Xiph.Org Foundation is a

nonprofit organization A nonprofit organization (NPO) or non-profit organisation, also known as a non-business entity, not-for-profit organization, or nonprofit institution, is a legal entity organized and operated for a collective, public or social benefit, in co ...

that produces free

multimedia Multimedia is a form of communication that uses a combination of different content forms such as text, audio, images, animations, or video into a single interactive presentation, in contrast to tradit ...

formats and software tools. It focuses on the Ogg family of formats, the most successful of which has been

Vorbis Vorbis is a free and open-source software project headed by the Xiph.Org Foundation. The project produces an audio coding format and software reference encoder/decoder ( codec) for lossy audio compression. Vorbis is most commonly used in con ...

, an open and freely licensed audio format and codec designed to compete with the patented WMA, MP3 and AAC. As of 2013, development work was focused on Daala, an open and patent-free video format and codec designed to compete with VP9 and the patented

High Efficiency Video Coding High Efficiency Video Coding (HEVC), also known as H.265 and MPEG-H Part 2, is a video compression standard designed as part of the MPEG-H project as a successor to the widely used Advanced Video Coding (AVC, H.264, or MPEG-4 Part 10). In comp ...

. In addition to its in-house development work, the foundation has also brought several already-existing but complementary

free software Free software or libre software is computer software distributed under terms that allow users to run the software for any purpose as well as to study, change, and distribute it and any adapted versions. Free software is a matter of liberty, n ...

projects under its aegis, most of which have a separate, active group of developers. These include Speex, an audio codec designed for speech, and

FLAC FLAC (; Free Lossless Audio Codec) is an audio coding format for lossless compression of digital audio, developed by the Xiph.Org Foundation, and is also the name of the free software project producing the FLAC tools, the reference softwa ...

, a lossless audio codec. The Xiph.Org Foundation has criticized

Microsoft Microsoft Corporation is an American multinational technology corporation producing computer software, consumer electronics, personal computers, and related services headquartered at the Microsoft Redmond campus located in Redmond, Washi ...

and the RIAA for their lack of openness. They state that if companies like Microsoft had owned

patents A patent is a type of intellectual property that gives its owner the legal right to exclude others from making, using, or selling an invention for a limited period of time in exchange for publishing an enabling disclosure of the invention."A ...

on the Internet, then other companies would have tried to compete, and "The Net, as designed by warring corporate entities, would be a battleground of incompatible and expensive 'standards' had it actually survived at all." They also criticize the RIAA for their support of projects such as the

Secure Digital Music Initiative Secure Digital Music Initiative (SDMI) was a forum formed in late 1998,Leonardo ChiariglioneRiding the Media Bits. Opening content protection chiariglione.org, 2003 composed of more than 200 IT, consumer electronics, security technology, ISP and re ...

. In 2008, the

Free Software Foundation The Free Software Foundation (FSF) is a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization founded by Richard Stallman on October 4, 1985, to support the free software movement, with the organization's preference for software being distributed under copyleft ( ...

listed the Xiph.Org projects as High Priority Free Software Projects.

History

Chris Montgomery, creator of the Ogg container format, founded the Xiphophorus company and later the Xiph.Org Foundation. The first work that became the Ogg media projects started in 1994. The name "Xiph" abbreviates the original organizational name, "Xiphophorus", named after the common swordtail fish, ''Xiphophorus hellerii''. It was officially incorporated on 15 May 1996 as Xiphophorus, Inc. The name "Xiphophorus company" was used until 2002, when it was renamed to Xiph.Org Foundation. In 1999, the Xiphophorus company defined itself on its website as ''"a distributed group of Free and Open Source programmers working to protect the foundations of Internet multimedia from domination by self-serving corporate interests."'' In 2002, the Xiph.Org Foundation defined itself on its website as ''"a non-profit corporation dedicated to protecting the foundations of Internet multimedia from control by private interests."'' In March 2003, the Xiph.Org Foundation was recognized by the

IRS The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) is the revenue service for the United States federal government, which is responsible for collecting U.S. federal taxes and administering the Internal Revenue Code, the main body of the federal statutory tax ...

as a 501(c)(3) Non-Profit Organization,Xiph.Org (2003-03-24
Speex reaches 1.0; Xiph.Org now a 501(c)(3) Non-Profit Organization
Retrieved 2009-09-01 which means that U.S. citizens can deduct donations made to Xiph.Org from their taxes.

Xiph.Org Foundation projects

* Ogg – a multimedia

container format A container format (informally, sometimes called a wrapper) or metafile is a file format that allows multiple data streams to be embedded into a single file, usually along with metadata for identifying and further detailing those streams. No ...

, a reference implementation, and the native file and stream format for the Xiph.org multimedia codecs **

– a lossy audio compression format and codec **

Theora Theora is a free lossy video compression format. It is developed by the Xiph.Org Foundation and distributed without licensing fees alongside their other free and open media projects, including the Vorbis audio format and the Ogg container ...

– a lossy video coding format and codec **

– a lossless audio compression format and software ** Speex – a lossy speech encoding format and software (deprecated) ** CELT – an ultra-low delay lossy audio compression format that has been merged into Opus, and is now obsolete ** Opus – a low delay lossy audio compression format originally intended for

VoIP Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP), also called IP telephony, is a method and group of technologies for the delivery of voice communications and multimedia sessions over Internet Protocol (IP) networks, such as the Internet. The terms Internet t ...

** Tremor – an integer-only implementation of the Vorbis audio decoder for embedded devices (software) **

OggPCM Ogg is a free, open container format maintained by the Xiph.Org Foundation. The authors of the Ogg format state that it is unrestricted by software patents and is designed to provide for efficient streaming and manipulation of high-quality ...

– an encapsulation of

PCM audio Pulse-code modulation (PCM) is a method used to digitally represent sampled analog signals. It is the standard form of digital audio in computers, compact discs, digital telephony and other digital audio applications. In a PCM stream, the amp ...

data inside the Ogg container format **Skeleton – a structuring information for multi-track Ogg files (a logical bitstream within an Ogg stream) ** RTP payloads – containers for Vorbis, Theora, Speex and Opus. ** CMML – an XML-based markup language for time-continuous data (a timed text codec; deprecated) ** Ogg Squish – a lossless audio compression format and software (discontinued) ** Tarkin – an experimental lossy video coding format; no stable release (discontinued) ** Daala – a video coding format and codec **Kate – an overlay codec that can carry animated text and images. *libao – an audio-output library that operates on different platforms *

Annodex Annodex is a digital media format developed by CSIRO to provide annotation and indexing of ''continuous media'', such as audio and video. It is based on the Ogg container format, with an XML language called CMML (Continuous Media Markup Langu ...

– an encapsulation format, which interleaves time-continuous data with CMML markup in a streamable manner * Icecast – an open source multi-platform streaming server (software) * Ices – a source client for broadcasting in Ogg Vorbis or MP3 format to an icecast2 server (software) *IceShare – an unfinished peercasting system for Ogg multimedia (no longer maintained) * cdparanoia – an open source

CD Audio Compact Disc Digital Audio (CDDA or CD-DA), also known as Digital Audio Compact Disc or simply as Audio CD, is the standard format for audio compact discs. The standard is defined in the ''Red Book'', one of a series of Rainbow Books (named f ...

extraction tool that aims to be bit-perfect (currently unmaintained) * XSPF – an XML Shareable Playlist Format

OpenCodecs

''OpenCodecs'' is a software package for Windows adding DirectShow filters for the

and

WebM WebM is an audiovisual media file format. It is primarily intended to offer a royalty-free alternative to use in the HTML5 video and the HTML5 audio elements. It has a sister project, WebP, for images. The development of the format is sponso ...

codecs. It adds Theora and WebM support to

Windows Media Player Windows Media Player (WMP) is the first media player and media library application that was developed by Microsoft for playing audio, video and viewing images on personal computers running the Microsoft Windows operating system, as well as ...

and enables HTML5 video in

Internet Explorer Internet Explorer (formerly Microsoft Internet Explorer and Windows Internet Explorer, commonly abbreviated IE or MSIE) is a series of graphical web browsers developed by Microsoft which was used in the Windows line of operating systems (in ...

. It consists of: * ''dshow'', Xiph's DirectShow filters for their suite of Ogg formats, including Theora and

* ''webmdshow'', the DirectShow filter for WebM maintained by the WebM project * An ActiveX plugin adding HTML5 video capability to Internet Explorer older than version 9

QuickTime Components

''Xiph QuickTime Components'' are implementations of the Ogg container along with the Speex,

and

codecs for QuickTime. It allows users to use Ogg files in any application that uses QuickTime for audio and video file support, such as

iTunes iTunes () is a software program that acts as a media player, media library, mobile device management utility, and the client app for the iTunes Store. Developed by Apple Inc., it is used to purchase, play, download, and organize digital mu ...

and QuickTime Player. Since QuickTime Components does not function in

macOS Sierra macOS Sierra (version 10.12) is the thirteenth major release of macOS (formerly known as and ), Apple Inc.'s desktop and server operating system for Macintosh computers. The name "macOS" stems from the intention to uniform the operating syst ...

and above, the project was discontinued in 2016.

References

External links

* {{Xiph.org Free software project foundations in the United States Non-profit organizations based in Massachusetts