It just hasn't been tested in the courts since its insignificant market share likely doesn't warrant the effort. And Google clearly doesn't have much confidence since they aren't willing to indemnify any users.
Is it? Is this not the list? https://www.sisvel.com/images/documents/Video-Coding-Platfor...
These are legitimate companies who have a long history of involvement in the codec space and so unless you have some evidence calling it FUD is pretty baseless.
But again if AOM has full confidence that there are no patents issues then they should indemnify users so there is a guarantee it will be royalty-free.
Sure, they have a long history of involvement in the codec space ... which makes them even more desperate to stop AV1 by any means, to stop their patent licensing revenue model from going away.
Of course AOM isn't going to open themselves to unlimited liability in the case of some submarine patent. No-one ever does that. E.g. if you buy HEVC patent pool licenses you don't get any such indemnity.
But the nice feature of AOM of course is the Defensive Termination clause in their patent license: https://aomedia.org/license/patent-license/ If one of the companies you listed launches a first-strike lawsuit against any AV1 user, they lose their ability to use AV1.
Until some company decides to put its neck on the block and launch such a lawsuit, or at least identify specific patents they think are necessary, their claims cannot be taken seriously.
Wat. Yeah. I hear "patent pool", I go "okay, just for orientation let me see an itemized breakdown of the fee schedule." That's the logical continuation of that conversation.
In my head, anyway. I'm just a curious observer who wants to understand how much licensors are paying in practice by understanding what they're paying for.
> But again if AOM has full confidence that there are no patents issues then they should indemnify users so there is a guarantee it will be royalty-free.
Name something you're sure about. Would you be willing to bet your entire life savings its true? Most people would say no, regardless of how sure they are.
A person's life savings is not comparable to the funds raised by an LLC. An LLC going bankrupt is not the same as a person going bankrupt.
Still leaves an opening for patent troll type operations but pretty much rules out anyone who actually wants to use codecs in their products. Which is why no one has been foolish enough to try to 'prove it' in court, just trying would wreck their own business.
Right now it likely is patent encumbered and so not really all that different to HEVC only that it has seen minimal adoption amongst hardware/software vendors and content creators and so is infinitely less useful.