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How the Kodi Box Took Over Piracy

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Re: How the Kodi Box Took Over Piracy

#111

Post by mschuster91 »

Crosseye_Jack wrote: post #110
mschuster91 wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> EDIT: Reading the issues on the NF Plugin GH seems like you will need a heatsink for the RPI3 and you are prob only going to max out at 720p Why, though? Isn't the Pi CPU the same family that's also in smartphones, where Netflix works even with the FHD (or Retina!) screens everyone and their dog puts in a smartphone?

It seems to be down to inputstream.adaptive which is the bridge between widevine and kodi. See all the decoding has to be done in software and atm inputstream.adaptive isn’t refined/optimised enough for lower end CPUs such as what powers the RPI. Remember that the rpi is designed to be cheap. The whole rpi3 board is sold for $35 which still makes a profit for the board manufacturers and the Raspberry Pi foundation. S…

> See all the decoding has to be done in software

So you're saying that, basically, Netflix is leaving the whole hardware acceleration capabilities of any mobile SoC and most recent-ish desktop/laptop chipset on the table and does basically its own decoding from crypted bitstream to framebuffer?!

Who designed this crap?

Re: How the Kodi Box Took Over Piracy

#112

Post by have_faith »

tomjen3 wrote: post #65
have_faith wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We both know full well that mass football fan adoption of the service isn't just to watch the odd game at that specific time on one day of the week. You're right that it isn't strictly "stingy", but wanting something you've been denied isn't a good reason to take it.

The standard reason for not pirating is that it cost the producers money. In the case where they won't sell it at prices (some) people would pay for, who does piracy hurt?

I don't see "they won't sell it to me at a price I like" as justification for pirating it yourself as if it's somehow deserved. I would much prefer people use an argument not based on whether or not the cost means you should be allowed to have it or not.

Re: How the Kodi Box Took Over Piracy

#113

Post by Crosseye_Jack »

mschuster91 wrote: post #111
Crosseye_Jack wrote: post #110

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It seems to be down to inputstream.adaptive which is the bridge between widevine and kodi. See all the decoding has to be done in software and atm inputstream.adaptive isn’t refined/optimised enough for lower end CPUs such as what powers the RPI. Remember that the rpi is designed to be cheap. The whole rpi3 board is sold for $35 which still makes a profit for the board manufacturers and the Raspberry Pi foundation. S…

> See all the decoding has to be done in software So you're saying that, basically, Netflix is leaving the whole hardware acceleration capabilities of any mobile SoC and most recent-ish desktop/laptop chipset on the table and does basically its own decoding from crypted bitstream to framebuffer?! Who designed this crap?

Sorry if I worded it badly, I didn't mean to imply that all Widewine content is decoded in software on all platforms, just that's the way its handled on Kodi running on a Raspberry Pi.

Now i'm not a widevine "Partner" just a person with too much time on my hands and an interest in DRM. So for anyone who works on kodi or who is reading who is a widevine partner who's NDA's prevent you from correcting please forgive any mistakes. This is just my understanding of Widevine.

As I understand it on Android/ChromeOS widevine can decrypt and decode in hardware but I believe its done via a HAL.

As far as I understand it there are 3 security levels to widevine Level1 being the highest and 3 being the lowest.

Level 1 is where the decrypt and decode are all done within a trusted execution environment (As far as I understand it Google work with chipset vendors such as broadcom, qualcomm, etc to implement this) and then sent directly to the screen.

Level 2 is where widevine decrypts the content within the TEE and passes the content back to the application for decoding which could then be decoded with hardware or software.

Level 3 (I believe) is where widevine decrypts and decodes the content within the lib itself (it can use a hardware cryptographic engine but the rpi doesn't have one).

Android/ChromeOS support either Level1 or Level3 depending on the hardware and Chrome on desktops only seems to support Level 3. Kodi is using the browser implementation (at least when kodi is not running on Android) of widevine which seems to only support Level 3 (So decrypt & decode in software) and therefore can not support hardware decoding. But that doesn't mean that hardware decoding of widevine protected content can not be supported on any mobile SoC. Sorry if I gave that impression.

When a license for media is requested the security level it will be decrypted/decoded with is also sent and the returned license will restrict the widevine CDM to that security level.

I believe NetFlix only support Level 1 and Level 3, which is why for a while the max resolution you could get watching NetFlix on chrome in a desktop browser was 720p as I believe that was the max resolution NetFlix offered at Level 3 and we had to use Edge/IE(iirc) to watch at 1080p as it used a different DRM system (PlayReady) and why atm Desktop 4k Netflix is only currently supported on Edge using (iirc) Intel gen7+ processors and NVidia Pascal GPUs (I don't know if AMD support PlayReady 3.0 on their GPUs as I don't have one so not really had the desire to investigate, I'm guessing that current Ryzen CPUs do not as they currently don't have integrated GPUs).

On Android where Netflix's app believed Level 1 was supported it would request a Level 1 license and then Widevine would then pass the content off to the TEE for decryption and decode which would then use hardware for decoding. If it didn't believe that Level 1 was supported it would fallback to Level 3 which is why some Android tablets had to run a modified NetFlix app to force Level 1 requests because the official app wasn't tested on that device and was put on the supported devices list even though it did support Level 1 (running the modified app on a device that didn't support Level 1 wouldn't result in playback).

Re: How the Kodi Box Took Over Piracy

#114

Post by ravishi »

have_faith wrote: post #8
dazbradbury wrote: post #3

"In the UK, Kodi boxes have garnered more attention from authorities, thanks to stingy soccer fanatics driving an early swell of adoption" This is very unfair. I don't own a Kodi box, but in the UK it's against the law to show football games on TV on Saturday between 2:45pm and 5:15pm [1]. So it's not "stingy" football fans, it's fans that have no other way to watch a 3pm kick off without actually going to the game i…

We both know full well that mass football fan adoption of the service isn't just to watch the odd game at that specific time on one day of the week. You're right that it isn't strictly "stingy", but wanting something you've been denied isn't a good reason to take it.

Hey, I just want to thank for a book recommendation of yours I picked up in another thread. Didn't find any other way of contacting you, so here we are. Scattered Minds: this book has just changed my life. Thank you so much, kind internet stranger.

Re: How the Kodi Box Took Over Piracy

#115

Post by thirdsun »

giobox wrote: post #84
retSava wrote: post #4

Argh, this must be so frustrating for the Kodi devs...! There really is a very strong case for running a Kodi-box for ones own legit collection, and now it's just mentioned for the (admittedly, probably) not so slight share of piracy. MPAA and friends has turned their eye on Kodi since a while ago, like Sauron on the little hobbitses. Could this be a submarine piece?

I'd be shocked if the number of "legitimate" Kodi users is even close to the number of those using it to obtain whatever TV/movie content they are interested in not having to pay for. Federation Against Copyright Theft (FACT) in the UK commissioned a report claiming as much as a million of them have been sold in the UK alone - while I'd take that number with a large pinch of salt given the source, It's pretty clear t…

While that may be true it's a rather recent development that the devs over at Kodi certainly don't enjoy. Kodi or XBOX media center / XBMC as it was known has been around since the early (original) XBOX days. It powered my home theater for years, long before it was sold as a piracy box.

If we reduce Kodi to piracy related use cases, we might as well throw in VLC.

Re: How the Kodi Box Took Over Piracy

#116

Post by thirdsun »

Nullabillity wrote: post #22
hotgoldminer wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I know several people with access to Kodi that don't regard it as theft/piracy. They become pretty defensive when you accuse them of it. How do you think IP owners can adapt when piracy is made so transparent that it doesn't even feel like piracy anymore?

> How do you think IP owners can adapt when piracy is made so transparent that it doesn't even feel like piracy anymore? Stop thinking of it as paying for a physical product, and start thinking of it as a tip jar for making more stuff in the future.

You can't be serious. How would you feel if your salary was generated by a tip jar?

IP owners are free to set their terms and you're welcome to not purchase their content if don't agree with them. Don't get me wrong - I don't like the DRM-ridden practices of the movie industry either and wish they would copy the music industry, which allows me to buy their content DRM-free wherever I want.

Re: How the Kodi Box Took Over Piracy

#117

Post by mschuster91 »

Crosseye_Jack wrote: post #113
mschuster91 wrote: post #111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> See all the decoding has to be done in software So you're saying that, basically, Netflix is leaving the whole hardware acceleration capabilities of any mobile SoC and most recent-ish desktop/laptop chipset on the table and does basically its own decoding from crypted bitstream to framebuffer?! Who designed this crap?

Sorry if I worded it badly, I didn't mean to imply that all Widewine content is decoded in software on all platforms, just that's the way its handled on Kodi running on a Raspberry Pi. Now i'm not a widevine "Partner" just a person with too much time on my hands and an interest in DRM. So for anyone who works on kodi or who is reading who is a widevine partner who's NDA's prevent you from correcting please forgive an…

Thanks for clearing it up!

And... Jeez. What utter amount of bullsh.t and wasted money... everyone with a bluray drive and a copy of AnyDVD HD can create a perfect untraceable backup anyway so why do the studios insist on making the experience for Netflix users as bad as possible?!

Re: How the Kodi Box Took Over Piracy

#118

Post by Nullabillity »

thirdsun wrote: post #116
Nullabillity wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> How do you think IP owners can adapt when piracy is made so transparent that it doesn't even feel like piracy anymore? Stop thinking of it as paying for a physical product, and start thinking of it as a tip jar for making more stuff in the future.

You can't be serious. How would you feel if your salary was generated by a tip jar? IP owners are free to set their terms and you're welcome to not purchase their content if don't agree with them. Don't get me wrong - I don't like the DRM-ridden practices of the movie industry either and wish they would copy the music industry, which allows me to buy their content DRM-free wherever I want.

This is already how all digital content works, it's just a question of whether producers and lawmakers are ready to admit it yet.

Re: How the Kodi Box Took Over Piracy

#119

Post by thirdsun »

Nullabillity wrote: post #118
thirdsun wrote: post #116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can't be serious. How would you feel if your salary was generated by a tip jar? IP owners are free to set their terms and you're welcome to not purchase their content if don't agree with them. Don't get me wrong - I don't like the DRM-ridden practices of the movie industry either and wish they would copy the music industry, which allows me to buy their content DRM-free wherever I want.

This is already how all digital content works, it's just a question of whether producers and lawmakers are ready to admit it yet.

It's not, unless by all you mean some digital content. Donation-based content is still the exception and I think it's fine for creators to set a definitive price/value for their work as they see fit.

I buy my music digitally, lossless for a one-time flat fee and I own the content, ready to played with any player/software I can think of. With software and games it's slightly different since there's usually DRM involved, yet there's rarely a tip jar to be seen.

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