Burn All GIFs

Introduction

From burnallgifs.org, Unisys, once a well-known computer company, holds a patent on a method of data compression called LZW. Other, much better, methods of data compression are not covered by any patent.

LZW is used in an obsolete graphic format called GIF, which many web sites use in order to be compatible with old web browsers. Unisys is charging web sites $5000 or more to use these now-obsolete GIF graphics if the software originally used to create the GIFs was not covered by a Unisys license. This was the reason GIF was removed from the popular GDLib for dynamic images in PHP, and the GNU Image Manipulation Program (GIMP).

The fact that Unisys was able to patent LZW is due to a flaw in the US patent system that makes even pencil-and-paper calculations patentable. You could violate some US patents just doing the story problems in a math or computer science textbook! However, Unisys's actions are legal under US law, so the only reasonable alternative to paying the "Unisys tax" on the web is to upgrade graphics from GIF to PNG format, or MNG format for animations.

See also SoftwarePatent.

GIF-free Sites

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Replace all your GIFs with PNGs and MNGs. Put any of these Burn All GIFs logos in your website now to show your support:
http://burnallgifs.org/images/