VideoLan legal for use in school?

[darthasp]

Hi there,

I am a network admin for a school in the united kingdom and I would like to deploy and use video lan for both playing DVD's on local machines and across the internal network.

I have a windows based network - server and workstations.

However having read the FAQ section 3.4 entitled "What about personal/commercial usage?" I am confused about whether i have to pay some royalty to some companies.

Can any one help me - basically can I download the windows version off this site and use it in the school 'as is' or do i need to pay someone. I am obviously happy to donate to the project if I start using VideoLan - but I must make sure I am legal first...

Regards

Phil

[Guest]

The use of VLC is completely free according to the GPL. So you can download and use it in your school without paying royalties.

[markfm]

Depending on location, what you are actually doing, you might need to be careful. Some items in VLC are, at least in the US, "patent encumbered", and/or violate the US DMCA.

Not to say that VLC isn't awesome, just that you need to be aware. For instance, to deploy vlc for widespread use I would probably look into MPEG-LA if I wanted to encode using mpeg 4 (mp4v).

VLC is highly modular -- it's quite possible to leave out certain plugins, to "sculpt" what you deploy.

[darthasp]

Thanks for the responses

Regards

Phil