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W3C abandons consensus, standardizes DRM, EFF resigns

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Re: W3C abandons consensus, standardizes DRM, EFF resigns

#871

Post by holmb »

brockers wrote: post #856
holmb wrote: post #849

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It can never be illegal to use any tool. It is the intent and action carried out with the tool that decides whether it is illegal. Consider the difference carrying a knife, being a hunter, and carrying a knife being a bankrobber and going into a bank to use it.

Oh it most certainly can... it SHOULDN'T but it absolutely can.

Perhaps the knife was a bit exagerated. It will be considered a weapon in many jurisdictions. Lynx however will/should hardly be considered a hacking tool. curl has been in deep waters many times, equally perplexing as the lynx scenario. https://daniel.haxx.se/blog/2016/01/19/subject-urgent-warnin...

Re: W3C abandons consensus, standardizes DRM, EFF resigns

#872

Post by pornel »

DarkCrusader2 wrote: post #772
d--b wrote: post #700

What people don't get is that EME sets a strange precedent in the history of HTML. Web browsers have always been very hackable. HTTP meant you could always look at the traffic being exchanged. And because there was little point in obscuring anything, web browsers allowed you to look into and modify everything: - view/modify document source - view/modify DOM - debug script - and so on This is how CSS was defined too.…

I do not understand DRM/silverlight properly. Does this means that I won't be able to see what code is running in my browser for eg. JS collecting data in the background or use things like adblocker, greasemonkey etc.

> I won't be able to see what code is running in my browser

Yes, but it's not JS. It's a plug-in the EME spec calls "CDM", and it is allowed to be anything, including kernel modules and hardware.

Websites that sign contracts with CDM plug-in vendors can use these unrestricted plug-ins, but you aren't allowed to check what they're doing because of DMCA.

Re: W3C abandons consensus, standardizes DRM, EFF resigns

#873

Post by floatboth »

mfukar wrote: post #840
floatboth wrote: post #834

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Open source software can never be completely "gone". The "OMG EVERYTHING WILL BE DRM" panic is not new. We've had widely available DRM back when Flash was super popular. And still, to this day, the only DRM'd thing is movies.

The only thing? What about computer software? Maybe you meant to type 'the only thing I care about'.

I actually don't care about movies, very rarely watch them at all. The vast majority of video I watch is YouTube.

I meant to type "I never actually saw DRM on the web in person".

Also, proprietary desktop software is still usually "protected" by just a serial number :D

Re: W3C abandons consensus, standardizes DRM, EFF resigns

#874

Post by jarman »

enriquto wrote: post #767
near wrote: post #710

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The web has been engineered to a complexity level so grossly obscene that it is all but impossible for independent developers to produce fully independent web browsers anymore. You would need hundreds of millions of dollars in capital and strong leadership to produce a browser that would be successful in today's world. I could dedicate the rest of my life working 100 hours a week on a browser, and I would die before…

We should all move back to gopher. Seriously.

I am all for text-only, structured web; but gopher transfer protocol is broken mess (which is an achievement considering simplicity of it's purpose).

Re: W3C abandons consensus, standardizes DRM, EFF resigns

#875

Post by criddell »

mirimir wrote: post #796
tudorw wrote: post #752

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If we want to win that war, we should focus on content not technology, Mosaic got a lead in the game because, despite the 'techies' seeing no use for images, image support was added, with images came the transition of media, users were au fait with articles containing text and images and could now experience similar on line, this alone was not enough, content creators starting creating content that people wanted to c…

I don't see any way to win that war. The IP oligarchs have won it. They own the W3C now. But there is clearly a demand for DRM-free browsers. And if the worst fears are realized, and mainstream browsers won't display media without DRM, or become snooping devices for IP oligarchs, that demand will increase. Sure, it'll never be more than a niche, but DRM-free browsers will be there for those who want them.

> mainstream browsers won't display media without DRM

Seriously?

Nothing has really changed, has it? Video services want to use DRM so they developed or bought tools to do so. A de facto standard emerged around the frameworks and the W3C essentially ratified the standard. If I understand it correctly, the standard itself isn't DRM, rather it's a place where DRM controls can be installed.

I get that the EFF saw this as an opportunity to ask for a promise from DRM companies to not sue researchers and I applaud them for that. But now that they lost that battle, I think it's entirely appropriate for them to drop out and apply their resources elsewhere. For example, if they can get rid of the ability to sue researchers in the first place, then none of this really matters.

I don't think there's a demand for DRM free browsers but there is a demand for DRM free content.

Re: W3C abandons consensus, standardizes DRM, EFF resigns

#876

Post by avaer »

cjsuk wrote: post #765
tudorw wrote: post #752

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If we want to win that war, we should focus on content not technology, Mosaic got a lead in the game because, despite the 'techies' seeing no use for images, image support was added, with images came the transition of media, users were au fait with articles containing text and images and could now experience similar on line, this alone was not enough, content creators starting creating content that people wanted to c…

I agree. Back in the dark ages, when the battle of www vs Gopher was still on, I sided heavily on the side of Gopher because it didn't get in the way of the content. Gopher was a means to navigate the maze of content and most of the content was textual, postscript and neatly typeset. You could sit down with it and read it focused or print it out. We've regressed to the point where 5KiB of text comes with 2MiB of crap…

It's only insane if you subscribe to the idea that the 5 kibibytes of content is the purpose of a news or other site. Maybe as a user that's what you came for, but from a business perspective the purpose of the piece is to sneak 2 mebibytes of crap into your life. The snr on that is much better.

It's only insane if you have the tools to look at what's happening under the hood. Most people don't have any idea.

Re: W3C abandons consensus, standardizes DRM, EFF resigns

#877

Post by H1Supreme »

cannonedhamster wrote: post #855
chris_wot wrote: post #843

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't see why these webpages need to be so huge. If websites used HTML5 properly and used CSS more extensively, a lot of the crap I feel could be removed. Seriously, aside from graphics and video, what is taking up the size of these pages? Mountains of JavaScript?

As someone who used to work for a web optimization company, yes mountains of Javascript. Javascript for analytics, javascript for transitions, javascript for DRM, javascript for updating pricing in real time, javascript for fonts, javascript for colors, javascript to lazy load the images....six different style sheets and images that are downloaded and resized client side...and this is just the navigation bar.

Just for fun I like to pull up the browser diagnostics on pages, and watch the absurd number of requests build up. It's insane how much junk is downloaded on seemingly simple sites.

Re: W3C abandons consensus, standardizes DRM, EFF resigns

#878

Post by ctrl-j »

eridius wrote: post #746
ctrl-j wrote: post #635

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Consensus and compromise is obviously very important, but when one side is strictly anti-DRM, it's pretty hard to compromise. When it's the first time they've broken with consensus, and the decision is very much not in the best interests of the common user - it's kind of a big deal. DRM may be a necessity for corporations to feel they can make money safely - it's not consumer friendly, and it certainly doesn't need…

But it is in the interests of the common user. It's absolutely beneficial for browsers to have a standardized API for this stuff instead of non-standard plugin hell. People like you seem to think that if the W3C rejected DRM then sites would stop using it (and hence this being for the benefit of the user). But that belief is hopelessly naive. Sites like Netflix are never going to stop using DRM. They're contractually…

> People like you seem to think that if the W3C rejected DRM then sites would stop using it (and hence this being for the benefit of the user).

When did I say that? Specifically? Why did you assume I'm ignorant of the way corporations operate?

That's on you. Not me.

> It's absolutely beneficial for browsers to have a standardized API for this stuff instead of non-standard plugin hell.

Except the standard that they adopted is not friendly to the end-user. So "Non standard plugin hell" becomes "standard DRM hell."

A while back Widevine stopped working for me after an update. Uninstalling and reinstalling didn't work. End result? Almost no video played in my browser. You know what still would have worked? Pirate Bay.

You can spin it however you want. DRM is good for content providers. It's not good for users.

If Netflix requires DRM - so be it. They've got good engineers, they can provide a DRM plugin that you have to use. Or a standalone player. If a service doesn't have good engineering, their service will suffer.

It doesn't need to be a part of the open web standard.

Re: W3C abandons consensus, standardizes DRM, EFF resigns

#879

Post by bridge_ro »

shawnee_ wrote: post #777
RcouF1uZ4gsC wrote: post #4

Basically, unless you are writing a browser with decent marketshare, you defacto have no voice in making the standards. Basically, the only voices that matter are Mozilla (Firefox), Apple (Safari), Google(Chrome), and Microsoft (Edge/Explorer). Despite what any standard says, web developers are going to go by the behavior of the browsers do. The only company on the list of browser makers that really has any desire to…

> The only company on the list of browser makers that really has any desire to try to exclude DRM is Mozilla, and unfortunately, if they do that, the users will switch to the browser that makes watching Netflix easiest. This is simply not true. Netflix's entire business model is based around one thing: video content delivery. It started with DVDs in red envelopes, and has evolved to be app-based streaming now. Neithe…

I agree. I'm curious as to what percentage of Netflix users primarily stream through a web browser rather than an app. I know my personal experience amounts to basically nothing but I can't even remember the last time I watched something on Netflix through a browser. I just have a hard time imagining that a lack of Netflix would kill Firefox.

Re: W3C abandons consensus, standardizes DRM, EFF resigns

#880

Post by swiley »

near wrote: post #710
RcouF1uZ4gsC wrote: post #4

Basically, unless you are writing a browser with decent marketshare, you defacto have no voice in making the standards. Basically, the only voices that matter are Mozilla (Firefox), Apple (Safari), Google(Chrome), and Microsoft (Edge/Explorer). Despite what any standard says, web developers are going to go by the behavior of the browsers do. The only company on the list of browser makers that really has any desire to…

The web has been engineered to a complexity level so grossly obscene that it is all but impossible for independent developers to produce fully independent web browsers anymore. You would need hundreds of millions of dollars in capital and strong leadership to produce a browser that would be successful in today's world. I could dedicate the rest of my life working 100 hours a week on a browser, and I would die before…

ehhh HTML parsers/DOMs are trivially easy to write. after that you need to go get a JS lib (like ducktape) and write a css and json parser.

After that all you need is a layout engine, which GUI tookits like tk and gtk+ already have for text editing.

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