Is the VC-1 compression/encoding technology licensable?

[tomld]

I was told the compression/encoding technology used in Windows Movie Maker is called "RC-1". I am wondering if this technology is licensable, so that it could be used in a custom compression application?

How would I go about using this technology in a custom app?

Also is this RC-1 technology responsible for everything pertaining to taking a large AVI file and converting it to a much smaller WMV file or is there other technology at work also?

Thanks
Tom

[celtic_druid]

Actually it is VC-1 aka Windows Media Video 9. To use it in an app you should easily be able to interface via dshow and use their DMO encoders.

The reason why MS created VC-1 was to make it an open standard (this is why ffmpeg now handles VC-1) to try and get Digital TV, HD-DVD, etc. to use it. However as far as licensing, I am not sure because MS isn't the sole owner of the technology (soon after creating VC-1, the other 11 companies noticed that it used technology which they owned).

You might be better off with h.264/AVC (which WMV9 is based on anyway). There are already better quality, faster implimentations out there and licensing is handled via the MPEG-LA.

[tomld]

I'm still not entirely clear how to obtain and implement either VC-1 or h.264/AVC. I read on the MPEG-LA website licensing for the AVC suite is free if under 100,000 units per year is shipped. Still how do I obtain or implement this? Are there any pre-build modules that a programmer could simply build around and customize?

[celtic_druid]

If your app is GNU then you could use x264 for encoding. Actually you could probably build it as a DLL, release only the source for that and be ok. Then you have faac for audio encoding and GPAC for mp4 muxing.

On the comercial side you have Ateme who provide Ahead's Nero Digital codecs and Moonlight who do encoders for Cyberlink and what was formally Elcard (now owned by mainconcept who have their own crappy h.264 implimentation).

VC-1, I don't. It is MS's baby so for info I suggest you check out their site.

[edDV]

FYI - Tons of VC-1 news released at NAB. Call Microsoft for licensing info.

http://www.microsoft.com/windows/windowsmedia/forpros/events/NAB2005/VC-1.aspx
http://www.microsoft.com/windows/windowsmedia/forpros/events/NAB2005.aspx

Preliminary licensing fee proposal is covered in this article.
http://www.tvtechnology.com/features/news/News_VC1.shtml
Things have probably changed since January.