Slashdoty goodness

[gfish]

LZW is out of patent. Wow, end of an era. I hope PNG isn't hurt too bad by this, though. I still really prefer it to GIF, even without the evil IP issues.

And, check it out, a new Vinge short story. I really want to live in his future. No one gets where computers are going like he does, not even Ken MacLeod.

Comments

[niac.livejournal.com]

Spiffy story, and yeah, you're right.

[shadowblue.livejournal.com]

PNG is so huge though.
Or, at least, everything I ever download in PNG format (which is, almost always, from cyphertext) takes forever to download. :)

[shadowblue.livejournal.com]

I really liked that. I will have to get more of his work.

[adularia.livejournal.com]

PNG's got enough advantages that GIF lacks. I much doubt it will be hurt.

[grinninfoole.livejournal.com]

What is LZW?

[gfish.livejournal.com]

The (no longer) patented compression algorithm used by the GIF standard. Because it was patented, they got to extort user fees out of people who wrote GIF viewers/encoders, messing up lots of free software development and generally being a big pain. A good object lesson in why standards shouldn't include patented technology, and why software patents can really suck.