On Wed, 31 Jan 2018 08:52:21 +1300, Peter Reutemann quoted:
'Patent holders who allow use of their patents get hefty royalties with which they can develop new technologies for the next generation of MPEG standards.'
What fraction of turnover do these companies spend on R&D? Typically maybe 1%. And it doesn’t cost that much (maybe 4-5 figures) to get a patent, particularly since you don’t even have to prove your idea works. And think of all the free, open research that they copy from in their patented technologies, without having to give anything in return. '... all the investments (collectively hundreds of millions USD) made by the industry for the new video codec [HEVC] will go up in smoke and AOM's royalty free model will spread to other business segments as well.' And here we see why patents are very much a monopoly mechanism; faced with free-market competition, monopolies inevitably fall apart.