GStreamer is a so called multimedia framework for Linux. Fluendo is the company behind this and it has now launched codecs for GStreamer, codecs which normally require some form of emulation via Wine to work. These codecs have been written for Linux and are completely legal with licenses, but that also means they aren’t free, which nudges the whole open source initiative. Except from Microsoft’s codecs it also offers Dolby’s AC3 decoder. The codecs from Microsoft doesn’t just make it possible play media but also record and encode, which has to be considered the greatest advantage over other solutions such as VLC.
