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MP3
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For other uses, see MP3 (disambiguation).
MPEG-1 Audio Layer 3
File extension: .mp3
MIME type: audio/mpeg
Type of format: Audio

MPEG-1 Audio Layer 3, more commonly referred to as MP3, is a popular audio


encoding format.

It uses a lossy compression algorithm that is designed to greatly reduce the amount of
data required to represent the audio recording, yet still sound like a faithful reproduction
of the original uncompressed audio to most listeners. It was invented by a team of
European engineers at Philips, CCETT (Centre commun d'études de télévision et
télécommunications), IRT and Fraunhofer Society, who worked in the framework of the
EUREKA 147 DAB digital radio research program, and it became an ISO/IEC standard
in 1991.

MP3 is an audio-specific format. The compression takes off certain sounds that cannot be
heard by the listener, i.e. outside the normal human hearing range. It provides a
representation of pulse-code modulation–encoded audio in much less space than
straightforward methods, by using psychoacoustic models to discard components less
audible to human hearing, and recording the remaining information in an efficient
manner. Similar principles are used by JPEG, an image compression format.

Contents
[hide]

• 1 Development
• 2 Going public
• 3 MP2
• 4 Internet
• 5 Encoding audio
• 6 Decoding audio
• 7 Audio quality
• 8 Bit rate
• 9 File structure
• 10 Design limitations
• 11 ID3 and other tags
• 12 Volume normalization
• 13 Licensing and patent issues
• 14 Alternative technologies
• 15 See also
• 16 References

• 17 External links

[edit] Development
Modern lossy bit compression technologies, including MPEG, MP3, etc, are based on the
early work of Prof Oscar Bonello of the University of Buenos Aires, Argentina. He was
involved in Studio equipment design for Broadcast radio automation. At the same time he
taught Acoustics at the University (he is the author of the "Bonello Criterion" for room
acoustics design), Psychoacoustics being his main field of research. In 1983 he started
researching the idea of using the Critical Band Masking principle (a property of the ear)
in order to reduce the bit stream needed to encode an audio signal. The masking principle
was discovered in 1924 and further developed by Egan-Hake and Richard Ehmer in 1959.
Bonello's work created, in 1987, the world's first bit compression system, named ECAM,
working in real time and implemented by hardware on an IBM PC computer. This plug in
card and the associated control software was demonstrated for the first time in 1988 as a
fully working product named Audicom and introduced to the world at the international
NAB Radio Exhibition in Atlanta, USA on 1990. The basic Bonello implementation is
now used in MP3 and other systems. Bonello refuses to apply for any patents around this
technology. [1] [2]

MPEG-1 Audio Layer 2 encoding began as the Digital Audio Broadcast (DAB) project
managed by Egon Meier-Engelen of the Deutsche Forschungs- und Versuchsanstalt für
Luft- und Raumfahrt (later on called Deutsches Zentrum für Luft- und Raumfahrt,
German Aerospace Center) in Germany. This project was financed by the European
Union as a part of the EUREKA research program where it was commonly known as EU-
147, which ran from 1987 to 1994.

As a doctoral student at Germany's University of Erlangen-Nuremberg, Karlheinz


Brandenburg began working on digital music compression in the early 1980s, focusing
on how people perceive music. He completed his doctoral work in 1989 and became an
assistant professor at Erlangen-Nuremberg. While there, he continued to work on music
compression with scientists at the Fraunhofer Society (in 1993 he joined the staff of the
Fraunhofer Institute). [3]

In 1991, there were two proposals available: Musicam (known as Layer 2), and ASPEC
(Adaptive Spectral Perceptual Entropy Coding). The Musicam technique, as proposed by
Philips (The Netherlands), CCETT (France) and Institut für Rundfunktechnik (Germany)
was chosen due to its simplicity and error robustness, as well as its low computational
power associated with the encoding of high quality compressed audio. The Musicam
format, based on sub-band encoding, was a key to settle the basis of the MPEG Audio
compression format (sampling rates, structure of frames, headers, number of samples per
frame). Its technology and ideas were fully incorporated into the definition of ISO MPEG
Audio Layer I and Layer II and further on of the Layer III (MP3) format. Under the
chairmanship of Professor Mussmann (University of Hannover) the editing of the
standard was made under the responsibilities of Leon van de Kerkhof (Layer I) and
Gerhard Stoll (Layer II).

A working group consisting of Leon Van de Kerkhof (The Netherlands), Gerhard Stoll
(Germany), Leonardo Chiariglione (Italy), Yves-François Dehery (France), Karlheinz
Brandenburg (Germany) took ideas from Musicam and ASPEC, added some of their own
ideas and created MP3, which was designed to achieve the same quality at 128 kbit/s as
MP2 at 192 kb/s.

All algorithms were approved in 1991, finalized in 1992 as part of MPEG-1, the first
standard suite by MPEG, which resulted in the international standard ISO/IEC 11172-3,
published in 1993. Further work on MPEG audio was finalized in 1994 as part of the
second suite of MPEG standards, MPEG-2, more formally known as international
standard ISO/IEC 13818-3, originally published in 1995.

Compression efficiency of encoders is typically defined by the bit rate because


compression rate depends on the bit depth and sampling rate of the input signal.
Nevertheless, there are often published compression rates that use the CD parameters as
references (44.1 kHz, 2 channels at 16 bits per channel or 2x16 bit). Sometimes the
Digital Audio Tape (DAT) SP parameters are used (48 kHz, 2x16 bit). Compression
ratios with this reference are higher, which demonstrates the problem of the term
compression ratio for lossy encoders.

Karlheinz Brandenburg used a CD recording of Suzanne Vega's song "Tom's Diner" to


assess the MP3 compression algorithm. This song was chosen because of its softness and
simplicity, making it easier to hear imperfections in the compression format during
playbacks. Some jokingly refer to Suzanne Vega as "The mother of MP3". Some more
critical audio excerpts (glockenspiel, triangle, accordion, ...) were taken from the EBU
V3/SQAM reference compact disc and have been used by professional sound engineers
to assess the subjective quality of the MPEG Audio formats.

[edit] Going public


A reference simulation software implementation, written in the C language and known as
ISO 11172-5, was developed by the members of the ISO MPEG Audio committee in
order to produce bit compliant MPEG Audio files (Layer 1, Layer 2, Layer 3). Working
in non-real time on a number of operating systems, it was able to demonstrate the first
real time hardware decoding (DSP based) of compressed audio. Some other real time
implementation of MPEG Audio encoders were available for the purpose of digital
broadcasting (radio DAB, television DVB) towards consumer receivers and set top
boxes.

Later, on July 7, 1994 the Fraunhofer Society released the first software MP3 encoder
called l3enc. The filename extension .mp3 was chosen by the Fraunhofer team on July
14, 1995 (previously, the files had been named .bit). With the first real-time software
MP3 player Winplay3 (released September 9, 1995) many people were able to encode
and playback MP3 files on their PCs. Because of the relatively small hard drives back in
that time (~ 500 MB) the technology was essential to store non-instrument based (see:
tracker and MIDI) music for listening on a computer.

[edit] MP2
In October 1993, MP2 (MPEG-1 Audio Layer 2) files appeared on the Internet and were
often played back using the Xing MPEG Audio Player, and later in a program for Unix by
Tobias Bading called MAPlay, which was initially released on February 22, 1994
(MAPlay was also ported to Microsoft Windows).

Initially the only encoder available for MP2 production was the Xing Encoder,
accompanied by the program cdda2wav, a CD ripper used for extracting CD audio tracks
to Waveform Audio Files.

The Internet Underground Music Archive (IUMA) is generally recognized as the start of
the on-line music revolution. IUMA was the Internet's first high-fidelity music web site,
hosting thousands of authorized MP2 recordings before MP3 or the web was popularized.

[edit] Internet
In the first half of 1995 through the late 1990s, MP3 files began to spread on the Internet.
MP3's popularity began to rise rapidly with the advent of Nullsoft's audio player Winamp
(released in 1997), the Unix audio player mpg123 and the peer-to-peer file sharing
network Napster (released in 1999). These programs made it simple for average users to
play back, create, share and collect MP3s.

The small size of MP3 files has enabled widespread peer-to-peer file sharing of music,
which would previously have been nearly impossible. The major record companies, who
argue that such free sharing of music reduces sales, reacted to this by pursuing law-suits
against Napster, which was eventually closed down, and eventually against individual
users who engaged in file sharing. Napster has now returned, albeit in a slightly different
form, and these legal actions have had little effect on the production and distribution of
MP3 copied audio.

Despite the popularity of MP3, online music retailers often use other proprietary formats
that are encrypted (known as Digital Rights Management) to prevent users from using
purchased music in ways not specifically authorised by the record companies. The record
companies argue that this is necessary to prevent the files from being made available on
peer-to-peer file sharing networks. However, this has other side effects such as
preventing users from playing back their purchased music on different types of devices.
Some services, such as eMusic, continue to offer the MP3 format, which allows users to
playback their music on virtually any device.

[edit] Encoding audio


The MPEG-1 standard does not include a precise specification for an MP3 encoder. The
decoding algorithm and file format, as a contrast, are well defined. Implementers of the
standard were supposed to devise their own algorithms suitable for removing parts of the
information in the raw audio (or rather its MDCT representation in the frequency
domain). During encoding 576 time domain samples are taken and are transformed to 576
frequency domain samples. If there is a transient, 192 samples are taken instead of 576.
This is done to limit the temporal spread of quantization noise accompanying the
transient. (See psychoacoustics.)

As a result, there are many different MP3 encoders available, each producing files of
differing quality. Comparisons are widely available, so it is easy for a prospective user of
an encoder to research the best choice. It must be kept in mind that an encoder that is
proficient at encoding at higher bit rates (such as LAME, which is in widespread use for
encoding at higher bit rates) is not necessarily as good at other, lower bit rates.

[edit] Decoding audio


Decoding, on the other hand, is carefully defined in the standard. Most decoders are
"bitstream compliant", meaning that the decompressed output they produce from a given
MP3 file will be the same (within a specified degree of rounding tolerance) as the output
specified mathematically in the ISO/IEC standard document. The MP3 file has a standard
format, which is a frame consisting of 384, 576, or 1152 samples (depends on MPEG
version and layer) and all the frames have associated header information (32 bits) and
side information (9, 17, or 32 bytes, depending on MPEG version and stereo/mono). The
header and side information help the decoder to decode the associated Huffman encoded
data correctly.

Therefore, comparison of decoders is usually based on how computationally efficient


they are (i.e., how much memory or CPU time they use in the decoding process).

[edit] Audio quality


When creating an MP3 file, there is a trade-off between the amount of space used and the
sound quality of the result. Typically, the creator of the MP3 file is allowed to set a bit
rate, which specifies how many kilobits the file may use per second of audio, for
example, when ripping a compact disc to this format. The lower the bit rate used, the
lower the audio quality will be, but the smaller the file size. Likewise, the higher the bit
rate used, the higher quality, and therefore, larger the file size the resulting MP3 will be.

As described, MP3 files encoded with a lower bit rate will generally play back at a lower
quality. With too low a bit rate, "compression artifacts" (i.e., sounds that were not present
in the original recording) may be audible in the reproduction. Some audio is hard to
compress because of its randomness and sharp attacks. When this type of audio is
compressed, artifacts such as ringing or pre-echo are usually heard. A sample of applause
compressed with a relatively nominal bitrate provides a good example of compression
artifacts.

Besides the bit rate of an encoded piece of audio, the quality of MP3 files also depends
on the quality of the encoder itself, and the difficulty of the signal being encoded. As the
MP3 standard allows quite a bit of freedom with encoding algorithms, different encoders
may feature quite different quality, even when targeting similar bit rates. As an example,
in a public listening test featuring two different MP3 encoders at about 128kbps[4], one
scored 3.66 on a 1–5 scale, while the other scored only 2.22.

Quality is heavily dependent on the choice of encoder and encoding parameters. While
quality around 128kbps was somewhere between annoying and acceptable with older
encoders, modern MP3 encoders can provide very good quality at those bit rates[5]
(01/2006). However, in 1998, MP3 at 128kbps was only providing quality equivalent to
AAC-LC at 96kbps and MP2 at 192kbps[6].

The transparency threshold of MP3 can be estimated to be at about 128k with good
encoders on typical music as evidenced by its strong performance in the above test,
however some particularly difficult material can require 192k or higher. As with all lossy
formats, some samples can not be encoded to be transparent for all users.

For digital stereophonic sounds, this transparency threshold of MP3 can be greatly
reduced by using the Joint stereo coding mode based on stereo intensity redundancy
removal. This feature further reduces the overall bit rate of a stereophonic sound down to
96 k. Unfortunately, in spite of a wide use of this feature in most MP3 files and all
standardized encoders no official results of this transparency level were ever published
due to strong lobbying and opposition of the professional music industry.

The simplest type of MP3 file uses one bit rate for the entire file — this is known as
Constant Bit Rate (CBR) encoding. Using a constant bit rate makes encoding simpler and
faster. However, it is also possible to create files where the bit rate changes throughout
the file. These are known as Variable bit rate (VBR) files. The idea behind this is that, in
any piece of audio, some parts will be much easier to compress, such as silence or music
containing only a few instruments, while others will be more difficult to compress. So,
the overall quality of the file may be increased by using a lower bit rate for the less
complex passages and a higher one for the more complex parts. With some encoders, it is
possible to specify a given quality, and the encoder will vary the bit rate accordingly.
Users who know a particular "quality setting" that is transparent to their ears can use this
value when encoding all of their music, and not need to worry about performing personal
listening tests on each piece of music to determine the correct settings.

In a listening test, MP3 encoders at low bit rates performed significantly worse than those
using more modern compression methods (such as AAC). In a 2004 public listening test
at 32 kbit/s[7], the LAME MP3 encoder scored only 1.79/5 — behind all modern encoders
— with Nero Digital HE AAC scoring 3.30/5.

It is also important to note that perceived quality can be influenced by listening


environment (ambient noise), listener attention, and listener training.

[edit] Bit rate


Several bit rates are specified in the MPEG-1 Layer 3 standard: 32, 40, 48, 56, 64, 80, 96,
112, 128, 160, 192, 224, 256 and 320 kbit/s, and the available sampling frequencies are
32, 44.1 and 48 kHz. A sample rate of 44.1 kHz is almost always used since this is also
used for CD audio, the main source used for creating MP3 files. A greater variety of bit
rates are used on the internet. 128 kbit/s is the most common since it typically offers very
good audio quality in a relatively small space. 192 kbit/s is often used by those who
notice artifacts at lower bit rates. By contrast, uncompressed audio as stored on a compact
disc has a bit rate of 1411.2 kb/s (16 bits/sample × 44100 samples/second × 2 channels).

Some additional bit rates and sample rates were made available in the MPEG-2 and the
(unofficial) MPEG-2.5 standards: bit rates of 8, 16, 24, 32, 40, 48, 56, 64, 80, 96, 112,
128, 144, 160 kb/s and sample rates of 8, 11.025, 12, 16, 22.05 and 24 kHz.

Non-standard bit rates up to 640 kb/s can be achieved with the LAME encoder and the
freeformat option, but few MP3 players can play those files. Gabriel Bouvigne, a
principal developer of the LAME project, says that the freeformat option is compliant
with the standard but, according to the standard, decoders are only required to be able to
decode streams up to 320 kbit/s.[8]

[edit] File structure


MP3 File Structure

An MP3 file is made up of multiple MP3 frames, which consist of the MP3 header and
the MP3 data. This sequence of frames is called an Elementary stream. Frames are
independent items: one can cut the frames from a file and an MP3 player would be able
to play it. The MP3 data is the actual audio payload. The diagram shows that the MP3
header consists of a sync word, which is used to identify the beginning of a valid frame.
This is followed by a bit indicating that this is the MPEG standard and two bits that
indicate that layer 3 is being used, hence MPEG-1 Audio Layer 3 or MP3. After this, the
values will differ depending on the MP3 file. ISO/IEC 11172-3 defines the range of
values for each section of the header along with the specification of the header. Most
MP3 files today contain ID3 metadata, which precedes or follows the MP3 frames; this is
also shown in the diagram.

[edit] Design limitations


There are several limitations inherent to the MP3 format that can not be overcome by any
MP3 encoder.

Newer audio compression formats such as Vorbis and AAC no longer have these
limitations.

In technical terms, MP3 is limited in the following ways:

• Bit rate is limited to a maximum of 320 kb/s (while some encoders can create
higher bit rates, there is little-to-no support for these higher bit rate mp3s)
• Time resolution can be too low for highly transient signals, may cause some
smearing of percussive sounds although this effect is to a great extent limited by
the psychoacoustical properties of the Musicam polyphase filterbank (Layer II).
Pre-echo is concealed due to the specific time-domain characteristics of the filter.
• Frequency resolution is limited by the small long block window size, decreasing
coding efficiency
• No scale factor band for frequencies above 15.5/15.8 kHz
• Joint stereo is done on a frame-to-frame basis
• Encoder/decoder overall delay is not defined, which means lack of official
provision for gapless playback. However, some encoders such as LAME can
attach additional metadata that will allow players that are aware of it to deliver
seamless playback.

Nevertheless, a well-tuned MP3 encoder can perform competitively even with these
restrictions.

[edit] ID3 and other tags


Main articles: ID3 and APEv2 tag
A "tag" in a compressed audio file is a section of the file that contains metadata such as
the title, artist, album, track number or other information about the file's contents.

As of 2006, the most widespread standard tag formats are ID3v1 and ID3v2, and the
more recently introduced APEv2.

APEv2 was originally developed for the MPC file format (see the APEv2 specification).
APEv2 can coexist with ID3 tags in the same file or it can also be used by itself.

Tag editing functionality is often built-in to MP3 players and editors, but there also exist
tag editors dedicated to the purpose.

[edit] Volume normalization


As compact discs and other various sources are recorded and mastered at different
volumes, it may be useful to store volume information about a file in the tag so that at
playback time, the volume can be dynamically adjusted.

A few standards for encoding the gain of an MP3 file have been proposed. The idea is to
normalize the average volume (not the volume peaks) of audio files, so that the volume
does not change between consecutive tracks. This should not be confused with dynamic
range compression (DRC), which is a form of normalization used in audio mastering.

Listeners who prefer to experience music as it was intended to be heard on the original
compact disc may prefer to not use volume normalization, because the average volume of
each track was set intentionally by a professional mastering engineer.

The most popular and widely used solution for storing replay gain is known simply as
"Replay Gain". Typically, the average volume and clipping information about audio track
is stored in the metadata tag.

One can download audio converting software to change the formats.

[edit] Licensing and patent issues


A large number of different organizations have claimed ownership of patents necessary to
implement MP3 (decoding and/or encoding). These different claims have led to a number
of legal actions, and legal threats, from a variety of sources, resulting in uncertainty about
what is necessary to legally create MP3-supporting products with MP3 support in
countries that permit software patents.

The various patents claimed to cover MP3 by different patent-holders have many
different expiration dates, ranging from 2007 to 2017 in the U.S. [9]. However, U.S.
patents can only last up to 20 years, and MP3 was released as a specification in 1991, so
if U.S. courts applied U.S. law, no patent could apply beyond 2011 to MP3 itself.[10] In
the U.S., any patent claiming to cover the fundamentals of MP3 after 2012 should (by
law) be struck down as an invalid patent, due to the existence of published prior art (the
MP3 specification) more than a year before the patent's filing. If it had been published
earlier (such as in public drafts), the latest date would be even earlier. However, it is
unclear if U.S. courts would enforce this. The situation in other countries that permit
software patents is similar.

Thomson Consumer Electronics claims to control MP3 licensing of the MPEG-1/2 Layer
3 patents in many countries, including the United States, Japan, Canada and EU
countries[1]. Thomson has been actively enforcing these patents. Due to different
practices in different European countries when granting patents for computer-
implemented inventions under the European Patent Convention, it is unclear whether
national European courts would uphold the patents.

For current information about Fraunhofer IIS and Thomson's patent portfolio and
licensing terms and fees see their website mp3licensing.com. MP3 license revenues
generated ca. 100 million Euro revenue to the Fraunhofer Society in 2005. [2]

In September 1998, the Fraunhofer Institute sent a letter to several developers of MP3
software stating that a license was required to "distribute and/or sell decoders and/or
encoders". The letter claimed that unlicensed products "infringe the patent rights of
Fraunhofer and THOMSON. To make, sell and/or distribute products using the [MPEG
Layer-3] standard and thus our patents, you need to obtain a license under these patents
from us." [3]

These patent issues significantly slowed the development of unlicensed MP3


software[citation needed] and led to increased focus on creating and popularizing alternatives
such as AAC, Ogg Vorbis, and WMA. Microsoft, the makers of the Windows operating
system, chose to move away from MP3 to their own proprietary Windows Media formats
to avoid the licensing issues associated with the patents[citation needed]. Until the key patents
expire, unlicensed encoders and players appear to be infringing articles in countries that
recognize those patents.

In spite of the patent restrictions, the perpetuation of the MP3 format continues; the
reasons for this appear to be the network effects caused by:

• familiarity with the format,


• the large quantity of music now available in the MP3 format,
• the wide variety of existing software and hardware that takes advantage of the file
format,
• the lack of DRM restrictions, which makes MP3 files easy to edit, copy and
distribute over networks (Samsung, Apple, Creative, etc.),
• the majority of home users not knowing or not caring about the patents
controversy, who often do not consider such legal issues in choosing their music
format for personal use.
Additionally, patent holders declined to enforce license fees on free and open source
decoders, allowing many free MP3 decoders to develop. [4] Furthermore, while attempts
have been made to discourage distribution of encoder binaries, Thomson has stated that
individuals using free MP3 encoders are not required to pay fees. Thus while patent fees
have been an issue for companies attempting to use MP3, they have not meaningfully
impacted users, allowing the format to grow in popularity.

Sisvel S.p.A. [5] and its US subsidiary Audio MPEG, Inc. [6] previously sued Thomson
for patent infringement on MP3 technology[7], but those disputes were resolved in
November 2005 with Sisvel granting Thomson a license to their patents. Motorola also
recently signed with Audio MPEG to license MP3-related patents.

In September 2006 German officials seized MP3 players from SanDisk's booth at the IFA
show in Berlin after an Italian patents firm won an injunction on behalf of Sisvel against
SanDisk in a dispute over licencing rights. The injunction was later reversed by a Berlin
judge [8]; but that reversal was in turn blocked the same day by another judge from the
same court, "bringing the Patent Wild West to Germany" in the words of one
commentator. [9].

On February 16, 2007, Texas MP3 Technologies sued Apple, Samsung Electronics, and
Sandisk with a patent-infringement lawsuit regarding portable MP3 players. The suit was
filed in Marshall, Texas; this is a common location for patent infringement suits due to
speedy trials and juries that often find in favor of the plaintiff. Texas MP3 Technologies
claimed infringement with U.S. patent 7,065,417, awarded in June 2006 to multimedia
chip-maker SigmaTel, covering "an MPEG portable sound reproducing system and a
method for reproducing sound data compressed using the MPEG method." [11]

Alcatel-Lucent also claims ownership of several patents relating to MP3 encoding and
compression. In November 2006, (prior to the companies' merger) Alcatel filed a lawsuit
against Microsoft (see Alcatel-Lucent v. Microsoft), alleging infringement of seven of its
patents. On February 23, 2007 a San Diego court upheld the suit, and awarded Alcatel-
Lucent a record-breaking $1.52bn in damages.[12] Microsoft has said it will appeal the
verdict, maintaining that the federal jury's decision is "unsupported by the law or facts",
since Microsoft had already paid $16m to license the technology from Fraunhofer IIS,
which, it claims, is "the industry-recognized rightful licensor". [13]. A week later on March
2, U.S. District Judge Rudi Brewster ruled from the bench in a related suit and dismissed
all of Alcatel-Lucent's patents claims relating to speech recognition. Alcatel-Lucent plans
to appeal the ruling. [14]

In short, with Thomson, Fraunhofer IIS, Sisvel (and its US subsidiary Audio MPEG),
Texas MP3 Technologies, and Alcatel-Lucent all claiming legal control of relevant MP3
patents related to decoders, the legal status of MP3 remains unclear in countries that
permit software patents.

[edit] Alternative technologies


Main article: List of codecs

Many other lossy and lossless audio codecs exist. Among these, mp3PRO, AAC, and
MP2 are all members of the same technological family as MP3 and depend on roughly
similar psychoacoustic models. The Fraunhofer Gesellschaft owns many of the basic
patents underlying these codecs as well, with others held by Dolby Labs, Sony, Thomson
Consumer Electronics, and AT&T.

In a 2005 listening test[5] that compared the performance of the LAME MP3 encoder
against more modern compression formats at 128 kbit/s, it was found that there was no
statistically significant difference between the results for LAME, Ogg Vorbis, several
AAC encoders and WMA. However, a test at a very low bit rate of 32 kbit/s[7], showed
that MP3 was significantly worse than the more modern codecs at that lower bit rate.

[edit] See also


• Comparison of audio codecs
• Copyright infringement
• Digital audio player
• ID3
• Joint stereo
• LRC (file format)
• Media player
• MP3 blog
• MP3 Surround
• Streaming Media
• DJ digital controller

[edit] References
1. ^ Masking by Tones vs Noise Bands Richard Ehmer ASA Journal, Vol 3,
Number 9, September 1959
2. ^ The invention of Audicom http://www.solidynepro.com/indexahtmlp_Hist-
ENG,t.htm
3. ^ How MP3 Was Born by Jack Ewing BusinessWeek.com. March 5, 2007.
http://www.businessweek.com/print/globalbiz/content/mar2007/gb20070305_707
122.htm
4. ^ [|Amorim, Roberto] (2003-08-03), Results of 128kbps Extension Public
Listening Test. Retrieved on 2007-03-17
5. ^ a b [|Mares, Sebastian] (2006–01), Results of Public, Multiformat Listening Test
@ 128 kbps. Retrieved on 2007-03-17
6. ^ David Meares, Kaoru Watanabe & Eric Scheirer (1998–02). "Report on the
MPEG-2 AAC Stereo Verification Tests" (PDF). International Organisation for
Standardisation. Retrieved on 2007-03-17.
7. ^ a b [|Amorim, Roberto] (2004-07-11), Results of Dial-up bit rate public
Listening Test. Retrieved on 2007-03-17
8. ^ [|Bouvigne, Gabriel] (2006-11-28), freeformat at 640 kbps and foobar2000,
possibilities?. Retrieved on 2007-03-17
9. ^ tunequest (2007-02-26). Big List of MP3 Patents (and supposed expiration
dates).
10. ^ Duncan (2006-01-04). MP3 patent expiration?.
11. ^ Martyn Williams (2007-02-26). Texas MP3 Technologies claims the companies
infringed its patent covering 'an MPEG portable sound reproducing system'. IDG
News Service.
12. ^ BBC report of the Alcatel-Lucent lawsuit verdict.
13. ^ Joe Wilcox (2007-02-23). Microsoft's Patent Disputes with Alcatel-Lucent,
AT&T Make Waves.
14. ^ Anne Broache (2007-03-02). Microsoft wins in second Alcatel-Lucent patent
suit. CNET News.com, published on ZDNet news

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