Legal

Licenses

• FSF-approved licenses

US Patents

• Patents expire 20 years after they're filed.

JPG

• 4,698,672, "Coding system for reducing redundancy"
• Filed: October 27, 1986; expires: October 27, 2006
• Assigned to Compression Labs, which was acquired by Forgent Networks in 1997

GIF

• 4,558,302, LZW Compression, "High speed data compression and decompression apparatus and method"
• Filed: June 20, 1983; expires: June 20, 2003
• Assigned to Sperry Corporation, later Unisys Corporation