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#title: ASF: changing copyright rules by means of patents

#descr: Microsoft has prohibited a Free Software programmer from writing
import/export filters for its Advanced Streaming Format (ASF).  The
programmer wanted interoperability with a format that Microsoft is
promoting.  But for Microsoft, interoperability is in this case doubly
disadvantageous:  besides reducing the lock-in effect, on which
Microsoft's platform strategy relies, it also can circumvent the locks
on unauthorized copying, by which Microsoft wants to attract content
providers to its ASF platform.  Whereas in the DeCSS case a court
ruling was necessary to enforce new draconian copyright provisions of
the highly disputed Digital Millenium Act, in the ASF case a simple
patent suffices to achieve the same legislative goal.

#TFa: Avery Lee, author of VirtualDub reports the sad news: %(bq:Today I
received a polite phone call from a fellow at Microsoft who works in
the Windows Media group. He informed me that Microsoft has
intellectual property rights on the ASF format and told me that,
although the implementation was still illegal since it infringed on
Microsoft patents. I have asked for the specific patent numbers, since
I find patenting a file format a bit strange. At his request, and much
to my own sadness, I have removed support for ASF in VirtualDub 1.3d,
since I cannot risk a legal confrontation.)

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