å forholde seg til
royalty-belastede standarder for å få tilgang til videoen og
lyden.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Det gjør meg veldig trist at regjeringen har forlatt prinsippet om
at alle standarder som ble valgt til å være påkrevd i katalogen skulle
være uten royalty-betaling.  Jeg håper det ikke betyr at en har mistet
all forståelse for hvilke prinsipper som må følges for å oppnå
likeverdig konkurranse mellom aktørene i IT-bransjen.  NUUG advarte
mot dette i
&lt;a href=&quot;http://wiki.nuug.no/uttalelser/200901-standardkatalog-v2&quot;&gt;sin
høringsuttalelse&lt;/a&gt;, men ser ut til å ha blitt ignorert.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Oppdatering 2012-06-29: Kom over &lt;ahref=&quot;
http://www.regjeringen.no/upload/FAD/Vedlegg/IKT-politikk/Refkat_v2.pdf&quot;&gt;en
rapport til FAD&lt;/a&gt; fra da versjon 1 av katalogen ble vedtatt, og der
er det tydelig at problemstillingen var kjent og forstått.&lt;/p&gt;
</description>
        </item>
        
        <item>
                <title>Microsofts misvisende argumentasjon rundt multimediaformater</title>
                <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Microsofts_misvisende_argumentasjon_rundt_multimediaformater.html</link>        
                <guid isPermaLink="true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Microsofts_misvisende_argumentasjon_rundt_multimediaformater.html</guid>
                <pubDate>Fri, 26 Jun 2009 13:30:00 +0200</pubDate>
                <description>&lt;p&gt;I
&lt;a href=&quot;http://www.regjeringen.no/upload/FAD/Vedlegg/Hoeringer/Refkat_V2/MicrosoftNorge.pdf&quot;&gt;Microsoft
sin høringsuttalelse&lt;/a&gt; til
&lt;a href=&quot;http://www.regjeringen.no/nb/dep/fad/dok/horinger/horingsdokumenter/2009/horing---referansekatalog-versjon-2.html?id=549422&quot;&gt;forslag
til versjon 2 av statens referansekatalog over standarder&lt;/a&gt;, lirer
de av seg følgende FUD-perle:&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;blockquote&gt;&quot;Vorbis, OGG, Theora og FLAC er alle tekniske
  spesifikasjoner overordnet styrt av xiph.org, som er en
  ikke-kommersiell organisasjon.  Etablerte og anerkjente
  standardiseringsorganisasjoner, som Oasis, W3C og Ecma, har en godt
  innarbeidet vedlikeholds- og forvaltningsprosess av en standard.
  Det er derimot helt opp til hver enkelt organisasjon å bestemme
  hvordan tekniske spesifikasjoner videreutvikles og endres, og disse
  spesifikasjonene bør derfor ikke defineres som åpne
  standarder.&quot;&lt;/blockquote&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;De vokter seg vel for å nevne den anerkjente
standardiseringsorganisasjonen IETF, som er organisasjonen bak HTTP,
IP og det meste av protokoller på Internet, og RFC-standardene som
IETF står bak.  Ogg er spesifisert i
&lt;a href=&quot;http://ietf.org/rfc/rfc3533.txt&quot;&gt;RFC 3533&lt;/a&gt;, og er uten
tvil å anse som en åpen standard.  Vorbis er
&lt;a href=&quot;http://ietf.org/rfc/rfc5215.txt&quot;&gt;RFC 5215&lt;/a&gt;.  Theora er

under standardisering via IETF, med
&lt;a href=&quot;http://svn.xiph.org/trunk/theora/doc/draft-ietf-avt-rtp-theora-00.txt&quot;&gt;siste
utkast publisert 2006-07-21&lt;/a&gt; (riktignok er dermed teksten ikke
skrevet i stein ennå, men det blir neppe endringer som ikke er
bakoverkompatibel).  De kan være inne på noe når det gjelder FLAC da
jeg ikke finner tegn til at &lt;a
href=&quot;http://flac.sourceforge.net/format.html&quot;&gt;spesifikasjonen
tilgjengelig på web&lt;/a&gt; er på tur via noen
standardiseringsorganisasjon, men i og med at folkene bak Ogg, Theora
og Vorbis også har involvert seg i Flac siden 2003, så ser jeg ikke
bort fra at også den organiseres via IETF.  Jeg kjenner personlig lite
til FLAC.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Uredelig argumentasjon bør en holde seg for god til å komme med,
spesielt når det er så enkelt i dagens Internet-hverdag å gå
misvisende påstander etter i sømmene.&lt;/p&gt;
</description>
        </item>
        
        <item>
                <title>Standarder fungerer best når en samler seg rundt dem</title>
                <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Standarder_fungerer_best_n_r_en_samler_seg_rundt_dem.html</link>        
                <guid isPermaLink="true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Standarder_fungerer_best_n_r_en_samler_seg_rundt_dem.html</guid>
                <pubDate>Tue, 19 May 2009 11:30:00 +0200</pubDate>
                <description>&lt;p&gt;En standard er noe man samler seg rundt, ut fra ideen om at en får
fordeler når mange står sammen.  Jo flere som står sammen, jo
bedre.  Når en vet dette, blir det litt merkelig å lese noen av
uttalelsene som er kommet inn til
&lt;a href=&quot;http://www.regjeringen.no/nb/dep/fad/dok/horinger/horingsdokumenter/2009/horing---referansekatalog-versjon-2/horingsuttalelser.html?id=549423&quot;&gt;høringen
om versjon 2 av statens referansekatalog over standarder&lt;/a&gt;.  Blant
annet Abelia, NHO og Microsoft tror det er lurt med flere standarder
innenfor samme område.  Det blir som å si at det er fint om Norge
standardiserte både på A4- og Letter-størrelser på arkene, ulik
sporvidde på jernbaneskinnene, meter og fot som lengemål, eller
høyre- og venstrekjøring - slik at en kan konkurrere på hvilken
standard som er best.  De fleste forstår heldigvis at dette ikke
bidrar positivt.&lt;/p&gt;
</description>
        </item>
        
        <item>
                <title>Hvorfor jeg ikke bruker eFaktura</title>
                <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Hvorfor_jeg_ikke_bruker_eFaktura.html</link>        
                <guid isPermaLink="true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Hvorfor_jeg_ikke_bruker_eFaktura.html</guid>
                <pubDate>Thu, 23 Apr 2009 23:00:00 +0200</pubDate>
                <description>&lt;p&gt;Telenors annonsering om å kreve 35 kroner i gebyr fra alle som
ønsker papirfaktura har satt sinnene i kok, og pressedekningen så
langt snakker om at eldre og folk som ikke behersker data vil få en
urimelig ekstrakostnad.  Jeg tror ikke jeg passer inn i noen av de
kategoriene, men velger å holde meg unna eFaktura - som er det
Telenor ønsker å få folk over på - pga. systemets egenskaper.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Slik jeg har sett eFaktura til forbrukere så langt, så sender
selger en elektronisk beskjed til kundens bank, som legger ut
informasjon om fakturaen i nettbanken for godkjenning.  Personlig
ville jeg sett det som mer naturlig at det gikk en elektronisk beskjed
fra selger til kunde, dvs meg, og at jeg så kunne bruke den videre
mot banken eller andre hvis jeg ønsket dette.  Mine innkjøp og
regninger er jo en sak mellom meg og mine leverandører, ikke en sak
mellom min bank og mine leverandører.  Kun hvis jeg ønsker å betale
fakturaen skal banken involveres.  En faktura bør jo inn i
regnskapet, og jeg ønsker mulighet til å legge det inn der.  Når
fakturaen sendes til banken i stedet for meg, blir det vanskeligere.
Hele eFaktura-modellen virker på meg som en umyndiggjøring av meg
som kunde.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;I tillegg har jeg ikke vært i stand til å finne
eFaktura-formatets spesifikasjon, og det ser ut til at utsending av
slike krever dyre avtaler med bankene for å få lov til å sende ut
eFaktura til kunder.  Jeg ser vel helst at fakturering på
elektroniske formater kan gjøres f.eks. via epost eller HTTP uten å
måtte betale mellommenn for retten til å lever ut en faktura, og
liker rett og slett ikke dagens faktureringsmodeller.&lt;/p&gt;
</description>
        </item>
        
        <item>
                <title>Standardize on protocols and formats, not vendors and applications</title>
                <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Standardize_on_protocols_and_formats__not_vendors_and_applications.html</link>        
                <guid isPermaLink="true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Standardize_on_protocols_and_formats__not_vendors_and_applications.html</guid>
                <pubDate>Mon, 30 Mar 2009 11:50:00 +0200</pubDate>
                <description>&lt;p&gt;Where I work at the University of Oslo, one decision stand out as a
very good one to form a long lived computer infrastructure.  It is the
simple one, lost by many in todays computer industry: Standardize on
open network protocols and open exchange/storage formats, not applications.
Applications come and go, while protocols and files tend to stay, and
thus one want to make it easy to change application and vendor, while
avoiding conversion costs and locking users to a specific platform or
application.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;This approach make it possible to replace the client applications
independently of the server applications.  One can even allow users to
use several different applications as long as they handle the selected
protocol and format.  In the normal case, only one client application
is recommended and users only get help if they choose to use this
application, but those that want to deviate from the easy path are not
blocked from doing so.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;It also allow us to replace the server side without forcing the
users to replace their applications, and thus allow us to select the
best server implementation at any moment, when scale and resouce
requirements change.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;I strongly recommend standardizing - on open network protocols and
open formats, but I would never recommend standardizing on a single
application that do not use open network protocol or open formats.&lt;/p&gt;
</description>
        </item>
        
        <item>
                <title>Hva er egentlig en åpen standard?</title>
                <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Hva_er_egentlig_en__pen_standard_.html</link>        
                <guid isPermaLink="true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Hva_er_egentlig_en__pen_standard_.html</guid>
                <pubDate>Sat, 28 Mar 2009 10:50:00 +0100</pubDate>
                <description>&lt;p&gt;Jeg møter alle slags interessante mennesker på min vei, og et møte
jeg lærte mye av var å treffe på en svært kompetent IT-fyr som
benektet ting jeg anser som åpenbart og selvfølgelig når det gjelder
standarder.  Det var interessant, da det fikk meg til å tenke litt
nøyere på hvilke mekanismer som ligger til grunn for at noe oppfattes
som en standard.  Det hele startet med arbeid rundt integrering av NSS
LDAP mot Active Directory, og problemer som oppstår pga. at Active
Directory ikke følger LDAP-spesifikasjonen som dokumentert i RFCer fra
IETF (konkret, AD returnerer kun et subset av attributter hvis det er
mer enn 1500 atributter av en gitt type i et LDAP-objekt, og en må be
om resten i bolker av 1500).  Jeg hevdet måten dette ble gjort på brøt
med LDAP-spesifikasjonen, og henviste til hvor i LDAP-spesifikasjonen
fra IETF det sto at oppførselen til AD ikke fulgte
LDAP-spesifikasjonen.  AD-spesialisten overrasket meg da ved å
fortelle at IETF var ikke de som definerte LDAP-spesifikasjonen, og at
Active Directory ikke brøt den virkelige LDAP-spesifikasjonen som han
mente lå til grunn.  Jeg ble spesielt overrasket over denne
tilnærmingen til problemstillingen, da til og med Microsoft så vidt
jeg kan se anerkjenner IETF som organisasjonen som definerer
LDAP-spesifikasjonen.  Jeg fikk aldri spurt hvem han mente sto bak den
egentlige LDAP-spesifikasjonen, da det var irrelevant for problemet vi
måtte løse (få Linux og AD til å fungere sammen).  Dette møtet
fortalte meg uansett at det ikke er gitt at alle aktører er enige om
hva en standard er, og hva som er kilden til en gitt standard.  Det er
vanskelig å enes om felles standarder før en først enes om hvem som
bestemmer hva en gitt standard innebærer.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Hva er så en standard?  I sin abstrakte form er det noe å samles
om.  På engelsk er en av betydningene fane brukt i krig, du vet, den
type fane en samlet seg rundt på kamplassen i riddertiden.  En
standard definerer altså et felleskap, noen som har noe felles.  Det
er naturligvis mange måter å utgjøre et felleskap på.  En kan
f.eks. enes om å gjøre alt slik som Ole gjør det, og dermed si at Oles
oppførsel er standard.  Hver gang Ole endrer oppførsel endrer også
standarden seg uten noe mer organisering og prosedyre.  En variant av
dette er å gjøre slik som Ole har gjort det i stedet for slik Ole til
enhver til gjør noe.  Dette er ofte litt enklere å forholde seg til,
da en slipper å sjekke med Ole hver gang for å vite hvordan ting skal
gjøres nå, men hvis det Ole gjorde noe dumt den gang en bestemte seg
for å følge Ole, så er det vanskeligere å få endret oppførsel for å
unngå dette dumme.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;En kan også ta det et skritt videre, og istedet for å basere seg på
enkeltpersoners oppførsel sette seg ned og bli enige om hvordan en
skal gjøre ting, dvs. lage et felleskap basert på konsensus.  Dette
tar naturligvis litt mer tid (en må diskutere ting i forkant før en
kan sette igang), men det kan bidra til at den oppførselen en
planlegger å benytte seg av er mer gjennomtenkt.  Det ender også
typisk opp med en beskrivelse av ønsket oppførsel som flere kan forstå
- da flere har vært involvert i å utarbeide beskrivelsen.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Dette er dessverre ikke alt som trengs for å forstå hva en åpen
standard er for noe.  Der alle kan se på hvordan folk oppfører seg, og
dermed har valget om de vil oppføre seg likt eller ikke, så er det
endel juridiske faktorer som gjør det hele mer komplisert -
opphavsretten og patentlovgivningen for å være helt konkret.  For å gi
et eksempel. Hvis noen blir enige om å alltid plystre en bestemt
melodi når de møtes, for å identifisere hverandre, så kan
opphavsretten brukes til å styre hvem som får lov til å gjøre dette.
De har standardisert hvordan de kjenner igjen alle som følger denne
standarden, men ikke alle har nødvendigvis lov til å følge den.
Musikk er opphavsrettsbeskyttet, og fremføring av musikk i
offentligheten er opphavsmannens enerett (dvs. et monopol).  Det vil i
sin ytterste konsekvens si at alle som skal plystre en
opphavsrettsbeskyttet melodi i det offentlige rom må ha godkjenning
fra opphavsmannen.  Har en ikke dette, så bryter en loven og kan
straffes.  Det er dermed mulig for opphavsmannen å kontrollere hvem
som får lov til å benytte seg av denne standarden.  En annen variant
er hvis en standard er dokumentert, så er dokumentet som definerer
standarden (spesifikasjonen) beskyttet av opphavsretten, og det er
dermed mulig for rettighetsinnehaver å begrense tilgang til
spesifikasjonen, og slik styre hvem som kan ta i bruk standarden på
den måten.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Der opphavsretten innvilger et monopol på kunstneriske uttrykk med
verkshøyde, innvilger patentlovgivningen monopol på ideer.  Hvis en
slik patentert idé (fortrinnsvis uttrykt i en teknisk innretning, men
det er kompliserende faktorer som gjør at det ikke er et krav) trengs
for å ta i bruk en standard, så vil den som innehar patent kunne styre
hvem som får ta i bruk standarden.  Det er dermed ikke gitt at alle
kan delta i et standard-felleskap, og hvis de kan delta, så er det
ikke sikkert at det er på like vilkår.  F.eks. kan rettighetsinnehaver
sette vilkår som gjør at noen faller utenfor, det være seg av
finansielle, avtalemessige eller prinsipielle årsaker.  Vanlige slike
vilkår er &quot;må betale litt for hver kunde/bruker&quot; som utelukker de som
gir bort en løsning gratis og &quot;må gi fra seg retten til å håndheve
sine egne patentrettigheter ovenfor rettighetshaver&quot; som utelukker
alle som ønsker å beholde den muligheten.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;En åpen standard innebærer for meg at alle kan få innsikt i en
komplett beskrivelse av oppførsel som standarden skal dekke, og at
ingen kan nektes å benytte seg av standarden.  Noen mener at det
holder at alle med tilstrekkelig finansiering kan få tilgang til
spesifikasjonen og at en kun har finansielle krav til bruk.
Pga. denne konflikten har et nytt begrep spredt seg de siste årene,
nemlig fri og åpen standard, der en har gjort det klart at alle må ha
komplett og lik tilgang til spesifikasjoner og retten til å gjøre bruk
av en standard for at en standard skal kunne kalles fri og åpen.&lt;/p&gt;
</description>
        </item>
        
        <item>
                <title>Fri og åpen standard, slik Digistan ser det</title>
                <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Fri_og__pen_standard__slik_Digistan_ser_det.html</link>        
                <guid isPermaLink="true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Fri_og__pen_standard__slik_Digistan_ser_det.html</guid>
                <pubDate>Sat, 31 Jan 2009 23:10:00 +0100</pubDate>
                <description>&lt;p&gt;Det er mange ulike definisjoner om hva en åpen standard er for noe,
og NUUG hadde &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.nuug.no/dokumenter/standard-presse-def-200506.txt&quot;&gt;en
pressemelding om dette sommeren 2005&lt;/a&gt;.  Der ble definisjonen til
&lt;a href=&quot;http://www.aaben-standard.dk/&quot;&gt;DKUUG&lt;/a&gt;,
&lt;a href=&quot;http://europa.eu.int/idabc/servlets/Doc?id=19529&quot;&gt;EU-kommissionens
European Interoperability Framework ( side 9)&lt;/a&gt; og 
&lt;a href=&quot;http://www.teknologiradet.no/files/7polert_copy.htm&quot;&gt;teknologirådet&lt;/a&gt; omtalt.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Siden den gang har regjeringens standardiseringsråd dukket opp, og de
ser ut til å har tatt utgangspunkt i EU-kommisjonens definisjon i
&lt;a href=&quot;http://www.regjeringen.no/nb/dep/fad/kampanjer/standardiseringsradet/arbeidsmetodikk.html?id=476407&quot;&gt;sin
arbeidsmetodikk&lt;/a&gt;.  Personlig synes jeg det er en god ide, da
kravene som stilles der gjør at alle markedsaktører får like vilkår,
noe som kommer kundene til gode ved hjelp av økt konkurranse.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;I sommer kom det en ny definisjon på banen.
&lt;a href=&quot;http://www.digistan.org/&quot;&gt;Digistan&lt;/a&gt; lanserte
&lt;a href=&quot;http://www.digistan.org/open-standard:definition&quot;&gt;en
definisjon på en fri og åpen standard&lt;/a&gt;.  Jeg liker måten de bryter
ut av diskusjonen om hva som kreves for å kalle noe en åpen standard
ved å legge på et ord og poengtere at en standard som er både åpen og
fri har noen spesielle krav.  Her er den definisjonen etter rask
oversettelse fra engelsk til norsk av meg:&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;blockquote&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Definisjonen av en fri og åpen standard&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Den digitale standardorganisasjonen definierer fri og åpen standard
som følger:&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;ul&gt;
&lt;li&gt;En fri og åpen standard er immun for leverandørinnlåsing i alle
stadier av dens livssyklus.  Immuniteten fra leverandørinnlåsing gjør
det mulig å fritt bruke, forbedre, stole på og utvide en standard over
tid.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;Standarden er adoptert og vil bli vedlikeholdt av en ikke-kommersiell
organisasjon, og dens pågående utvikling gjøres med en åpen
beslutningsprosedyre som er tilgjengelig for alle som er interessert i
å delta.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;Standarden er publisert og spesifikasjonsdokumentet er fritt
tilgjengelig.  Det må være tillatt for alle å kopiere, distribuere og
bruke den uten begresninger.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;Patentene som muligens gjelder (deler av) standarden er gjort
ugjenkallelig tilgjengelig uten krav om betaling.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;Det er ingen begresninger i gjenbruk av standarden.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Det økonomiske resultatet av en fri og åpen standard, som kan
måles, er at det muliggjør perfekt konkurranse mellom leverandører av
produkter basert på standarden.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;/blockquote&gt;

&lt;p&gt;(Tar gjerne imot forbedringer av oversettelsen.)&lt;/p&gt;
</description>
        </item>
        
        <item>
                <title>ODF-bruk i staten, ikke helt på plass</title>
                <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/ODF_bruk_i_staten__ikke_helt_p__plass.html</link>        
                <guid isPermaLink="true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/ODF_bruk_i_staten__ikke_helt_p__plass.html</guid>
                <pubDate>Thu, 22 Jan 2009 23:00:00 +0100</pubDate>
                <description>&lt;p&gt;I går publiserte
&lt;a href=&quot;http://universitas.no/nyhet/52776/&quot;&gt;Universitas&lt;/a&gt;,
&lt;a href=&quot;http://www.dagensit.no/trender/article1588462.ece&quot;&gt;Dagens-IT&lt;/a&gt;
og &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.idg.no/computerworld/article118622.ece&quot;&gt;Computerworld
Norge&lt;/a&gt; en sak om at de ansatte ved Universitetet i Oslo ikke følger
regjeringens pålegg om å publisere i HTML, PDF eller ODF.  Det er bra
at det kommer litt fokus på dette, og jeg håper noen journalister tar
en titt på de andre statlige instansene også.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Skulle ønske det var en enkel måte å sjekke om ODF-dokumenter er i
henholdt til ODF-spesifikasjonen, og en måte å teste om programmer som
hevder å støtte ODF forstår alle delene av ODF-spesifikasjonen.
Kjenner kun til ufullstendige løsninger for slikt.&lt;/p&gt;
</description>
        </item>
        
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