4 ms·

I agree that DRM is a bad thing, but in this instance, what is the alternative to implementing in the browser? Media companies will each have their own DRM plug

I agree that DRM is a bad thing, but in this instance, what is the alternative to implementing in the browser? Media companies will each have their own DRM plugins, which won't work on all browsers and platforms. Which is worse?

jug5 9y ago
DRM in HTML is worse.
kuschku 9y ago
DRM in the browser is worse. Because it makes this too easy. Now Facebook and Twitter wre considering DRM for their video content, and YouTube is already implementing it. In a few years you won't be able to download a single video you see on the web. Great.
- trumbitta2 9y ago
  And despite the downvotes, this is a huge problem because videos are not only movies and tv series: videos are also interviews, live reporting, crimes, calling out politicians or worse. If you can't download those, you have one card less to play when they decide to put them down from the Internet.
Touche 9y ago
Being in the spec is worse, because now it is the browser's responsibility. This is what EME defenders don't seem to understand, it's all about offloading the responsibility off of media companies and onto browser vendors. Let me repeat that, EME is a redistribution of software maintenance (bugs, etc.) off of the media companies and onto browser vendors.
- tehbeard 9y ago
  Past experience with buggy software has shown me media companies are way worse at this than Microsoft/Google/Mozilla whose job is to ship working code.
  - chimeracoder 9y ago
    > Past experience with buggy software has shown me media companies are way worse at this than Microsoft/Google/Mozilla whose job is to ship working code. With EME, you still have to download a proprietary binary written by the media companies and run it on your computer. It's not inherently any less buggy than the previous approaches were.
    - hsivonen 9y ago
      The proprietary DRM components come from Google, Microsoft and Apple.
  - Touche 9y ago
    Which is exactly why they want to offload the responsibility onto someone else.
- lordlimecat 9y ago
  That is a good thing if you care in the least about security. Being secure is a selling point of browsers, and hence they take code quality seriously-- bug trackers, bug bounties, regular and automatic updates. History has shown that third party plugin providers care not even a little bit about how slow or broken their plugins are, because they have a monopoly on that content you want to view. As a result, in a world where the content creators control the plugin code, everyone ends up with broken, insecure, slow plugins. We're trying to exit that world. Don't start getting nostalgic for it.
Drakim 9y ago
I would actually have preferred that. Making DRM a harder and more inconvenient choice means DRM is a less attractive option. Making DRM easy and painless means it becomes normal. You might ask, if DRM is so easy and painless, what's so bad about it? The thing is, I only think it will be easy and painless for one specific type of use, such as watching from netflix.com in a browser. You can forget about trying to consume the media in any other way (other than what Netflix has decided is "good"). And then some years down the road some brilliant manager comes up with the idea of using DRM for many more things than video. After all, why should our visitors be able to see the source code of our websites? Why should imgur's visitors be able to "steal" images that they are hosting and put them other places?
- Touche 9y ago
  This doesn't make DRM any easier. It makes it easier for media companies. If you are implementing a browser now you have to do backroom deals with DRM providers to use their plugins. Hopefully you have a nest egg from advertisement sales or manufacturing a popular phone or something, otherwise the DRM providers won't give 2 shits about you.
avaer 9y ago
The alternative is forcing media companies to adapt to market demand. Instead we're forcing developers and users to adapt to media company demand. That's worse than letting crappy proprietary plugins continue to die a deserved death.
- acdha 9y ago
  > The alternative is forcing media companies to adapt to market demand. Citation needed that there's market demand. A couple decades in, as far as I can tell the average consumer is all too happy with the current setup, which is why there's been so little effective opposition. > Instead we're forcing developers and users to adapt to media company demand. Developers … of browsers, who were the ones who backed this proposal so they could stop having to support the performance and security problems of plugins. If you're just developing a website which doesn't sell restricted content, your life doesn't change in any way. If you do, well, the contract terms haven't changed – the only difference is that you don't need to maintain a second development and hosting environment for Flash/Silverlight. As for the user experience, the only change from that perspective is that things have gotten easier. Most users have never had unrestricted commercial video so all they're losing is the need to install a plugin or pay someone to remove malware from their PC when they forget to update that plugin. Plus the fans don't stay on constantly when playing >480p like they did with Flash. I don't like DRM but if hyperbolic rhetoric was going to solve this problem that would have happened a decade or two earlier.
- dasil003 9y ago
  You don't know what you're talking about. Studios would rather kill streaming on PCs entirely, and force streaming to happen on approved devices than give up DRM, and they have the market clout to do just that. Bottom line is they have the content people want so they do what they want, browser makers have no leverage to play activist in this situation.
IshKebab 9y ago
Erm... that is how it works. There are lots of EME plugins and they don't work on all browsers or platforms. Here's a list: https://drmtoday.com/platforms/ https://drmtoday.com/platforms/
lordlimecat 9y ago
Not to mention that they would be riddled with security holes, with no regular update schedule or bug bounty in sight. DRM isnt going away, this may be the lesser of two evils.

jug5 9y ago

DRM in HTML is worse.

kuschku 9y ago

DRM in the browser is worse. Because it makes this too easy. Now Facebook and Twitter wre considering DRM for their video content, and YouTube is already implementing it. In a few years you won't be able to download a single video you see on the web. Great.

trumbitta2 9y ago
And despite the downvotes, this is a huge problem because videos are not only movies and tv series: videos are also interviews, live reporting, crimes, calling out politicians or worse. If you can't download those, you have one card less to play when they decide to put them down from the Internet.

Touche 9y ago

Being in the spec is worse, because now it is the browser's responsibility. This is what EME defenders don't seem to understand, it's all about offloading the responsibility off of media companies and onto browser vendors. Let me repeat that, EME is a redistribution of software maintenance (bugs, etc.) off of the media companies and onto browser vendors.

tehbeard 9y ago
Past experience with buggy software has shown me media companies are way worse at this than Microsoft/Google/Mozilla whose job is to ship working code.
- chimeracoder 9y ago
  > Past experience with buggy software has shown me media companies are way worse at this than Microsoft/Google/Mozilla whose job is to ship working code. With EME, you still have to download a proprietary binary written by the media companies and run it on your computer. It's not inherently any less buggy than the previous approaches were.
  - hsivonen 9y ago
    The proprietary DRM components come from Google, Microsoft and Apple.
- Touche 9y ago
  Which is exactly why they want to offload the responsibility onto someone else.
lordlimecat 9y ago
That is a good thing if you care in the least about security. Being secure is a selling point of browsers, and hence they take code quality seriously-- bug trackers, bug bounties, regular and automatic updates. History has shown that third party plugin providers care not even a little bit about how slow or broken their plugins are, because they have a monopoly on that content you want to view. As a result, in a world where the content creators control the plugin code, everyone ends up with broken, insecure, slow plugins. We're trying to exit that world. Don't start getting nostalgic for it.

Drakim 9y ago

I would actually have preferred that. Making DRM a harder and more inconvenient choice means DRM is a less attractive option. Making DRM easy and painless means it becomes normal. You might ask, if DRM is so easy and painless, what's so bad about it? The thing is, I only think it will be easy and painless for one specific type of use, such as watching from netflix.com in a browser. You can forget about trying to consume the media in any other way (other than what Netflix has decided is "good"). And then some years down the road some brilliant manager comes up with the idea of using DRM for many more things than video. After all, why should our visitors be able to see the source code of our websites? Why should imgur's visitors be able to "steal" images that they are hosting and put them other places?

Touche 9y ago
This doesn't make DRM any easier. It makes it easier for media companies. If you are implementing a browser now you have to do backroom deals with DRM providers to use their plugins. Hopefully you have a nest egg from advertisement sales or manufacturing a popular phone or something, otherwise the DRM providers won't give 2 shits about you.

avaer 9y ago

The alternative is forcing media companies to adapt to market demand. Instead we're forcing developers and users to adapt to media company demand. That's worse than letting crappy proprietary plugins continue to die a deserved death.

acdha 9y ago
> The alternative is forcing media companies to adapt to market demand. Citation needed that there's market demand. A couple decades in, as far as I can tell the average consumer is all too happy with the current setup, which is why there's been so little effective opposition. > Instead we're forcing developers and users to adapt to media company demand. Developers … of browsers, who were the ones who backed this proposal so they could stop having to support the performance and security problems of plugins. If you're just developing a website which doesn't sell restricted content, your life doesn't change in any way. If you do, well, the contract terms haven't changed – the only difference is that you don't need to maintain a second development and hosting environment for Flash/Silverlight. As for the user experience, the only change from that perspective is that things have gotten easier. Most users have never had unrestricted commercial video so all they're losing is the need to install a plugin or pay someone to remove malware from their PC when they forget to update that plugin. Plus the fans don't stay on constantly when playing >480p like they did with Flash. I don't like DRM but if hyperbolic rhetoric was going to solve this problem that would have happened a decade or two earlier.
dasil003 9y ago
You don't know what you're talking about. Studios would rather kill streaming on PCs entirely, and force streaming to happen on approved devices than give up DRM, and they have the market clout to do just that. Bottom line is they have the content people want so they do what they want, browser makers have no leverage to play activist in this situation.

IshKebab 9y ago

Erm... that is how it works. There are lots of EME plugins and they don't work on all browsers or platforms. Here's a list: https://drmtoday.com/platforms/ https://drmtoday.com/platforms/

lordlimecat 9y ago

Not to mention that they would be riddled with security holes, with no regular update schedule or bug bounty in sight. DRM isnt going away, this may be the lesser of two evils.