Recently (actually since I posted an article introducing MediaCoder’s new CUDA support on the doom9 forum), a group of people, mainly those developing software similar to MediaCoder, began to pick holes in MediaCoder. Some of the same people, requested that the FFmepg group put MediaCoder on the FFmpeg shame list, accusing MediaCoder of abusing and modifying FFmpeg without publishing the patch. They also insinuated that MediaCoder contains virus and malwares, as well as tampering with the MediaCoder description on Wikipedia and changing the description as adware. I am very angry and shame on them. I hereby make the following statements:
Recently (actually since I posted an article introducing MediaCoder’s new CUDA support on the doom9 forum), a group of people, mainly those developing software similar to MediaCoder, began to pick holes in MediaCoder. Some of the same people, requested that the FFmepg group put MediaCoder on the FFmpeg shame list, accusing MediaCoder of abusing and modifying FFmpeg without publishing the patch. They also insinuated that MediaCoder contains virus and malwares, as well as tampering with the MediaCoder description on Wikipedia and changing the description as adware. I am very angry and shame on them. I hereby make the following statements:
- MediaCoder DOES NOT link against any GPL-ed libraries. It only invokes GPL-ed programs and use their outputs. MediaCoder does not violate GPL license.
- MediaCoder uses an unmodified build of FFmpeg (builds are obtained from here and here) and only invokes FFmpeg as a separate process instead of using its code directly. This does not conflict with FFmpeg’s license.
- MediaCoder uses patched builds of MPlayer and MEncoder. The patch (available here) adds pipe input/output support as well as a few additional features and command line options. It only invokes MPlayer or MEncoder as a separate process instead of using its code directly. This does not conflict with MPlayer’s license.
- I respect all the FFmpeg and MPlayer developers and respect the work they’ve done on the both projects. MediaCoder is standing on the shoulder of giants. I have also submitted patches in the MPlayer dev mail-list and would like to contribute to the projects whenever possible. MediaCoder itself does not contain any source code from any (L)GPLed software.
- MediaCoder (distributions from the offical download locations) does NOT contain any virus and malwares. The MediaCoder installer bundles OpenCandy, a software recommendation network. Users can choose whether to accept the recommendation during installation.
- MediaCoder is NOT an adware. There is no ads banner on the application GUI (not including the contents served on the web site). MediaCoder does NOT collect any personal information. It is a pure freeware. As for bundled OpenCandy in the installer, please refer to their privacy policy.
- The latest versions of MediaCoder do not contain encoder binaries those people are arguing about, including CT AAC+ encoder and Nero AAC encoder, though these encoders are supported and the binaries can be downloaded separately from its owner’s website. CT AAC+ encoder was removed from distribution since about 3 years ago. Nero AAC encoder was bundled until previous 0.7.0. I have already realized improper and removed it recently.
- Since version 0.7, MediaCoder is distributed under MediaCoder End User License Agreement and is no longer open-sourced. It is still and will be always totally free of charge.
- MediaCoder is now identified as a product of Broad Intelligence Technologies, which is a software company I started to run since early 2009. MediaCoder is not a commercial software though we are building some commercial solutions (like distributed transcoding cluster) around MediaCoder. While pursuing some deserved commercial interests by providing solutions and services, we make most of our efforts and breakthroughs (like recent new GPU/CUDA support) go into the free MediaCoder software and we will do our best to provide the community with the best free media transcoder.
