Cisco will release the open source implementation of H.264, which will be included in Firefox

Today, Cisco announced the release of the free high-quality open source implementation of H.264 - along with free, pre-compiled modules that will be available for download from the Cisco website. This step means that any open source project will be able to use the H.264 module from Cisco without royalties. Now H.264 is one of the most popular video codecs on the Internet: it is used for streaming video in html5, for video conferencing and on smartphones.

The patent status of video codecs is one of the most sore spots of open source. The most popular codec in modern, H.264 , is patented and licensed by MPEG LA in such a way that the conditions do not allow it to be included in open source-products - more about thiswrote on Habr earlier . Now, ready-made Cisco OpenH.264 codec modules can be included in any application. The most important thing is that soon (at the beginning of 2014) they will be included in Firefox, since Mozilla has already supported the Cisco initiative, having promised in the person of its CTO Brendan Ike to participate as much as possible in the development and support of OpenH.264. This solution will enable the use of H.264 in WebRTC along with VP8.

Cisco will release its own H.264 stack under the BSD license and compile binary modules for all possible popular platforms; These modules can be used in any application. Now you don’t have to pay for the use of the ready-made module - Cisco pays for the license, which transfers money to MPEG LA. However, here lies the main drawback of today's announcement: in case you need to use the codec sources in your application, you still have to pay deductions. Thus, it turns out that despite the open source, they do not make much sense - it will not be so easy to use them.

Sources: blogs.cisco.com , brendaneich.com , gigaom.com , Monty Montgomery opinion ,codec site .