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News from the Linux front
The lack of DVD support for Linux has come to the forefront lately, pushing some developers to come up with solutions that included an unauthorized DVD decoder for Linux, which resulted in lawsuits filed by the DVD industry.
InterVideo has a long-standing Content Scrambling System (CSS) license, enabling it to produce and market DVD player/decoder software without violating copyright or other laws.
InterVideo sales and marketing head Joe Monastiero says the Linux platform presents a variety of opportunities for the company to expand its existing technology base, including DVD software.
"Of notable interest is the set-top environment; however, even the PC space has enough interest in Linux to make our development worthwhile," he said. "Additionally, as should be obvious based on the reports generated by Wired News a few months ago regarding DVD and Linux, the reason why the CSS hack was done for the Linux community is because traditional Windows multimedia developers writing Linux code are not exactly plentiful."
The product, dubbed LinDVD, will allow users to play back DVD movies, interactive DVD titles, MPEG video content, and Video CDs on PCs that are equipped with a DVD drive without the need for a hardware decoder card. The decoder/player includes integrated MPEG1 and MPEG2 file playback, a powerful VCD 2.0 player, and SVCD playback. A full multi-channel Dolby Digital (TM) audio decoder will be included.
LinDVD will be available late spring and will be priced at $29.95. If "someone writes a multichannel audio driver for their Linux sound card," Monastiero said, "the multichannel version would be $49.95 and would support full 5.1 output."
In keeping with the spirit of open source ethics, Monastiero says that InterVideo is looking at ways to open up as much of the product as possible to the OS community.
"Certainly, there will be an [application programming interface] published to create unique user experiences and [user interfaces]," he said. "We are also looking at ways to help developers port drivers to our code.
"But the CSS, Dolby, and navigation code will definitely not be open source. We're doing this to add a legal player to the market that the DVD industry can also be happy with."
"This is another exciting day for the Linux community," said Linus Torvald, creator of the Linux operating system. "[Linux] continues to attract industry-leading software companies like InterVideo. Their digital video and audio products will greatly enhance the Linux multimedia experience."
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Related Wired Links:
DVD Battle Heats Up
Mar. 8, 2000
DVD Wars: Defense Rallies
Mar. 7, 2000
DVD Case in Open Source Forum
Feb. 4, 2000
DVD Case: It's a Linux Thing
Jan. 28, 2000
DVD Lawyers Make Secret Public
Jan. 26, 2000
More Bad News for DVD Hackers
Jan. 24, 2000
DVD Case: Battle of the Basics
Jan. 20, 2000
DVD Round 1 Goes to Hackers
Dec. 29, 1999
DVD Hackers Hit With Lawsuit
Dec. 28, 1999
The DVD Hack: What Next?
Nov. 4, 1999
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