Talk:Proprietary file format

OOXML isn't open
The European Union says that patents related to an open standard must be made royalty-free, not just permitted for use within the standard.

Though the OOXML specification is publicly available, patents make improving it difficult, since Microsoft only permits the patents relevant to the specification to be used within the specification's definition. This means that it's hard for competitors to embrace, extend, and extinguish the patent but it also means that only Microsoft can improve the specification. Since modification of the specification is severely limited, it is not open by any definition of the word; at most it's on par with freeware software.

The above follows open source software, which has different prerequisites for openness than open standards, but OOXML is still a proprietary format. Though it has promised not to, Microsoft has made no legal assurance that it won't sue implementers for patent infringement. SteveSims (talk) 02:41, 28 November 2007 (UTC)
 * The article open standard suggests that multiple definitions of open standard exist. The European Union is not (yet) the ruler of the world. :)
 * Your statement "only Microsoft can improve the specification" is not correct. The specification is currently only maintained by Ecma International and ISO working groups. Microsoft announced that it will be an active participant in the future evolution of the Open XML standard.
 * Several standards organization agree that OOXML is an open standard:
 * The ISO agreed that it is an open standard when it approved OOXML for acceptance as an ISO/IEC standard.
 * The DIN and the Fraunhofer Institute of Open Communication Systems agree that it is an open standard.
 * The VDE agrees that it is an open standard.
 * Ghettoblaster (talk) 13:00, 31 May 2008 (UTC)
 * References
 * References

Plain Text

 * "note that 'plain text' may mean more than just ASCII"

If I understand correctly, not all plain text encodings are open (i.e. previous extensions to ASCII before UTF-8). This is probably why it was listed as "ASCII -- plain text" rather than "Plain text -- ASCII, UTF-8, etc. --Dbolton (talk) 03:46, 19 February 2008 (UTC)

Definition
The first line of the article states A proprietary format is a file format which is covered by a patent or copyright.. That is a useless definition. Actually that definition applies to for instance GPL formats as well as GPL is esentially a copyright licence.

If that is the basis for the article it might as well be removed as an article. hAl (talk) 07:32, 11 July 2008 (UTC)
 * I've changed the text. Does that work better? --DuLithgow (talk) 11:19, 11 July 2008 (UTC)
 * Actually it isn't. For instance Micrsoft has a lot of propriety formats that they allow free use of by anyone.
 * I would rather suggest something like: A proprietary format is a file format which is controlled by a private person or organization. hAl (talk) 16:07, 11 July 2008 (UTC)
 * The wording has been changed to be more specific about the restrictions created by propriety formats. duncan.lithgow (talk) 07:11, 15 January 2016 (UTC)
 * JeremyDjSkeezy 2603:9000:F300:78AB:286A:B485:9107:487A (talk) 10:38, 22 September 2023 (UTC)

Odd definitions in article
This is not what other people understand by open vs. proprietary format. See for instance: openformats.org.VasileGaburici (talk) 10:53, 16 August 2008 (UTC)
 * I've fixed the definition also per the previous section. --Nemo 06:47, 14 September 2009 (UTC)

MP3
MP3 is protected by patent holders which "are intended to give the license holder exclusive control of the technology". Ubuntu states "...by default...proprietary media formats are not configured 'out of the box'..including DVD, MP3, Quicktime, Windows Media, and more." There are probably plenty more reliable sources saying the same thing. If you have any reliable sources saying otherwise please back your statement rather than removing items from the article without discussion.--dbolton (talk) 03:08, 29 March 2010 (UTC)
 * My problem is calling it "proprietary" when it is a documented AND an official standard format. Feel free to call it patented and/or restricted in certain countries, but "proprietary" is simply a bad definition for the MP3 format, especially since software patents do not apply to most countries. And please note the burden of proof is on you, not me. And also note it is perfectly OK to remove information not backed up by sources, like I did (and yes, I used Google). But I will not "fight" over this, I admit the mp3 format has some restrictions and that we should mention them. my only problem is calling the format **proprietary** because having a patent is simply different from being the proprietary of something. --SF007 (talk) 10:00, 29 March 2010 (UTC)

Use vs. Control
I'm an IP attorney and was recently involved in a trial where the plaintiff tried to use compounding pharmacy case law to protect a software patent. Was the sequence of molecules used by someone not holding the patent proprietary, and is the application in use or in control of standards? The compounding pharmacist was deemed by the judge to be using a sequence without the need for a license, and the analogy didn't help the plaintiff, because the judge ruled (so far) that the patent did not protect custom development of "related code." The argument in these cases usually comes down to monopoly vs. rent seeking-- attempting to get government, regulatory or legal entities to protect a monopoly. The courts have to "split the baby" by teasing out fine differences between ownership, use and control, many of which come down to very detailed semiotics and semantics, as well as code (or formula) sequences, as we've seen in this article and discussion. Invariably, this always ends up in very tiny details of the patent itself. The tradeoff is to be "open enough" to allow wide development, alteration and use that keeps the entity vibrant with many minds contributing (Wiki anyone?) yet stay "closed enough" to maintain a perpetuity (consistent royalty stream). By definition then, this will always be a gray area, because the goal itself has to be to balance open vs. closed even for the patent holder, or they face the tradeoff of worthlessly closed from a use valence or worthlessly open from a revenue valence. Someone above made a VERY wise comment-- not only is the burden of proof on the patent holder, BUT a necessary but not sufficient condition of freedom of use is the holder not suing to protect a patent or element. The problem is that the holder always has that right, and will hold it over developers heads as a risk. If we're just playing around for our university, that's one thing, if we're getting investors to back a venture based on a mod-- you get the idea. Things seen as open or semi open can rapidly become closed, so the caution in this article is appropriate. To be very honest, in this age where developer employees get rapidly dissatisfied and move faster than we can keep track of 'em, if a Google employee goes to work over at Bing, you can imagine that a whole stadium of attorneys will be watching the scoring and harmonic analysis models that "suddenly" appear at Microsoft in image searches. Just a fictional example, don't anyone get their hackles up! Maybe the "future" will see lots more solutions like Craig's List, Wiki and Facebook where high numbers of contributors are balanced by unrelated revenue sources. Developers still will want to eat their cake and have it too-- encouraging "user feedback" but then punishing users who innovate "too" much.Phoenixthebird (talk) 11:03, 18 September 2010 (UTC)

What on earth does 'open proprietary format' mean?
The opening paragraph introduces the notions of open and proprietary formats as opposites. That's clear enough. But the list of prominent proprietary formats begins with a sublist labeled "Open proprietary formats", which would appear from the first paragraph to be a contradiction in terms. I've added a paragraph attempting to reduce the impression that there is a clear black/white distinction between the two (in the spirit of Phoenixthebird's remarks above) and glossing the phrases "open proprietary" and "closed proprietary" as meaning proprietary formats which are, respectively, publicly documented and not publicly documented. If anyone has a better handle on what was meant by those phrases on the part of those who introduced (or retained) the phrases, feel free to correct the gloss. C.M.Sperberg-McQueen (talk) 22:20, 20 December 2014 (UTC)

External links modified
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