Say, remember that wacky brouhaha over the proposed MPEG-4 licensing terms? The one that got Phil Schiller all riled up during last February's QuickTime Live keynote? If not, the gist is that Apple was holding off on shipping the allegedly almost-ready-for-prime-time QuickTime 6 (which includes full MPEG-4 support) until the MPEG-LA group of patent holders came up with a licensing plan that didn't require commercial streaming content providers to shell out what Phil viewed as unfair per-stream royalties-- a scheme which Apple apparently feels would hinder the widespread adoption of the MPEG-4 standard in a big way. Okay, sure, when set out in those terms, it's not exactly heart-pounding stuff as far as drama is concerned... but at the time there was definitely something about seeing Phil rally the troops to strike a blow against oppressive licensing fees that quickened our pulses a smidge. Maybe we just had our dramatic expectations ratcheted down to the minimum-- it was a Philnote, after all. Phil, a hothead firebrand with power to the people on his mind? The boy done us proud.

Anyway, as you've most likely heard by now, Apple has finally made a version of QuickTime 6 available to us yokels in the general public. Don't get too excited, though, because this still isn't the "real thing," per se-- it's a "Public Preview," probably less euphemistically referred to as Scary Beta Software. Apple makes a point of recommending that it "only be run for testing purposes on a non-essential system," and seeing as we don't really have any "non-essential systems" kicking around and QuickTime 5 is serving our media needs just fine right now, we'll probably opt to wait for the official QuickTime 6 release with Mac OS X 10.2 this summer. But if you're game, feel free to jump right in and "test" all the new features like MPEG-4 support, "Instant-On" streaming and skip protection, the "updated" interface, etc. Remember, if you don't like it, you can always download and reinstall QuickTime 5 and you'll be none the worse for wear. At least, that's what Apple claims, and who are we to doubt its word?

So does this release of a "Public Preview" of QuickTime 6 mean that the MPEG-4 license wars are finally over? Well, no, not quite-- at least, not according to CNET. A final license has "yet to be hammered out," but Steve thinks a resolution is just around the corner: "Every 'i' is not dotted and every 't' is not crossed, but it's getting there." Heck, Steve, if it's just a matter of dotting and crossing a couple of letters, we can take care of that for you; we got B's in Penmanship. Just fly us out and we'll even bring our own pen. Anything to help the cause.

The good news, of course, is that even if we aren't brought in with our lucky Brain Juice Pen to complete that contract with our world-renowned "i"-dotting and "t"-crossing skills, it sounds to us like all the licensing terms will be worked out in time for QuickTime 6's "real" release this summer. So relax, already. And someone tell Phil to change out of those battle fatigues and stop spouting revolutionary slogans-- he's freaking out the squares in Accounting.