Re: [dispatch] [AVT] Proposal to form Internet Wideband Audio Codec WG

Joel,

>And now, before I start repeating myself

I will also repeat here that it makes no sense to have this huge IETF work for voice (mainly) signaling (SIP, XMPP, NSIS) and no standard for an _Internet_ voice codec.

Going by your guidance for avoiding a voice codec, the IETF may also just give up signaling for voice and close down all the voice related signaling WGs. And since we are at it, why not all the A/V codec profiles in AVT? :-)
This is hard to rationalize.

Henry

On 6/3/09 2:57 PM, "Joel M. Halpern" <jmh@joelhalpern.com> wrote:

Let's be clear.  I am not trying to argue that the existing codecs are
good enough.  I hear everyone saying that they are not.
However, the IETF is not the answer to all the worlds standards problems.

In this case, there are a number of existing bodies addressing these
problems.  There also are apparently existing solutions with near the
right properties.
1) The IETF is structurally not well suited to dealing with the kinds of
patent problems that we are dealing with.
2) The IETF, based on history, is not very good at dealing with market
acceptance issues (questions such as why isn't Speex or SILK being
accepted.)
3) IETF WGs are very bad at working out what the real problems are.
THey are good at working out protocol issues.  But this is not primarily
a protocol issue, from what everyone is saying.

I have heard rumors of several other bodies that are working in this
space.  Given that we have lately been working very hard to keep other
folks from encroaching on our patch, we ought to be sensitive to
encroaching on theirs.

And now, before I start repeating myself, I will try to stay quite for a
few days and keep listening.
Yours,
Joel

Dan York wrote:
> I've been reading this thread with great interest as for the past
> probably 6 years or so I've been saying to anyone who will listen (and
> to those who won't ;-) that one factor that will help "IP
> communications/VoIP/UC/whatever-marketing-term-we-want-to-rename-our-products-to-this-week"
> to really find wide adoption is to provide a "rich communication
> experience" better than what people are used to now.
>
> Wideband audio is, to me, a huge part of that.
>
> However, I completely agree with Henning on this point:
>
>> On Jun 2, 2009, at 12:15 PM, Henning Schulzrinne wrote:
>>
>>> However, if we don't do this, we are stuck with the status quo, which
>>> is not all that satisfactory.
>
>
> The status quo is not satisfactory.  If you want to add wideband audio
> to your product, you've got an alphabet soup of mutually incompatible
> options with vastly different licensing terms/fees/options and source
> code availability.
>
> I think we ultimately need a "G.711 for wideband", i.e. a wideband codec
> that anyone can implement in any device.  I'd argue that a large part of
> the reason we are "stuck" with so many people in VoIP using G.711 is
> precisely because ANYONE can implement it in basically ANY device.  You
> can buy a G.711 codec implementation or you can write your own or find
> some code on the Internet (google "G.711 source code"). You can
> implement G.711 in your big softswitch or IP-PBX... or you can implement
> it in some small embedded device.
>
> And it interoperates.
>
> We need that kind of codec for wideband.... which I would say is
> "royalty-free" and needs to have "open source" implementations
> available.   (And yes, I know Speex is out there - I don't have a view
> as to why it is not more widely implemented.  And yes, I know Skype is
> giving away SILK royalty-free, but it's not open source.)
>
> Can the IETF help with this?  I don't know... but I think it's worth a
> shot.  If there is a group that is passionate about this (and there
> seems to be) then lets get the mailing list set up and have it go the
> regular List -> BOF -> Working Group trajectory.
>
> In the best case perhaps we come out with the codec we want/need.  At
> the very worst I think we'd wind up with at least creating some good
> discussions and requirements for what we do need.
>
> My 2 cents,
> Dan
>
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