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26th November 2023, 04:13 | #1 | Link | |
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Netflix Loses Patent Dispute to Broadcom in Germany, Ordered to Stop Using HEVC
Turns out HEVC does have "content fees" after all:
https://www.nexttv.com/news/achtung-...c-to-stream-4k https://www.broadbandtvnews.com/2023...inging-patent/ Quoting from the second article: Quote:
This is also probably why free-to-view platforms such as YouTube and Twitch have steered clear of HEVC and have adopted VP9 as their post-H.264 codec... Netflix will probably sign a license and pass the "content fee" to its subscribers, free-to-view platforms can't do that. This means that a ruling like the above for a free-to-view platform would mean being stuck with tons of HEVC-encoded content (that cost time and electricity to encode) that can't be streamed to users. The whole "one format to rule them all" idea is nice as an engineer's fantasy, but economic realities are dictating what actually happens. Anyway, looks like we have two post-H.264 codecs: HEVC (for subscription content and broadcast) and VP9 (for free-to-view). And then there's AV1 which is theoretically competing with VVC but actually competing with HEVC on internet subscription content and is also used for free-to-view. Last edited by kurkosdr; 26th November 2023 at 05:53. |
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26th November 2023, 06:04 | #3 | Link | |
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Basically, royalties apply for decoders, encoders, and transmission of encoded content (the last referred to as "content fees"). I trust YouTube (Google) have done their research and realised that HEVC can't be considered to be clear of "content fees" for free-to-view, and they are better of going to VP9 and AV1 (and streaming 1080p H.264 to UltraHD SmartTVs that support HEVC but not VP9). What we know is that there Broadcom is collecting "content fees", and there is no known waiver for free-to-view from Broadcom's side. And since the whole reason those patent holders broke off from MPEG LA was to milk their patents more aggressively, I wouldn't be too optimistic on such a waiver existing. Last edited by kurkosdr; 26th November 2023 at 06:07. |
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26th November 2023, 13:44 | #4 | Link |
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Well it speaks more for that there wasnt any, at least netflix didnt pay broadcom any But whats at least for sure, is that this proves the skepticals right, you are defiantly open to patent issues when having a service using HEVC.
From the looks of it broadcom has had Netflix in it sights for quite some time, filing patent infringements all over the place, saying that they are using their technology while undermining their STB/cable business. Just look at some of them on this filing: "Dynaimc Network Load Balacing Heterogeneous Link Speed", "System and method for Procesing Data Using a Network", "Multiple Pathway Session Setup to Support QoS Sercices" etc. Actually only two of the nine are video-compression related. https://www.documentcloud.org/docume...oadcom-Netflix As thay also have a bunch of HEVC related once they have been using those as well (from what I can see is that they also been filing h264 related ones), and from the looks of it, one of those worked. Here is patent in question: https://data.epo.org/publication-ser...8&iepatch=.pdf It will be very interesting to see that fallout of this, could have a huge impact that goes beyond Netflix not offering HEVC in Germany. The question is also if Broadcom is specificly targeting HEVC licensing fees, or if this is more a tactic cause Netflix didnt want to sign a license agreement with them, that seemed to cover a lot of more technologies than just video-compression. Last edited by excellentswordfight; 26th November 2023 at 13:53. |
26th November 2023, 18:31 | #5 | Link |
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I don't know that there will be a huge impact. From what I have been able to observe, most places/services have avoided HEVC which has resulted in a chicken & egg scenario where it isn't offered because nobody has it because it isn't offered.
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26th November 2023, 22:23 | #6 | Link |
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If all the HEVC patent holders wanted to waive "content-fees" (at least for free-to-view internet content), they would all do it tomorrow, and publicly so. The fact they don't is highly suspicious, it reeks of "let them adopt it first (and spend their time and electricity encoding to it), and then we'll come and collect".
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27th November 2023, 03:05 | #8 | Link | |
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Apple's also been all-in on HEVC for their devices, with it as their default video recording format AND image format (HEIC). |
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27th November 2023, 04:41 | #10 | Link | |
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https://support.google.com/youtube/answer/7126552 and doesn't use HEVC at all. They even have an HDR channel with HDR PQ videos: https://www.youtube.com/@TheHDRChannel I've attached the specs of the VP9 and AV1 streams of a video from the above channel below. The issue with Google's approach is that practically all UHD TVs support HEVC with HDR10, while not all UHD TVs support VP9 with HDR10 (minimum), which means that on TVs that don't support at least VP9 with HDR10, YouTube will top out either at 1080p H.264 or 2160p VP9 SDR (depending on what the TV does support). Netflix is a paid service though, and not providing HDR10 on UHD TVs could lead some people to stop paying for the premium tier of the subscription, so they have to do HEVC. Also, YouTube's streams don't do HDR10+ (don't know if Netflix does), not to say YouTube's HDR10 is bad for free-to-view video (also, HDR10+ coming sometime I am told). So, it boils down to: Is supporting HDR on older UHD TVs and providing HDR10+ worth paying the "content fee" for your streaming service? That depends on the streaming service. And that's how economic realities decide the formats. Code:
General Complete name : <path>/Real 4K HDR 60fps: Sony Food Fizzle in HDR VP9.webm Format : WebM Format version : Version 4 File size : 276 MiB Duration : 1 min 22 s Overall bit rate : 28.2 Mb/s Frame rate : 59.940 FPS Writing application : google/video-file Writing library : google/video-file Video ID : 1 Format : VP9 Format profile : 2 Format level : 5.1 HDR format : SMPTE ST 2086, HDR10 compatible Codec ID : V_VP9 Duration : 1 min 22 s Bit rate : 27.1 Mb/s Width : 3 840 pixels Height : 2 160 pixels Display aspect ratio : 16:9 Frame rate mode : Constant Frame rate : 59.940 FPS Color space : YUV Chroma subsampling : 4:2:0 (Type 0) Bit depth : 10 bits Bits/(Pixel*Frame) : 0.054 Stream size : 265 MiB (96%) Language : English Default : Yes Forced : No Color range : Limited Color primaries : BT.2020 Transfer characteristics : PQ Matrix coefficients : BT.2020 non-constant Mastering display color primaries : R: x=1.000000 y=1.000000, G: x=1.000000 y=1.000000, B: x=1.000000 y=1.000000, White point: x=1.000000 y=1.000000 Mastering display luminance : min: 0.1000 cd/m2, max: 0 cd/m2 Code:
General Complete name : <path>/Real 4K HDR 60fps: Sony Food Fizzle in HDR AV1.mp4 Format : dash Codec ID : dash (iso6/av01/mp41) File size : 266 MiB Duration : 1 min 22 s Overall bit rate : 27.2 Mb/s Frame rate : 59.940 FPS Encoded date : 2022-09-17 16:55:47 UTC Tagged date : 2022-09-17 16:55:47 UTC Video ID : 1 Format : AV1 Format/Info : AOMedia Video 1 Format profile : Main@L5.1 HDR format : SMPTE ST 2086, HDR10 compatible Codec ID : av01 Duration : 1 min 22 s Bit rate : 27.2 Mb/s Width : 3 840 pixels Height : 2 160 pixels Display aspect ratio : 16:9 Frame rate mode : Constant Frame rate : 59.940 (60000/1001) FPS Color space : YUV Chroma subsampling : 4:2:0 Bit depth : 10 bits Bits/(Pixel*Frame) : 0.055 Stream size : 266 MiB (100%) Title : ISO Media file produced by Google Inc. Encoded date : 2022-09-17 16:55:47 UTC Tagged date : 2022-09-17 16:55:47 UTC Color range : Limited Color primaries : BT.2020 Transfer characteristics : PQ Matrix coefficients : BT.2020 non-constant Mastering display color primaries : R: x=1.000000 y=1.000000, G: x=1.000000 y=1.000000, B: x=1.000000 y=1.000000, White point: x=1.000000 y=1.000000 Mastering display luminance : min: 0.1000 cd/m2, max: 1 cd/m2 Codec configuration box : av1C Last edited by kurkosdr; 27th November 2023 at 05:01. |
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28th November 2023, 02:15 | #11 | Link | |||||
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All premium services support HDR on lots of TVs that don't have decoders for AV1. Everyone launched HDR on HEVC, and will still deliver somewhere between 100%-40% of HDR as HEVC. AV1 is still a couple years out from critical mass, and there wasn't ever a x265-competitive VP9 HDR encoder in terms of quality @ perf @ bitrate. Quote:
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Lots of streaming services include HDR10+ in all their HDR-10 streams by default. |
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28th November 2023, 11:06 | #12 | Link | |
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28th November 2023, 19:03 | #13 | Link | |
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And one fun fact: On Firefox, even H.264 is not playable without system codecs, but almost every computer made from 2009 and onwards has an H.264 system codec (save for some Desktop Linux distros), so again, it's a problem no non-engineer cares about. Last edited by kurkosdr; 28th November 2023 at 19:19. |
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28th November 2023, 21:21 | #16 | Link | |
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they says it is just supporting Constrained Baseline, but it should actually also supports Main and High profiles. |
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28th November 2023, 21:34 | #18 | Link | |
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And even when a AV1 software decoder exists, premium content DRM requirements typically mandate HW DRM for HDR and UHD. Battery life playing a two hour movie in 4K 10-bit SW decode can also be materially lower than with a HW decoder. |
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28th November 2023, 21:36 | #19 | Link | |
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(even when targeting really slow SW decoders, Constrained Baseline + 8x8 blocks from High Profile is still better and a tiny bit faster to decode). |
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3rd December 2023, 03:23 | #20 | Link | |
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This means that if a movie or a documentary goes on air on linear TV it is also gonna be in HLG (90% of the times it's converted from PQ by basically taking the input in, finding the MaxCLL value in the metadata or a sidecar xml, mapping whatever that was to 1000 nits HLG - unless it's lower than 1000 nits - and then encoding). Sometimes it becomes a tedious process as it also involves getting the conversion process (and specially created LUTs) signed off by the majors owning the content that gets delivered. Running linear channels nowadays isn't easy as you quite literally need to produce the UHD HDR HLG BT2020 50p version for the UHD channel that gets encoded in H.265, the FULL HD BT709 SDR 25i version for the FULL HD channel that gets encoded in H.264 and the SD BT601 SDR 25i version for the SD channel that gets encoded in MPEG-2. I still dream of the day in which we'll be able to get rid of SD and MPEG-2 from the face of the Earth once and for all... Anyway the point being that those linear channel companies most often than not also have a (limited) streaming service and you can bet anything you want that anything UHD in there is also gonna be HLG 'cause the last thing they want is asking the staff to create yet another version, only in PQ perhaps, just for the streaming service, 'cause that would require time, effort and would also cost money as it would need to go down the whole processing chain again, I mean encoding, loudness correction, QC, distribution etc. Last edited by FranceBB; 3rd December 2023 at 03:28. |
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content-fees, h.265, hevc, licensing, patents |
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