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EFF Makes Formal Objection to DRM in HTML5

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Re: EFF Makes Formal Objection to DRM in HTML5

#71

Post by shmerl »

cynicalkane wrote: post #52

The market problem is that people want to consume expensive art. There is billions of dollars of interest in making this market clear. The market will not go away because a bunch of hackers find it unethical. As the war on drugs has demonstrated, the market interprets censorship as damage, and routes around it. I see a lot of opposition to DRM on principle . These principles will go nowhere. The interesting question…

> the market interprets censorship as damage, and routes around it.

You said it. DRM is close to censorship in its core idea - it's preemptive policing. The market will find routes around it.

> I see a lot of opposition to DRM on principle. These principles will go nowhere.

Not true. There is a lot of opposition in principle to the totalitarian approach (which DRM embodies). If there would be no opposition, then it will work as "they take as much as you give them". I.e. if you don't value your own freedom, they for sure won't do that for you.

Re: EFF Makes Formal Objection to DRM in HTML5

#72

Post by cynicalkane »

mwcampbell wrote: post #66
cynicalkane wrote: post #52

The market problem is that people want to consume expensive art. There is billions of dollars of interest in making this market clear. The market will not go away because a bunch of hackers find it unethical. As the war on drugs has demonstrated, the market interprets censorship as damage, and routes around it. I see a lot of opposition to DRM on principle . These principles will go nowhere. The interesting question…

Does this proposed W3C standard really get us any further away from taking over our devices with god-knows-what secret solutions? After all, the CDM plugins themselves are still proprietary.

I think it's a case of pushing at the margin; exposing more details of the CDM plugins than would otherwise be exposed. Opening the CDM spec is also a design win for reasons that should be obvious to people who've worked on software.

It's been the general trend in web browsers to minimize the permissions you need to give to plugins--I would expect CDM plugins to evolve the same way.

Re: EFF Makes Formal Objection to DRM in HTML5

#73

Post by AnthonyMouse »

alipang wrote: post #43
duncan_bayne wrote: post #33

I've made this point already on the W3C CEO's blog, but it bears repeating here: DRM removes control of certain aspects of a device that I own, and places it in the hands of another. It does so in a manner that could not be less trustworthy: most DRM solutions are proprietary, closed-source applications. This means that I can't rely on others to audit it for me (as with FOSS) and I can't audit it myself. Some DRM imp…

DRM allows you to volontarily give up whatever control of your machine you're talking about. As painful as it is, one part of living in a capitalist society is to exercise your right/power as a consumer. Don't like it? Don't use it. To me, DRM is not something that infringes on your freedom, though I'm very glad we have the EFF when they spend their time combatting things like surveillance, that are not opt-in.

>DRM allows you to volontarily give up whatever control of your machine you're talking about.

DRM doesn't allow you to do anything. It only restricts. Your argument is really that DRM would "allow" you to enter into arrangements you wouldn't otherwise be able to because Hollywood wouldn't be willing to take your money without it, which you have not proven. And you could say the same thing about a shock collar. If someone suggested it would be a good idea to fit everyone with a shock collar that would shock you if you did anything Hollywood didn't like, and (at first) you could opt out of the shock, but not the collar, and only by opting out of popular culture (or breaking the law), I hope you can imagine why the idea might not see a particularly warm reception regardless of how many movies Hollywood alleges they'll provide in exchange.

Re: EFF Makes Formal Objection to DRM in HTML5

#74

Post by bcoates »

cynicalkane wrote: post #52

The market problem is that people want to consume expensive art. There is billions of dollars of interest in making this market clear. The market will not go away because a bunch of hackers find it unethical. As the war on drugs has demonstrated, the market interprets censorship as damage, and routes around it. I see a lot of opposition to DRM on principle . These principles will go nowhere. The interesting question…

The enthusiasm against DRM is mostly based on principle because the technological argument is so uninteresting. "DRM is part of an standard s.t. required permissions are visible and minimizable and the platform is open, opt-in and extensible" isn't possible and this is non-controversial among anyone not in the business of trying to sell it to someone who doesn't know that.

Re: EFF Makes Formal Objection to DRM in HTML5

#75

Post by smackmybishop »

shawnz wrote: post #60
alipang wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't see how DRM is incompatible with their goals. Of course one might argue that DRM might be platform specific. However, I very much doubt this standard will make DRM more platform specific than it already is.

> However, I very much doubt this standard will make DRM more platform specific than it already is. Of course not! In fact, due to the nature of the web, it will make DRM in general less platform-specific! The problem is that HTML will become more platform-specific.

How will this make the binary-only, proprietary DRM blobs less platform specific, exactly?

Re: EFF Makes Formal Objection to DRM in HTML5

#76

Post by biot »

johnvschmitt wrote: post #46

Good for EFF. DRM is futile. There is NO stopping people from recording what's on their screen (with a cell phone camera among other devices). What we've seen is: A) The more barriers you put in front of legitimate use, the more you see illegitimate use grow. B) The EFF is rock solid in standing up & protecting our rights & values in the modern, internet, connected age. Please help fund them. Meaning: DRM all you wan…

HBO should have a Kickstarter campaign for each episode of Game of Thrones. Donate any amount you want, and if the total funds raised is $75 million (or whatever HBO determines is the expected sales figure of the one episode for the next 25 years), HBO releases the DRM-free episode for free to everyone who wants a copy.

If the amount isn't reached, then the episode is never released. Repeat the process for each successive episode in each season.

Re: EFF Makes Formal Objection to DRM in HTML5

#77

Post by [deleted] »

johnvschmitt wrote: post #46

Good for EFF. DRM is futile. There is NO stopping people from recording what's on their screen (with a cell phone camera among other devices). What we've seen is: A) The more barriers you put in front of legitimate use, the more you see illegitimate use grow. B) The EFF is rock solid in standing up & protecting our rights & values in the modern, internet, connected age. Please help fund them. Meaning: DRM all you wan…

[deleted]

Re: EFF Makes Formal Objection to DRM in HTML5

#78

Post by shmerl »

bcoates wrote: post #74
cynicalkane wrote: post #52

The market problem is that people want to consume expensive art. There is billions of dollars of interest in making this market clear. The market will not go away because a bunch of hackers find it unethical. As the war on drugs has demonstrated, the market interprets censorship as damage, and routes around it. I see a lot of opposition to DRM on principle . These principles will go nowhere. The interesting question…

The enthusiasm against DRM is mostly based on principle because the technological argument is so uninteresting. "DRM is part of an standard s.t. required permissions are visible and minimizable and the platform is open, opt-in and extensible" isn't possible and this is non-controversial among anyone not in the business of trying to sell it to someone who doesn't know that.

> the platform is open

Where did you find an open DRM? It sounds oxymoronic.

Re: EFF Makes Formal Objection to DRM in HTML5

#79

Post by cynicalkane »

bcoates wrote: post #74
cynicalkane wrote: post #52

The market problem is that people want to consume expensive art. There is billions of dollars of interest in making this market clear. The market will not go away because a bunch of hackers find it unethical. As the war on drugs has demonstrated, the market interprets censorship as damage, and routes around it. I see a lot of opposition to DRM on principle . These principles will go nowhere. The interesting question…

The enthusiasm against DRM is mostly based on principle because the technological argument is so uninteresting. "DRM is part of an standard s.t. required permissions are visible and minimizable and the platform is open, opt-in and extensible" isn't possible and this is non-controversial among anyone not in the business of trying to sell it to someone who doesn't know that.

DRM is just a math problem (encryption) coupled with a hardware problem (retaining control of the results). The industry in, say, video games has settled on an equilibrium of making it very hard but not impossible to crack the hardware. But uncrackable encryption hardware already exists, it would just be inconvenient to make it uncrackable inside an XBox.

But whether the methods of DRM are open or closed is an implementation detail. Nobody thinks that TLS being open makes it crackable. But if users and programmers know the capabilities and requirements of DRM solutions, they can sequester them from the rest of the computer.

Re: EFF Makes Formal Objection to DRM in HTML5

#80

Post by duncan_bayne »

johnvschmitt wrote: post #46

Good for EFF. DRM is futile. There is NO stopping people from recording what's on their screen (with a cell phone camera among other devices). What we've seen is: A) The more barriers you put in front of legitimate use, the more you see illegitimate use grow. B) The EFF is rock solid in standing up & protecting our rights & values in the modern, internet, connected age. Please help fund them. Meaning: DRM all you wan…

Netflix uses DRM, and is one of the sponsors of this attempt to add DRM to HTML5.
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