GitHub has disabled Rockchip’s Linux Media Process Platform (MPP) repository following a DMCA takedown request filed by a contributor to the FFmpeg project. The dispute isn’t about whether Rockchip used FFmpeg code—it’s about how it used it.
At the center of the complaint is an alleged violation of the GNU Lesser General Public License (LGPL), under which much of FFmpeg’s code is distributed.
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This Wasn’t Just Code Reuse
FFmpeg’s LGPL license explicitly allows reuse of its code, including in commercial products. But that permission comes with strict conditions:
- The reused code must remain under an LGPL-compatible license
- Original copyright notices and author attributions must be preserved
- The origin of the code must be clearly acknowledged
According to the DMCA filing, Rockchip failed on all three counts.
The complainant alleges that multiple source files in Rockchip’s MPP repository were directly derived from FFmpeg’s libavcodec code, but were relicensed under the Apache License—a move that is incompatible with the LGPL in this context.
Attribution Allegedly Removed
The complaint goes further, claiming that Rockchip removed original copyright headers and author information, effectively presenting FFmpeg-derived code as its own.
Specific decoder implementations—AV1, H.265, and VP9—are cited as examples. The similarities reportedly go beyond general structure, extending to identical comments and even commented-out function calls that still reference FFmpeg’s original symbols.
In other words, the code’s origin was not subtle.
A Long-Running Issue
Perhaps most damaging for Rockchip is the timeline.
According to the filing, Rockchip was notified of the licensing issue nearly two years ago and repeatedly acknowledged the problem, stating that it would be addressed. Despite those assurances, no corrective action was taken.
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That prolonged inaction ultimately led to the formal DMCA request.
As the complainant bluntly put it: the expected happened.
GitHub Pulls the Plug
Following the DMCA notice, GitHub disabled public access to the Rockchip Linux MPP repository. At the time of writing:
- The repository remains unavailable
- No public counter-notice has been filed
- GitHub has not restored access to the code
Why This Matters
Rockchip is a major Chinese semiconductor vendor. Its system-on-chip platforms power:
- Single-board computers
- Android devices
- Media players
- Embedded Linux systems
The MPP framework is a critical part of Rockchip’s ecosystem, providing hardware-accelerated video encoding and decoding for modern codecs. Its sudden removal could have real downstream effects for developers and distributions that depend on it.
The Bigger Picture
This takedown is a reminder of a lesson the open-source world keeps relearning:
Open source does not mean license-free.
Using FFmpeg—or any LGPL-licensed project—requires careful compliance, especially when code is copied, modified, and redistributed. Relicensing without compatibility, or stripping attribution, crosses a legal line.
And when that happens, even large vendors aren’t immune to having their code disappear overnight.
