sysKin can't work on x264 anymore

[superdump]

Before I begin this post I would like to make the point that I wish for this to remain as a friendly discussion. It would be a bad thing if this were to degenerate into a flame war or similar and the discussion be lost and essentially barred from the forum.

There are few developers working on x264 at the moment and I would like to attempt to gather more interest.

A number of highly skilled individuals receiving offers they cannot realistically refuse for careers in this field. My personal view is one of complete support for the individuals as if I were to be in a similar situation I would do the same.

There is a suspicion, which may be unfounded though seeming increasingly likely, that Nero is trying to buy up all the skilled programmers working on rival freeware opensource codecs (XviD and x264 at least) to reduce competition and boost their workforce. Of course there is nothing illegal or immoral (unless you're anti-corporation ;)) about this, however it is saddening to see projects such as this go under because of such tactics.

So, my theory is that I will do my best to learn C, assembler and all about AVC as fast as I can so that I may be able to contribute to the project and later be bought up by Nero. :) Who's with me?!

x264's progress has been very promising of late as the members of this forum may well know as I imagine you have been following fairly closely. akupenguin is a legend and I for one am incredibly grateful for his work on this encoder, but I feel we should not rely on him to keep it going.

Find us at #x264 on irc.freenode.net

Over and out.

[pest]

i would like to join in any way...

i'm skilled at c, c++, asm

i'm mostly into algorithms
rate-control and frame-type decisions are not my list :(

and i just don't know where i could be usefull
someone needs 8x8 dct in 3dnow? ;)

regards

[superdump]

Cool. I'm by no means a project leader or anything. I just felt like posting on here after hearing the 'good/bad' news. You probably want to talk to akupenguin (pengvado on IRC) about what's going on. I didn't expect such a quick response. :)

[pest]

the only problem is, that i'm working on a big project on my own...
but reading for example the xvid-source is no problem for me,
...see you on irc, next week :)

edit: oh read too fast, i try to contact akupenguin instead

[superdump]

Come on IRC anyway, it's probably easier to talk to him there.

Nice to see another person who uses lots of smilies. :D

[virus]

Yes, there we go. Radek has just signed a contract with Nero and won't even finish his new ME for x264. And possibly won't work on XviD anymore too. akupenguin has been invited by Nero, though he has not signed anything yet, so he still works on the codec (and he does a lot of job on x264!).

The point is: x264 is at risk of dying by the beginning of the summer (aku won't work on it for the summer I guess, but it's hard to tell what will happen later - he may not return back). All of that thanks to Nero's tactics. Cheers, Bill Gates would be proud of you, dear Nero Software.

Believe me, there are many things that can be said. I just want to make some points. Nero's guys say they do this to give an "opportunity to let people work on what they like". Yeah.

Then, why instead of hiring some talented professionals which can work full-time, they want to recruit a couple of talented students that can only work part-time or for a summer internship? And why just after the person has become a regular contributor to x264? And why now, they couldn't wait until this person graduates for example? Why, if they do that just for getting good people (and not for destroying the competition), they don't allow explicitly any more work on x264?

My personal answer is simple: because that "we give you an opportunity" thingie is just an excuse for trying to destroy their best competitor. And that way they hurt an entire community too, but who cares about the casualties? Getting more and more money is more important after all, no? Think about it, next time you offer them your betatesting time for free. Anyway, this is just my personal opinion. Feel free to disagree.

Anyway I want to make well clear that I'm speaking against Nero and not against anyone, especially Radek who, I assume, needs money for paying his studies, and so of course he made a good choice (from his standpoint). I feel that people should know about Nero's tactics anyway.

I really would like to have time to learn the standard and try to help, but I lack aku's and sysKin's talent for doing so. And I also lack time, since I'm not a student anymore (and you know, open source software mainly blossoms in the universities).

I just hope some new skilled regular contributors for the core may appear soon. Otherwise, the project is likely to stall for a long time. I still hope in akupenguin, because he may be able to help again in the future and because he's really a great coder, but seeing how people is simply disappearing after touching x264 and how much work the codec still needs, I'm a bit depressed. And very, very angry.

cheers,
virus :(

[pest]

i would go if bill himself phones ;)

i've followed some of these things on hydrogenaudio, and yes it's sad
i'm no student...but...
now i feel like dropping my auspicious wavelet-codec :D
i'm reading doom9 since 4 years
perhaps it's time to contribute?

i have the feeling that the main part of the core is done
and now it's time to optimize the whole thing
and that's what i love

[Maximillius]

Originally posted by virus
Believe me, there are many things that can be said. I just want to make some points. Nero's guys say they do this to give an "opportunity to let people work on what they like". Yeah.

Well if this wasn't something that they wanted to work on, they wouldn't have accepted Nero's offer. It's not like Nero can force anyone to leave the projects they are working on to come work for them. Secondly, what is such the big deal about Nero wanting to hire good programmers to work for them? Are they only supposed to hire the crappy programmers? I don't get it.

[superdump]

OT: You have a wavelett codec? Post a thread about it so we can see. :)

[Doom9]

Well, it's sad but that's the world of business for you.

There have been many other examples of that sort in the past:
Part of Nero's AAC encoder team (old HA fellows will remember)
DVDShrink
Derrow (321 Software)
Brent Beyeler (bbmpeg, he works for Mainconcept if I'm not mistaken)

We all need to make a living somehow.. and if you write software as a hobby and get a good offer to do it professionally it makes sense to take it. And contracts that forbid you to do certain things are not unheard of. I'm not allowed to write certain kind of software for the next 2 or 3 years as well because of a previous engagement. Good thing nobody ruled out work as a webmaster and forum admin ;)

Something gets me wondering though: Ateme is their video codec partner and Nero didn't really need anybody working on video codecs. Makes one think, doesn't it?

And it could've been Microsoft after all. If anyone is interested, Microsoft is actually looking for video and audio engineers.

[superdump]

I think Nero use in-house decoders in their software releases, in which case they would need codec engineers for this, but surely they already have some?

Some good points their Doom9. I also remember a lot of people at HA getting 'eaten up' by Nero but as you say, and I completely agree, if they get an offer to do what they're already doing while getting paid for it then why not? :)

[Sirber]

Did divx bought xvid devs?

[virus]

Originally posted by Maximillius
Secondly, what is such the big deal about Nero wanting to hire good programmers to work for them? Are they only supposed to hire the crappy programmers? I don't get it.
I've already made my point clear on the subject, just read what I wrote after the sentence you've quoted. I just want to remind that akupenguin and sysKin *aren't* the only two smart programmers on the face of earth with knowledge on video coding. So it's not really "hire those two or you're out of business".

AFAIK Nero is a German firm. And, for example, German universities produce several good graduated coders with experience on video coding, because there's quite a bit of research on this field there. Same applies to nearby France. Yet, they roam to USA and Australia to hire two students. Two talented ones, but not yet professionals.

You see I'm very skeptical about that. I don't want to build a conspiracy theory at all costs, but I see too much coincidences here, especially considering x264's outstanding rise in the last 3 months. Radek has worked for years with XviD for example, but only recently he has joined x264. Same applies to akupenguin, who has been contacted right after becoming the de-facto x264's lead developer and producing several important work on it.

This makes you think.


@Doom9:

"Ateme is their video codec partner and Nero didn't really need anybody working on video codecs. Makes one think, doesn't it?"

Good point :)

[Doom9]

I've already made my point clear on the subject, just read what I wrote after the sentence you've quoted. I just want to remind that akupenguin and sysKin *aren't* the only two smart programmers on the face of earth with knowledge on video coding. So it's not really "hire those two or you're out of business".
Put yourself in Nero's position though and things look quite differently. Hey, we have our biggest competitor trying to hire off people regularly. And considering they have a quasi monopoly, they can affort higher salaries, and eventually crushing us by buying projects. It isn't just about people being good, it's also about them not competing with you.

I'd very much like x264 to be in the AVC realm what XviD is in the ASP realm.. and perhaps by now companies have smartened up to realize that a good free competititor can cut into your business.

[Sirber]

They want the market badly...

[bond]

my cents:

nero started with buying opensource/free software devs a long time ago already, eg when entering the aac encoding market they bought ivan dimkovic, together with his (still freely available) aacenc, which is an early version of the todays nero aac encoder. they also bought menno, who was the original developer of faac (now doesnt work on it anymore of course) and faad (which he still works on)
so it might very well be that nero realised that hiring oss devs is a cheap way of recruiting good people
but it might also very well be a move to harm xvid and x264, which indeed are big competitors to nero

the funny thing is when entering the video market, they hired an external codec producer, ateme, and did not produce it themselves, but after syskin already showed that he is a great dev for years on xvid, suddenly they hired him when he meant to start working on x264, an upcoming competitor to neros new avc codec, on which he will not be allowed to work on anymore of course
also they tried to hire pengvado and ateme did hire fenrir, the original author of x264, who of course now also doesnt work on it anymore

propably its both:
- get rid of nasty and popular opensource competing products by swallowing their devs
- get people, you know to be good thanks to the oss software, for propably relatively not much money (as they are students, unemployed aso...). altough often they than dont work on audio/video codecs at nero/ateme anyways


so if you want to get a job at nero or ateme, start developing x264! nero is aiming high and still has lots of money to give :D

[virus]

Originally posted by Doom9
Put yourself in Nero's position though and things look quite differently. Hey, we have our biggest competitor trying to hire off people regularly. And considering they have a quasi monopoly, they can affort higher salaries, and eventually crushing us by buying projects. It isn't just about people being good, it's also about them not competing with you.
I see you point. But unfortunately, if the big companies want to buy off the medium ones, and the medium ones want to buy off the smaller ones, and both the medium and the smaller ones react by recruiting all OS devs they can find, then the very existence of OS software is threatened, at least in the video coding domain (and probably in many other domains, where a professional career is in sight after you've contributed good code to some OS project).

I may sound pathetic but I still feel the need to speak out about this situation, sorry. Especially because it's the large community of OS software users which will be damaged the more. :(

[Andrey]

Yeah. Nero begin such a politics long ago by hiring I.Dimkovich and M.Bakker. Now they realize that they could achieve two goals with it :(
On the other hand, some people that I respect much can now work on what they like (I hope) and get payed...
Many things have light and dark side merged together. :)
Anyway, it's a huge loss for x264 codec and community...
EDIT:
>>Then, why instead of hiring some talented professionals which can
>>work full-time, they want to recruit a couple of talented students
>>that can only work part-time or for a summer internship?
Heh. I'm a senior system analyst working in the bank. I was bought :) from rather big development company (may be you heard of it: one of the east europe big devs - Exigen). My two programers were taken from them too. Not because I'm evil :cool: , but because I have to complete my projects, but good Domino specialists are VERY hard to find here.
As I understand, situation is similiar in any field: there are huge number of people that know how to write two sentences in a M$ Word, can master one table in M$ Access. But when things going to jdbc, multi-thread applications, data integration (I'm not talking of special things like programming full-text indexes, video encoding or other very narrowed things that require a lot of expirience) and so on you can not find a good specialist, just because any good specialist is empoyed already. So, you have the only option to buy him...

[IgorC]

May be Nero or/and Ateme are developing AVC High Profile that´s why they need more engineers

[Andrey]

>>May be Nero or/and Ateme are developing AVC High Profile
They are, I think, because JohnV or somebody from their team already posted it here.
Also, they developing multi-platform solution (at least linux involved) and AVC for portables...

[Leo 69]

@ IgorC

Ateme did the AVC high profile a big while ago, don't know why they can't insert it in Recode..

[IgorC]

Originally posted by Leo 69
@ IgorC

Ateme did the AVC high profile a big while ago, don't know why they can't insert it in Recode..

If I wasn´t mistaking, it wasn´t a final version. In doom9´s comparing test it says it´s far from any release. Just try to read without losing details.

[superdump]

I wouldn't say it's far from release at all. Ateme's High Profile could probably be released now. I know one member of their group (Nero/Ateme) is pushing for its release. They're probably keeping it back as a 'secret weapon' because they're still ahead of the rest at the moment.

OT: If Snow had good RC it would be a very big contender from my testing.

[DeathTheSheep]

I see. What stage IS x264 in development? I hear that

x264:AVC:now == divx:ASP:v2.0

which means that x264 is where DivX2 was in terms of quality (of course, for the different standards).

Even so, because AVC as a standard is so phenominally good, a 2/6 beats ASP 6/6.

So where would SNOW be? Wavelet 1.0 vs. ASP 6.0? So if it reached the maturity of what 6.0 is to ASP, it would whoop both AVC and ASP? That would truly bite.

But perhaps I'm wrong. I beleive, however, that the developers need to be bought quickly in order to prevent it from reaching the fabled, legendary (likely nonexistent) 100% effeciency, because then it would be too late. Simply get the creators before they can create something that would destroy you. Proper buisness logic, correct?

[superdump]

x264 is indeed doing very well and PSNR-wise has been approaching that of Ateme/Nero's AVC codec. It is not as good visually however and it is a little slower. But their AVC codec contains a number of features which are yet to be implemented in x264 (RDO for one). As you have pointed out, there's still a lot of progress to be made before maturity. :) That's the exciting thing about all this.

Snow is also right up there, as I stated, but that's for another thread.

EDIT: The above has been edited for a misinterpretation.

[Doom9]

@virus: keep in mind how many actively developed open source projects there are, corporate buyouts notwithstanding. Some even manage to make it a business without straying from the open source model (mysql as a prominent example). And Linux is being used widely even in the corporate world.. yet it is still open source. An open source project thrives if there are enough sufficiently motivated people that do not depend solely on the skills they bring to a project to make a living. Most companies oppose that their hired programmers do the same work they do during the day during the night and release it for free..

And the AVC high profile encoder from ateme that I tested really was far from release. I'm not sure I'm at liberty to say where it stands now. Either way, 3 months ago it wasn't such a great thing... most of you would probably not have spotted the difference in a blind test (me included.. knowing which codec you're looking at can be a curse).

[IgorC]

SO next version of Recode2 : revXXX patch by Ateme, Syskin - import x264 rev178 :p

[Teegedeck]

Sad, sad. Well, people gotta make a living, and I cannot say that Menno and Ivan being hired by Ahead kept me from using HE AAC. All these nice words by Ahead are of course really just makebelief, this is business. It is not like they were supporting an open source project or like Nero was free Software that kicks a**, like Firefox or OpenOffice, and Ahead ain't Sun. Smart move, again, Ahead!

So, we are forced to use an encoding application that seriously sucks (Recode) if we want to encode in top-notch h.264? That is a reason for me to postpone any plans for 'migration to AVC' for the foreseeable future... No, this certainly isn't a development to be celebrated, although I'm happy for sysKin as well as for any other nice, talented person who gets the chance to do what he does and likes best and gets an income from it. Good luck!

[Tommy Carrot]

Well, it's a great loss, but Syskin only recently began working on x264, most of the development was done by Akupenguin anyway. What's the deal with him, has he joined to Nero too? If not, then not everything is lost, the development can progress further, maybe with a bit slower pace.

[RadicalEd]

Always a shame to see cash replace community as the source of motivation for creators. On the other hand, good to see sysKin recieve some compensation for his work, outside of pats on the back. I don't know whether to be happy for him or sad for us :|

[IgorC]

is it our deal? Good or bad? It´s only deal of Syskin. So people don´t cry here. Nothing is free and we know it. What are you suppose to do? To work for free .. for fun ... . What´s about family about future of children and other things.

[Teegedeck]

Originally posted by Tommy Carrot
Well, it's a great loss, but Syskin only recently began working on x264, most of the development was done by Akupenguin anyway. What's the deal with him, has he joined to Nero too? If not, then not everything is lost, the development can progress further, maybe with a bit slower pace.
On the other hand, should he sign, too, Nero's AVC should 'get ahead' quickly...

[Doom9]

I don't know whether to be happy for him or sad for us :| I think you can be both at the same time.

Gotta ask the guys at ateme what this could mean since they are supposed to deliver the video codec. Until today I thought if anybody was hiring it would be ateme.

[Blue_MiSfit]

So, we are forced to use an encoding application that seriously sucks (Recode) if we want to encode in top-notch h.264? That is a reason for me to postpone any plans for 'migration to AVC' for the foreseeable future... No, this certainly isn't a development to be celebrated, although I'm happy for sysKin as well as for any other nice, talented person who gets the chance to do what he does and likes best and gets an income from it. Good luck!



My sentiments EXACTLY.

We'll miss you sysKin :)

[akupenguin]

Originally posted by pest
and i just don't know where i could be usefull
someone needs 8x8 dct in 3dnow? Eventually.

i have the feeling that the main part of the core is done
and now it's time to optimize the whole thing
and that's what i love It's not done in terms of either features or algorithms, and there's a chance even that the whole macroblock analysis thing will be restructured. But that doesn't mean it can't use optimizing.

[Teegedeck]

Originally posted by Blue_MiSfit

We'll miss you sysKin :)
And the Totoro. :)

[dragongodz]

its interesting how open source/freeware has become a real competitor nowdays. so much so that companies look to hire the programmers to both boost their own programs and to slow or kill the competitor. this has been going on for years and not only by nero. so people should not be surprised.

[virus]

Originally posted by Teegedeck Originally posted by Blue_MiSfit

We'll miss you sysKin :)
And the Totoro. :)
Well, guys, let's not make it look like a funeral :D

I hope sysKin will drop a line sometimes. Though admittely I'm still shocked. He announced to be ready to work on x264 just a little time ago and was so enthusiast to work on a new project. I hope he will be happy with his new job too... even though, according to sysKin himself, Nero made him sign a contract (which prevents work on "competing products" -> all ASP and AVC basically, since Nero is on both markets) without even telling him what he's gonna do - feel free to intepret this move as you wish...

Anyway he was working on some promising new ME code and now that won't make into x264 anymore. Also XviD will miss his creative bugs :( That's a little disaster for us, but after 2.5+ years of great patches, we really cannot pretend anything more from him. So let's just say "thanks Radek and good luck" :)

virus

[BoNz1]

Well, what can I say? sysKin has done some amazing work in XviD and also x264. And he will be sorely missed, no doubt. I understand that ateme and nero's business seem a little hard to swallow, like other people have said other good developers should take notice. If you are looking to get a good job at ateme or nero just send some good patches to the x264 mailing list :P. If you write good code, if seems they will have to hire you. Then everyone benefits, I guess.

BTW sysKin, I hope you will still hang out on IRC some. I know you won't be able to tease us with a new 'bug' you invented and we won't be able harrass you to code some new feature but whatever, its all good :).

I would like to learn how to code better myself but I am a full time student and I don't study anything computer science related. Which means when I crack open a book about writing C or assembler I get bored of it really quickly since I have to do so more reading for other courses too. Maybe one day I can get involved too. I have done a lot of math/calculus.

[sysKin]

Originally posted by virus
Originally posted by Teegedeck
Originally posted by Blue_MiSfit
We'll miss you sysKin

And the Totoro.

Well, guys, let's not make it look like a funeral :D

Whoa, my thoughts exactly.

I am not leaving this board, ever ;)

Oh, and it's funny how none of you said that maybe, just maybe, our involvement will turn Recode into the second best thing after sliced bread. After all, don't tell me you only ever used and will use Free software?
Just a thought ;D

Radek

[Axed]

Thats great to hear that you got a job doing what you enjoy (i hope so anyway) sysKin.

I think its good for the programmers who are being picked up by the big corporations after doing such important work in the open source community. Hopefully it will inspire equally skilled people to join the open source community efforts in an attempt to secure themselves jobs at a big corporation doing something they enjoy.

Alot of these projects arent just about 'doing it for the community', i believe they are also for the young guy who noone has ever heard of making an impact and causing people who can actually pay, to look at them, and hopefully give them a job and experience that will last them a lifetime.

[Neo Neko]

Indeed syskin. Indeed.

I think we were all a bit devided on this. Super happy for your good fortune. And very sad that you had to leave the X264 project before you really got going. Not to mention your work on Xvid.

Lets just remember folks Nero has done nothing wrong here. In fact they are after a fashion fostering involvement in opensource even as they remove people from it. Though I think they and others could be doing more. Companies like Nero etc need to do more than just see opensource as a handy hiring pool and possible competition. IBM/Novell have gotten the closest so far. Hiring opensource developers etc to work on their opensource projects. Opensource as competition is such a narrowminded view. Everyone can benefit from opensource. Even these businesses. And some are figuring it out. There are of course downsides. You don't have total controll. And you can't exclude competitors. But it's not as bad as it sounds either. You don't have as much staffing costs etc and some free work force. And with key guiding members of a project on the payroll you have a great degree of controll. I'm not saying that Nero should opensource all their software. Far from it. But it seems a bit needless to hire someone from an opensource project to do possibly duplicate work on a closed source component to be integrated into a much larger software. Especially when the opensource project could have been integrated and used more or less just as well. Business needs to learn to foster opensource more and in a stategic way. That way everyone gets what they want.

[Teegedeck]

My thoughts exactly. :) Also, when Ateme's AVC came out I was quite puzzled that I found that I didn't like using it as soon as it left the 'closed beta testing' stage. And that I didn't enjoy the beta testing as much as testing open source software. So I guess I'll have to stick with testing bleeding edge open source software in order to satisfy my sick desires...

[JohnV]

Originally posted by virus
I've already made my point clear on the subject, just read what I wrote after the sentence you've quoted. I just want to remind that akupenguin and sysKin *aren't* the only two smart programmers on the face of earth with knowledge on video coding. So it's not really "hire those two or you're out of business".

AFAIK Nero is a German firm. And, for example, German universities produce several good graduated coders with experience on video coding, because there's quite a bit of research on this field there. Same applies to nearby France. Yet, they roam to USA and Australia to hire two students. Two talented ones, but not yet professionals.

You see I'm very skeptical about that. I don't want to build a conspiracy theory at all costs, but I see too much coincidences here, especially considering x264's outstanding rise in the last 3 months. Radek has worked for years with XviD for example, but only recently he has joined x264. Same applies to akupenguin, who has been contacted right after becoming the de-facto x264's lead developer and producing several important work on it.

This makes you think.


@Doom9:

"Ateme is their video codec partner and Nero didn't really need anybody working on video codecs. Makes one think, doesn't it?"

Good point :) Well, your conspiracy theory is wrong. I was asked to help look for a few potential developers for us. I don't know any good devs which German universities produce because I work from Finland, but I know people working on xvid and x264 projects from doom9-community, #xvid and #mpeg -IRC channels. I know they are capable devs, they have already proven that they can produce code in real life video projects very nicely, something which often even many graduated coders lack in comparison. So of course I ask people like Radek and Loren, because I know about their work and I see them on IRC and they are talented. Simple as that. If they accept, it's their choice which they are free to do.

[Doom9]

Oh, and it's funny how none of you said that maybe, just maybe, our involvement will turn Recode into the second best thing after sliced breadConsidering its architecture and lockout tendencies I have my doubts. One of the most requested ND features is after all a way to use the codec in alternative tools. Sure, Recode is good for newbies, but in this place, a VfW codec or a public release of encavc would be much more welcome. You of all people know best what happened when the x264 VfW was released and how many people used it before that.

@JohnV: Wouldn't ateme need more coders to finish the high profile codec. I can't quite help but feel a bit puzzled about the need for people who work on a codec's core.

[JohnV]

Originally posted by Doom9
@JohnV: Wouldn't ateme need more coders to finish the high profile codec. I can't quite help but feel a bit puzzled about the need for people who work on a codec's core. Ateme makes its own decisions. We have also inhouse video codec's core development like in MPEG2's case. I don't know exactly about our long term plans, and even if I knew, I can't talk about it, but we will have mpeg4 related projects these people are useful for..
And obviously talented people like Radek and Loren are good asset for any company on this area of business.. but it's not my decision who gets hired, and like I said, talented people probably end up discussing with us or someone else, and if both parties think that they can be useful to each others, then a contract is quite likely signed..

[SeeMoreDigital]

So I guess there's no need to have a separate "Mpeg4/AVC/H.264 section" on the forum after-all :(

Cheers

[JohnV]

Originally posted by SeeMoreDigital
So I guess there's no need to have a separate "Mpeg4/AVC/H.264 section" on the forum after-all :(

Cheers Take a look at the open source FAAD2 aac decoder project. Did the project die when Menno was hired few years ago, or is it probably the best aac decoder available now..

I just say that it's not Nero's benefit that mass h264 adoption slows down, so I don't think there's much need to worry..

[Tommy Carrot]

I think your analogy is not the most appropriate for this situation, i would rather compare x264 with faac. After Menno left faac project, it almost completely died soon after that, and years later faac is still not a serious player in the audio-coder world.

BTW, the problem is not that the AVC solution of Nero is not free, the problem is Recode. It doesn't matter that Nero has the best codec in the world, if we can only use it in Recode, which is a rather useless piece of software IMO, i'm very reluctant to use it, and there are many people who feel similarly. Hiring more codec-engineers won't solve this problem.

However i'm still curious, what's the deal with Akupenguin?

[JohnV]

Originally posted by Tommy Carrot
I think your analogy is not the most appropriate for this situation, i would rather compare x264 with faac. After Menno left faac project, it almost completely died soon after that, and faac is still not a serious player in the audio-coder world, years after that. To my knowledge Menno has also contibuted to FAAC after he was hired. All credit to Menno and FAAC, but he really wasn't so much into AAC encoding, he has always been more into decoding. Even inhouse he is working on the aac decoding side, while Ivan Dimkovic and I have been working on the aac encoder.
while we can only use it in Recode, which is a rather useless piece of software IMO, i'm very reluctant to use itWell, this isn't the most specific critique.. There will be something hopefully more handy soon.