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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

#141

Post by ihsw »

cmircea wrote: post #83
bcoates wrote: post #63

What's the Mozilla Foundation's position on this? Are they planning on staying involved in a post-DRM W3C? It's about time to for the anti-DRM pressure groups to go down this list: http://www.w3.org/Consortium/Member/List And start demanding the member organizations to make a public statement as to exactly how far the EME DRM standardization is allowed to advance before they will withdraw from the W3C.

I am not sure of the official position, but I seriously doubt Mozilla will EVER implement this. They've been opposing H.264, which is a lesser evil (patents) than outright DRM.

Opposition is one thing, outright boycott and attacking the legitimacy of the W3C is something else. Frankly I think the latter is necessary.

Re: EFF Makes Formal Objection to DRM in HTML5

#142

Post by Shorel »

shmerl wrote: post #113
cynicalkane wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's true that people are routing around existing DRM solutions. It's not true that this represents any threat to DRM. As the Steam platform has demonstrated, if you make paying the easy solution and piracy the hard one, the target audience (viz. people willing to pay money) will choose the easy one. The average consumer will not try to route around unfree information as long as it shows up when they click play. Poli…

As the Steam platform has demonstrated, if you make paying the easy solution and piracy the hard one, the target audience (viz. people willing to pay money) will choose the easy one. Steam is still DRMed and can be annoying enough. Try to get Loom there to play on your Scummvm and good luck with that. I don't use Steam since I don't want to support DRMed approach. I use GOG and other DRM free distributors for gaming.…

My opinion is that Steam's DRM is as ethical as it can be, and the only thing wrong about it is accepting other additional schemes like GfWL on top of it.

I will oppose other forms of DRM, like everything Sony has done, but I think companies like Valve have to be rewarded for doing something good for game studios and players alike.

I see your stance the same as I see the RMS stance on software licenses. Too extreme to be practical for all purposes.

Re: EFF Makes Formal Objection to DRM in HTML5

#143

Post by Anonazon »

benatkin wrote: post #116
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…

No, what's futile is this objection by the EFF. But I think it's a token gesture, so it probably doesn't bother them that much.

I've really been disillusioned by EFF lately. It seems like they're more of a black hole of activist's dollars than anything productive. When I donate, I like my dollars to go to more productive and practical use (like FSF) than to support libertarian ideals wrapped in a feel good presentation.

Re: EFF Makes Formal Objection to DRM in HTML5

#144

Post by [deleted] »

johnvschmitt wrote: post #95
duncan_bayne wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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

Yes, that's a shame. But: Netflix makes it easy & convenient. They are not the bad guy. They are really stuck between a rock & a hard place. (Between old school distributors of content (Hollywood), squeezing them for money to make sure they have no margin), and ISP's (Comcast, AT&T) who are saying, "Hey, Netflix is popular, >50% of bandwidth, so let's shake them down" (net neutrality needs to keep them from doing thi…

[deleted]

Re: EFF Makes Formal Objection to DRM in HTML5

#145

Post by shmerl »

Shorel wrote: post #142
shmerl wrote: post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As the Steam platform has demonstrated, if you make paying the easy solution and piracy the hard one, the target audience (viz. people willing to pay money) will choose the easy one. Steam is still DRMed and can be annoying enough. Try to get Loom there to play on your Scummvm and good luck with that. I don't use Steam since I don't want to support DRMed approach. I use GOG and other DRM free distributors for gaming.…

My opinion is that Steam's DRM is as ethical as it can be, and the only thing wrong about it is accepting other additional schemes like GfWL on top of it. I will oppose other forms of DRM, like everything Sony has done, but I think companies like Valve have to be rewarded for doing something good for game studios and players alike. I see your stance the same as I see the RMS stance on software licenses. Too extreme t…

If you want to grade what's worse, DRM or closed source software, I'd say that the first one is worse. While closed source software restricts user's freedom for modification and redistribution, DRM goes way beyond that and violates much more.

I'd say it's practical, reasonable and not extreme to be opposed to any forms of DRM. There is simply no excuse for it to exist.

Unlike Valve, other distributors (GOG/CDPR) proved that DRM free gaming distribution is practical. So I don't see Valve as a best example in the gaming industry. Music is DRM free. Digital books publishing offers more and more DRM free options. It's the video industry which lingers behind the most.

Re: EFF Makes Formal Objection to DRM in HTML5

#146

Post by duncan_bayne »

VonGuard wrote: post #93
jlgreco wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Who cares if Netflix needs it? If Netflix wants to do DRM in the browser, then they can continue to do it the painful way with traditional proprietary plugins. Why should we oblige them and dirty the standard in the process?

Because not doing so concedes this type of market to Microsoft. Open standards are a way to ensure no specific company has control over stuff like this.

I sound like a stuck record here but: the proposed EME standard in no way standardises the underlying DRM mechanisms in individual vendors' CDMs.

Re: EFF Makes Formal Objection to DRM in HTML5

#147

Post by nullc »

bcoates wrote: post #121
cynicalkane wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's a last mile problem the industry doesn't need to solve. How many people would rather hack hardware than pay money to watch TV and play video games? Of course, if it becomes cost-effective to hardware encrypt the entire stream, I don't think the lack of a W3C standard will make any difference in stopping it.

> How many people would rather hack hardware than pay money to watch TV and play video games? It only takes one. Everyone else just uses that cracked copy. I'm not worried about DRM working, I'm worried about it not working in a way that gets in my way as someone whose time is generally worth more than the hassle of finding movies on bittorrent.

This has an expedient solution of only making devices which are able to play DRMed media (perhaps with permissive flags), and having all authoring tools use a per-user content creator key. Then the same broadcast encryption keying that allows players to be selectively disable also allows the cracked transcoder to be disabled.

Of course, this isn't terribly compatible with general purpose computing but operating systems intended for the public have been moving away from general purpose computing for some time and tables and mobile devices are pretty close to that now.

If we go far enough down that path the makers of these handicapped devices can even get legislative help in preventing competition from more user friendly devices by outlawing their sale as was the case for macrovision.

Re: EFF Makes Formal Objection to DRM in HTML5

#148

Post by mikeash »

mythz wrote: post #115
mikeash wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure looks like it's getting closer to me. The amount of content I can view without a plugin has absolutely exploded over the past few years. Sure, big Hollywood names aren't in there yet, but it's not like they're the only ones who make videos worth watching.

What you mean by "big Hollywood" the mainstream population refers to as "TV" and "Movies". None of which we're able to watch without a plugin. I do all my TV watching online (95% on Netflix/Hulu), even most of the videos I watch on YouTube require flash, despite being opt-in to using the HTML5 video player.

Your statement was "closer". Even if the video watchable without plugins is only 1% of the total, your statement is still wrong if it was e.g. 0.1% a few years ago.

Regarding YouTube, I do most of my YouTubing on iOS devices, and it's very rare to find a video that doesn't work, so the non-plugin support is good. Why it doesn't work in your browser, I couldn't say, but at this point I suspect it's more about your setup than YouTube not supporting it at all.

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