The W3C's plan for DRM in HTML5 is a betrayal for all web users

In this case, forget consumers. Once in a while, something is more important than appeasing the masses.

A DRM free HTML5 spec is not going to force Hollywood to allow you to play Games of Thrones on your open source Linux browser.

Neither is a DRM-infested spec. Instead, you have uninformed consumers Googling for "how can I watch Game of Thrones Season 2 Episode 3 online for free", getting infested with malware, but still watching the show for free.

If they really want to ship DRM, they can do it using the same tools everyone else uses, without special monopoly-preserving treatment or 'protected media paths' or kernel hooks or tailor-made plugin APIs. Big Media is no more deserving of special treatment or protection than any of the other industries that want to build apps on the web, and the idea of dedicating time and resources to babysitting a dying industry when there are REAL PROBLEMS that could be solved instead is ridiculous.

The problem is that they know as well as we do that DRM doesn't work, and DRM especially doesn't work without the aid of special kernel/software hooks like the Windows PMP and OS X's anti-debugging protections. This is why they're so desperate to get DRM baked into the HTML5 spec and baked into browsers. The reality is though, adding DRM to browsers produces no value for anyone other than the lazy big media companies that can't adapt to the modern world. It doesn't produce value for consumers, it doesn't produce value for developers outside of big media, and it doesn't produce value for the people who actually produce video and audio content. All it does is enrich IP lawyers and executives.

Furthermore, the idea that lacking DRM somehow makes the web 'suck' is preposterous. Do you know anything about the web? If the web sucks that's entirely separate from whether or not it can play encrypted video. If it sucks, it's because browsers are full of security problems, websites are poorly designed and poorly engineered, web accessibility for the disabled is poor, web performance is miserable in many markets, and ISPs like Comcast continually abuse their monopoly status to overcharge and under-deliver. Encrypted video is so far from a real-world concern or priority for ordinary people that suggesting it's somehow NECESSARY for the web to not suck makes you look absolutely raving insane.

It's just dumb. DRM is just dumb. It doesn't work for anything but the most naive case. It won't prevent distribution of "pirated" content, ever.

I'm not asking for a DRM-free world, but I still hold out hope that if we continue to push back forcefully enough we might at least get rid of some of the abject nonsense being inflicted on us. Seriously (and without getting into any details), look at the middleware layers of a consumer OS some day to see all the spots where DRM has its greasy fingers. Must it be in HTML too?

At least a compiled-to-JS codec or encryption module would be JS, so it would run on the web everywhere. Unlike Flash, Silverlight, and also the EME stuff as mentioned in the article, all of which require proprietary code, and so will only run in some browsers and some platforms.