Free Legal Movie Player
 

Is there a free Linux movie player that doesn't violate patent laws? MTV is shareware. At least something that can play VCDs (.dat files).

Xine plays VCDs

but Xine and MPlayer violate patent laws. In MPlayer I shouldn't just install the Win32 codec pack yet it plays some proprietary formats even without it.

why does this matter? violating patents is part of open source sport (and it makes big company's hate you!) I would go on a whole bunch about how i don't care that it's illegal i just wanna play the movie but i would end up in a time consuming flame war

Re: Free Legal Movie Player
 

None of the players violate patent laws, some of the codecs used however might.

Xine (and others) will play VCD's by default the problem comes in when you want to watch DVD's.

could you validate your statement
 

Could you please explain to me how Xine violates patent laws?

One of the main reasons I quit using Mirco$loth Windoze is because
their business practices are immoral, unethical, and IMO illegal. They
were found guilty in the anti-trust lawsuits, but their enormous
amount of money and ability to buy people and pay fines has really
obscured their guilt. Just for a system running well and being able
to get the job done; I did more, easier, with less trouble in W2K
than ever in the three Linux distros I've used. However, it has
been my belief that Slackware Linux in free and legal! And I am
committed to Slackware.

I download Slackware Linux over the internet from Slackware's
official mirrors. It is included in the distribution, and I don't know,
but I would assume Patrick Volkerding wouldn't put illegal software
in Slackware.

As for Mplayer, the only times I tried to set it up it was more
trouble than it could possibly be worth -- so I don't use it.

We live in China. We have VCDs and DVDs which were bought here,
and some bought in Thailand, some from Hong Kong, and some
from America. They all play in Xine just fine. I've read something
about different regions that don't play or whatever, but have no
idea what this means.
we have VCD

Though that article was by Mike Hearn, and nothing official to say anyone has broken any laws, I still fail to see why you say "Xine violates patent laws"

Everything is forbidden when it comes down to DVD's. Never say DVD out loud. If you can, not even think about DVD's... Same goes to music, you can listen to any music you like, but if you sing it, you might be infringing some patent laws... Down with the stupidity of those laws for crying out loud...

Forgive me if I'm wrong, but all this sounds like a bunch of cloak and dagger FUD to me. I don't own a single CD, DVD, or VCD that was copied. My Slackware distribution came from Slackware. So where does this illegal talk come from? You guys must be sniffing some M$ glue or something...

Megaman X, I saw the Posting swf last week - too cool that Little Billy ! ! !

LOL Chinaman!. yup, Billy is my favorite character today, followed closely by Mega Man X :D. Billy is the newbie we all were once ;)

I still am that newbie...

One day I looked back at some of my first posts in LQ, and I was so embarrassed that I considered editing the content -- actually a whole lot of my posts. Seems as if my emotions get the best of me a lot of times, and since week 1 using Linux I was here in LQ. Desperate, as I am today, to be able to issue

root@james:/mingdao/life# rm -rf /Micro$loth



Edit: Piggysmile, sorry for hijacking your thread. Even though I live in a country where "copyright means the right to copy" and is fully permitted by the government, I don't do it, condon it, support it, or participate in it. I've lost a number of potential customers for building new computers because I wouldn't install copy CDs. And I don't think anything I'm doing is violating any laws, which is what I meant by previous posts. If you want a distro that is totally FREE software, check out Debian.

well, my most hated audio format is mp3 next is wma. i have converted my whole digital music library to ogg.

that's the smell of freedom (and filesharing) and i'm sure M$ doesn't like it!

yeah join the club just my top is wma :-) it really sucks! what did you use to convert it?

All this software patent breaking talk is just FUD