[Savannah-hackers] No GIF please

[Loic Dachary]

        Hi,

        Your project pages on savannah.gnu.org use .gif files. Could
you please replace them by .png or .jpg files ? I include a full
explanation of the problems related to .gif files. Let us know if you
need more information.

        Thanks in advance,

--- http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/gif.html

  Why there are no GIF files on GNU web pages

   There  are  no GIFs on the GNU web site because of the patents (Unisys
   and  IBM)  covering  the  LZW  compression  algorithm which is used in
   making  GIF  files.  These  patents  make  it  impossible to have free
   software  to  generate  proper  GIFs.  They also apply to the compress
   program, which is why GNU does not use it or its format.

   Both  Unisys  and  IBM  applied for their patents in 1983, which means
   they will now expire in the year 2003. Until then, anyone who releases
   a  free  program  for  making GIF files is likely to be sued. We don't
   know  any  reason  to  think  that  the patent owners would lose these
   lawsuits.

   If  we  released  such  a program, Unisys and IBM might think it wiser
   (for public relations reasons) not to sue a charity like the FSF. They
   could  instead  sue  the users of the program, including the companies
   who  redistribute  GNU  software.  We feel it would not be responsible
   behavior for us to set up this situation.

   Many  people  think  that Unisys has given permission for distributing
   free  software  to  make  GIF  format.  Unfortunately that is not what
   Unisys  has actually done. Here is what Unisys actually said about the
   matter in 1995:

     Unisys  does  not  require  licensing,  or  fees  to  be  paid, for
     non-commercial,  non-profit GIF-based applications, including those
     for  use on the on-line services. Concerning developers of software
     for  the  Internet network, the same principle applies. Unisys will
     not   pursue   previous   inadvertent  infringement  by  developers
     producing  versions  of software products for the Internet prior to
     1995.  The  company  does not require licensing, or fees to be paid
     for non-commercial, non-profit offerings on the Internet, including
     "Freeware". 

   Unfortunately, this doesn't permit [7]free software, only [8]semi-free
   software  (18k  characters)  which  cannot be used in a free operating
   system  such as GNU. It also does not permit at all the use of LZW for
   other  purposes  such  as  compression of files. This is why we had to
   develop [9]GNU zip as a replacement for compress.

   [10]Commercial  redistribution of free software is very important, and
   we  want  the  GNU system as a whole to be redistributed commercially.
   This means we can't add a GIF-generating program to GNU, not under the
   Unisys terms.

   The  [11]Free  Software  Foundation  is  a  non-commercial, non-profit
   organization,  so  strictly  speaking  the  income  from  our sales of
   [12]CD-ROMs  is  not ``profit''. Perhaps this means we could include a
   GIF  program  on our CD-ROM and claim to be acting within the scope of
   the  Unisys  permission--or  perhaps not. But since we know that other
   redistributors  of GNU would be unable to include it, doing this would
   not be very useful.

   Shortly  after  Unisys  made its announcement, when the net in general
   was  reassured  thinking  that  Unisys  had  given permission for free
   GIF-generating  software,  we  wrote  to  the  Unisys legal department
   asking  for  clarification  of  these  issues.  We  did  not receive a
   response.

   Even  if  Unisys  really  did  give  permission  for  free software to
   generate  GIFs,  we would still have to deal with the IBM patent. Both
   the  IBM  and the Unisys patents cover the same ``invention''--the LZW
   compression algorithm. (This could reflect an error on the part of the
   US  Patent  and Trademark Office, which is famous for incompetence and
   poor judgment.)

   Decoding  GIFs  is  a  different issue. The Unisys and IBM patents are
   both  written  in such a way that they do not apply to a program which
   can  only  uncompress LZW format and cannot compress. Therefore we can
   and will include support for displaying GIF files in GNU software.

   Given  this  situation,  we  could  still include GIF files in our web
   pages  if  we  wanted to. Many other people would be happy to generate
   them  for  us,  and  we  would not be sued for having GIF files on our
   server.

   But  we feel that if we can't distribute the software to enable people
   to  generate  GIF files properly, then we should not have other people
   run such software for us. Besides, if we can't provide software in GNU
   to  generate  GIF  files,  we  have  to  recommend  an alternative. We
   ourselves should use the alternative that we recommend.

   In  1999,  Unisys  had  the  following to say about the issue of their
   patent:

     Unisys  has  frequently  been  asked  whether  a  Unisys license is
     required  in order to use LZW software obtained by downloading from
     the  Internet  or  from other sources. The answer is simple. In all
     cases,  a  written  license  agreement  or  statement  signed by an
     authorized  Unisys  representative  is required from Unisys for all
     use,  sale  or  distribution  of  any software (including so-called
     "freeware")  and/or  hardware  providing  LZW conversion capability
     (for example, downloaded software) 

   With  this  statement, Unisys is trying to take back what they said in
   1995 when they gave parts of the patent to the public. The legality of
   such a move is questionable.

   A  further  issue  is  that  the  LZW patents--and software patents in
   general--are  an offense against the freedom of programmers generally,
   and all programmers need to work together against software patents.

   So  even  if  we  could  find  a  solution to enable the free software
   community  to generate GIFs, that isn't really a solution, not for the
   problem  as  a  whole. The solution is switching to another format and
   not using GIF any more.

   Therefore, we don't use GIF, and we hope you won't use it either.

   It  is  possible  to make non-compressed images that act like GIFs, in
   that  they work with programs that decode GIF format. This can be done
   without  infringing  patents.  These  pseudo-GIFs  are useful for some
   purposes.

   It  is  also  possible  to  create GIFs using a patent-free run length
   encoding  but  this  doesn't achieve the compression that one normally
   expects in a GIF.

   We  decided  not to use these pseudo-GIFs on our web site because they
   are not a satisfactory solution to the community's problem. They work,
   but  they  are  very  large.  What  the  web  needs  is  a patent-free
   compressed format, not large pseudo-GIFs.

   [13]PNG  format  is  a  patent-free compressed format. We hope it will
   become  widely  supported;  then  we  will  use it. We do have [14]PNG
   versions of the images on this server.

   For more information about the GIF patent problems, see [15]the League
   for  Programming Freedom GIF page. Through that page you can find more
   information about the problem of software patents in general.

   [16]The  browser support page lists browsers which are compatible with
   the PNG format and comments on how well they support it.

   There's  a library called [17]libungif that reads gif files and writes
   uncompressed gifs to circumvent the Unisys patent.

   [18]http://burnallgifs.org  is a website devoted to discourage the use
   of GIF files on your website.
     _________________________________________________________________

    [19]Other Texts to Read
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   Copyright  (C)  1997,  1998,  1999  Free Software Foundation, Inc., 59
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   Verbatim  copying and distribution of this entire article is permitted
   in any medium, provided this notice is preserved.

   Updated: 14 Sep 2000 neel
     _________________________________________________________________

References

   1. http://www.gnu.org/graphics/philosophicalgnu.html
   2. http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/gif.html
   3. http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/gif.fr.html
   4. http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/gif.ja.html
   5. http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/gif.ko.html
   6. http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/gif.ru.html
   7. http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/free-sw.html
   8. http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/categories.html#semi-freeSoftware
   9. http://www.gnu.org/software/gzip/gzip.html
  10. http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/selling.html
  11. http://www.gnu.org/fsf/fsf.html
  12. http://www.gnu.org/order/order.html
  13. http://www.libpng.org/pub/png/index.html
  14. http://www.gnu.org/graphics/graphics.html
  15. http://lpf.ai.mit.edu/Patents/Gif/Gif.html
  16. http://www.libpng.org/pub/png/pngapbr.html
  17. http://prtr-13.ucsc.edu/~badger/software/libungif/index.shtml
  18. http://burnallgifs.org/
  19. http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/philosophy.html
  20. http://www.gnu.org/home.html
  21. mailto:address@hidden
  22. http://www.gnu.org/home.html#ContactInfo
  23. mailto:address@hidden
  24. mailto:address@hidden

-- 
Loic   Dachary         http://www.dachary.org/  address@hidden
24 av Secretan         http://www.senga.org/      address@hidden
75019    Paris         Tel: 33 1 42 45 09 16        address@hidden
        GPG Public Key: http://www.dachary.org/loic/gpg.txt