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W3C abandons consensus, standardizes DRM, EFF resigns

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Re: W3C abandons consensus, standardizes DRM, EFF resigns

#971
post #754
post #712

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I still control my machine. I just run software that I don't understand to get content to play. If I wasn't able to run a certain subset of software, i.e. DRM, then my machine would be less universal, not more.

No, you do not control your machine. Controling your machine does not imply you always understand what it is doing, jusy like controling your car doesn't imply you always know exactly where it is and how it got there. You may give your keys to your spouse to drive somewhere and you trust that they do just that. Back to computers, that means when you run someones elses software you don't necessarily know how it is doi…

But the _big_ problem starts when I cannot buy a computer without it, anymore.

So make one. There'll be a lot of things it won't be able to do, but nobody's going to put a gun to your head and order you to stop producing a DRM-free machine for yourself.

Meanwhile, the "you don't control your machine" argument suffers from the same fundamental tension as many of the RMS/GNU/FSF positions: in the name of freeing you from restrictions, they impose restrictions. The GPL, in the name of protecting what you can do with the software, specifies some things you must never be allowed to do with the software. The hardcore anti-DRM position, in the name of protecting what you can do with the hardware, specifies some things you must never be allowed to do with the hardware.

Now, that's not necessarily bad; there are arguments to be made that trading off a small amount of freedom to do a handful of things protects a large amount of freedom to do many things. But unfortunately that's not a type of argument RMS/GNU/FSF can admit to, because they frame things in absolutist moral terms. The absolutist cannot speak in terms of tradeoffs. To do so is to compromise the entire position and, worse, to open the door to others who might propose a different set of tradeoffs and argue that they're as reasonable as the absolutist's proposal; at that point, as the famous line goes, you're just haggling over your price.

So if you want a computer with no DRM, by all means go and build one. Refuse to put anything in it that you don't absolutely control. You'll be giving up quite a few things, like being able to play back popular media, but if that's the tradeoff you want you certainly are free to go and have it.

What you can't do is force others to abide by that; most people simply do not care that there are things in their computers not fully under their control, or if they reflect on it are willing to accept the tradeoff of, say, having hardware/software that will refuse to play certain media unless certain third-party-imposed conditions are met. You could argue that the overwhelming majority of them have never thought about this and probably wouldn't come to a rigorous and well-informed decision about it, but morally you have no inherent right to substitute your judgment of what's good for them in place of their judgment of what's good for them. The most you can do is build your own computer which does things the way you want, install only software that you personally trust to abide by your principles, and advocate for others to do the same.

Re: W3C abandons consensus, standardizes DRM, EFF resigns

#972

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is why I usually use just lynx.

I may be wrong, but isn't connecting to a web server by lynx illegal (considered "hacking") in some countries? I remember a case in the UK around the time of the London olympic games.

I'd hypothesise that anyone skilled enough to be using a text browser is also skilled enough to be a "hacker" and will most likely have a computer filled with "hacking tools" and other "circumvention devices".

Basically anyone that can use a text based browser also is using some form of *nix and knows how to handle a command line application. They probably tinker with computers and so have many low level tools at their disposal.

Re: W3C abandons consensus, standardizes DRM, EFF resigns

#973

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Mozilla is not funded by Google anymore, and hasn't been for several years (the Google contract ended back when I was still working at Mozilla). If you're interested, I wrote up some notes/thoughts from my experience in one of the sessions about EME and whether to implement it: http://www.b-list.org/weblog/2013/oct/16/eme/

That deal may be over but Mozilla still gets money from Google for search. Why is user advocacy so low key and half hearted, this being just one of them. What do they have to lose? They have consistently thrown in the towel while diluting the very things that users would choose them over Chrome for. There are many ways to exert influence in this world. Mozilla is in SV and is very much part of the culture and ecosyst…

Mozilla still gets money from Google for search.

No.

Re: W3C abandons consensus, standardizes DRM, EFF resigns

#974

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> That said, of course if it was possible to buy and download movies for permanent offline viewing, similar to music purchases There's actually quite a few systems which do exactly that. Funnily enough, all use DRM.

I'm not talking about temporary offline access to Netflix movies or buying/renting a movie via iTunes. I meant purchasing a real video file that I can put on my NAS and view in a player of my choice. Similar to music. I'm not aware of any video services that offers that.

> buying a movie via iTunes, Amazon, etc

Why, precisely, do you think you can't play the video file in a player of your choice? That is literally what DRM is - technical restrictions against using content you have purchased in a manner you desire. They provide the file in an encrypted format that only their own player can decrypt.

When iTunes used DRM for music, only Apple's devices could play music you bought from iTunes, too.

Re: W3C abandons consensus, standardizes DRM, EFF resigns

#975

I'm a bit uneducated when it comes to the cryptography involved, but I'm wondering why people here are so determined DRM can't ever work? Is it because someone will somehow get a copy and upload to torrents/streaming sites which of course won't have DRM. Thus only potentially annoying legitimate (eg. Netflix) users? Or are there other concerns?

If you're capable of actually consuming it (by seeing it with your eyes and/or hearing it with your ears), then it is possible to pirate it. Exactly zero DRM technologies today actually prevent piracy, and exactly zero DRM technologies ever will. Meanwhile, user-hostile DRM can and will (and already does) push users to simply pirate the media in question instead of putting up with the DRM. Users lose, publishers lose…

Publishers win control over playback hardware market which probably outweighs the loss, or they would have stopped doing it.

Re: W3C abandons consensus, standardizes DRM, EFF resigns

#976
post #958

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're joking right? Sometimes it's hard to tell...

I'm not joking. It's not that hard. You literally pick up the spec and implement it, it's mostly just fairly boring menial work.

I think you misunderstood. There is no "spec" for handling all of the invalid HTML out there. That's part of what makes writing a browser so hard. It's far from being menial work.

Re: W3C abandons consensus, standardizes DRM, EFF resigns

#977
post #964

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Markdown is a bad joke.

It's really fine for casual documentation. I wouldn't write a book or a paper in it though.

For a straight-text book, actually, Markdown is excellent. You can include images, or for technical content, tables, easily.

Technical papers with formulae and complex references are slightly more detailed, but that ends up being gloss. Even LaTeX for a simple text is quite minimal (though you need the starting template).

Source: I've made something of a hobby of marking up source docs into HTML, LaTeX, and Markdown. Of the set, Markdown would be my first go-to, and I've used it for some book-length projects.

Example here: https://ello.co/dredmorbius/post/lhw2eq4qmnnwxijlcrfyba

Re: W3C abandons consensus, standardizes DRM, EFF resigns

#978
post #878

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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 ad…

> 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 were doing something wrong perhaps. I have never installed widevine, yet all videos online worked for me. Try uninstalling it completely.

Re: W3C abandons consensus, standardizes DRM, EFF resigns

#980
post #976

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not joking. It's not that hard. You literally pick up the spec and implement it, it's mostly just fairly boring menial work.

I think you misunderstood. There is no "spec" for handling all of the invalid HTML out there. That's part of what makes writing a browser so hard. It's far from being menial work.

AFAIK all major browsers have converged on the parsing algorithm described in the HTML5 spec.

It‘s super lenient and very messy but at least it‘s consistent.

IMHO this was one of the biggest benefits coming out of the HTML5 efforts.

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