Well, I do not know whether there already was an ongoing discussion regarding the codecs among the Team — I am neither a developer nor a packager, and the Manjaro developers have moved from Telegram to Matrix a while ago, so I have no idea.
However, a few weeks ago, after looking into the topic of the codecs — and mind you that I personally don’t have a dog in that fight because I am using Intel graphics — I chose to reopen the debate via a private exchange with the Team here at the forum, because as it turns out, those codecs are not copyrighted but patented, and the European Union does not recognize patents on software.
Manjaro being a European distribution, it is therefore not required to exclude those codecs from the official install media and repositories. After looking into this matter deeper, the Team agreed. 