8 ms·

The EFF has strong words about where this is taking the open web [1]: "A Web where you cannot cut and paste text; where your browser can't "Save As..." an imag

by cyrus_ 13y ago

The EFF has strong words about where this is taking the open web [1]: "A Web where you cannot cut and paste text; where your browser can't "Save As..." an image; where the "allowed" uses of saved files are monitored beyond the browser; where JavaScript is sealed away in opaque tombs; and maybe even where we can no longer effectively "View Source" on some sites, is a very different Web from the one we have today. It's a Web where user agents—browsers—must navigate a nest of enforced duties every time they visit a page. It's a place where the next Tim Berners-Lee or Mozilla, if they were building a new browser from scratch, couldn't just look up the details of all the "Web" technologies. They'd have to negotiate and sign compliance agreements with a raft of DRM providers just to be fully standards-compliant and interoperable." They suggest the W3C may be digging itself into another hole like the one that led to the formation of WHATWG. A good read. [1] https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2013/10/lowering-your-standards https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2013/10/lowering-your-standard...

Supermighty 13y ago
What is the WHATWG's position on this? They represent the browser makers. If they support DRM then it's game over. Another break-away standards group won't be able to do anything to sway the browser makers. What could they do?
- cbhl 13y ago
  Consider that three of the largest browser makers -- Microsoft, Apple, and Google -- all have arms that deal heavily with media companies. I dislike DRM as much as the next person, but if it's implemented reasonably (think Steam or Netflix), then many consumers are willing to deal with it. EME was what enabled Netflix on ARM-based Chromebooks, for example; and I prefer EME to not being able to legally access media at all.
  - pdonis 13y ago
    I prefer EME to not being able to legally access media at all. In other words, you are willing to give up freedom to get--what, exactly? Movies? Music? Eye candy? I confess I simply can't understand this point of view. People are willing to hand over the Internet to DRM and the media corporations because they can't live without the "entertainment" that Hollywood provides? People are willing to have their computers pwned just so they can watch Netflix? That appalls me.
    - toyg 13y ago
      Dude, having your computer pwned is the smallest thing people will give up for entertainment. Romans were happy to hand their Republic to an Emperor, as long as he kept the circensem coming.
      - pdonis 13y ago
        Yes, but the Romans had few other options. Today people have lots of other options.
    - cbhl 13y ago
      I'm writing this comment from a Samsung Chromebook. When I use Chrome OS; I'm already giving up my freedom. Chromium itself is open-source, but there are tons of binary blobs on this device: the accelerated graphics driver for the Mali GPU, the ARM build of Adobe Flash, and the EME implementation that makes Netflix work on my device. EME is not new. There are already devices shipping with implementations, like mine. If EME is standardized, what it means for me is that there's a chance that my device will work with all DRMed content I want to access, and not on a per-service basis. We're not talking about giving "big bad media companies" full control of the Ring 0 Hypervisor; I am still perfectly capable of flipping the virtual developer switch on my device and booting a pure version of Linux at any time. If I buy a device ships like that, I hope that future me will have the good sense to return it to the store.
      - pdonis 13y ago
        When I use Chrome OS; I'm already giving up my freedom. Yes. Why? (I don't have a Chromebook, and don't use Chrome OS, for this very reason.)
      - makomk 13y ago
        You're giving up a lot more than that. Last I heard, the existing Chrome OS implementation of HTML5 EME refuses to run unless the device is a Chromebook that's locked down to ensure no unauthorized or modified code is running anywhere on the device: enable developer mode and the CDM disables itself.
- jgraham 13y ago
  The WHATWG doesn't really "exist" in quite the same way that the W3C does. There isn't Process for obtaining an opinion that you can then ascribe to an organisation rather than one or more individuals. It only represents the browser makers insofar as the specs hosted at whatwg.org accurately reflect what browsers implement. Sometimes this is achived by adjusting the browsers to match the specs; oftentimes the opposite occurs. It is certainly the case that several individuals editing specs under the WHATWG banner have set out their opposition to DRM. It seems unlikely that Hixie will include it the HTML spec he edits unless, of course, we end up with something implemented in browsers that is both interoperable and open. Since "open" rather defeats the point of DRM, it's difficult to imagine that happening, however.
  - justincormack 13y ago
    The W3C though is an organization you can buy. Their process is not reasonable and we should not recognise their authority. Especially after this.
- marcosdumay 13y ago
  Most browsers are free software nowadays. Their makers opinion is important (yeah, forking is hard work), but not that much.
  - glhaynes 13y ago
    This vastly underestimates the importance of the massive number of users running browsers supplied by the vendor of their device/OS.
  - azakai 13y ago
    EME is driven by two browser vendors, Google and Microsoft, in partnership with Netflix. See Editors section of the spec, https://dvcs.w3.org/hg/html-media/raw-file/tip/encrypted-media/encrypted-media.html https://dvcs.w3.org/hg/html-media/raw-file/tip/encrypted-med... Chrome and IE are the ones pushing this - so yes, the opinion of browser makers matter, but sadly the 2 biggest ones, Google and Microsoft, do not just support EME but are the ones driving it.
- parasubvert 13y ago
  Seemingly, the WHATWG is against this. But there's a big difference between individuals on a mailing list and broader corporate interests. It's a tragic comedy that everyone's yelling at the W3C for losing their way yet again... the WHATWG, weren't they great. Yet the WHATWG is basically a proxy for Google, Apple and Microsoft. And they have driven the W3C agenda for a long while. When you repeatedly shit on the hippies, academics, and non-browser makers that had more sway in the past at the W3C, and replace them by corporate browser makers, you weaken the antibodies that were in place. The WHATWG's presence has marginalizing other voices within the W3C and forced it to listen to its primary members - i.e. corporate, pay-to-play ones.
jonahx 13y ago
This news makes me so sad. Also: The more things progress, the more and more sense RMS makes.
- MarcScott 13y ago
  I wish I could upvote more than once.
  - deleted 13y ago
    [deleted]
- rimantas 13y ago
  Actually RMS makes less and less sense each day (and has nothing to do with this issue at all), and comments of this kind are getting annoying.
  - bigphishy 13y ago
    Wait.. are you being facetious? Can you explain why you feel this way.
- darth_aardvark 13y ago
  What is RMS in this context? Googling got me nowhere.
  - sounds 13y ago
    We're talking about DRM and content protection, so RMS' 1997 short story seems apropos: http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/right-to-read.html http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/right-to-read.html
  - oscargrouch 13y ago
    RMS -> Richard Matthew Stallman
wdewind 13y ago
> It's a place where the next Tim Berners-Lee or Mozilla, if they were building a new browser from scratch, couldn't just look up the details of all the "Web" technologies. They'd have to negotiate and sign compliance agreements with a raft of DRM providers just to be fully standards-compliant and interoperable. I may be totally naive here, but I'm not really sure why this matters. That there is a WC3 standard does not imply that browsers have to adhere to it. If they didn't they simply wouldn't be able to access DRM protected content. From a UX perspective this seems no different from Netflix putting their content behind a login. Maybe I am being an idiot, if so please correct me, but this doesn't really seem like anything to worry about. The threats implied by EFF, that massive corporations will control content on the internet, seems only true for content published by those massive corporations (and thus are already happening now, with 3rd party DRM ie: Netflix's Silverlight player). It doesn't stop people from publishing non DRM protected content. I would agree this doesn't belong in the spec on technical level, but it seems to be inclusive not exclusive.
- cyrus_ 13y ago
  The W3C is the guardian of the world wide web, a system for disseminating information publicly and globally to all those who may benefit from it. By standardizing DRM for video, they are giving legitimacy to a technical kludge that is designed specifically to prevent the dissemination of information. There are legitimate reasons why someone may wish to save a video to their hard drive, just like they can save an image today. There is no reason the web should be built upon mechanisms designed specifically to privilege corporate interests over the interests of those falling under fair use exemptions to copyright laws.
  - wdewind 13y ago
    If I had my way we wouldn't have copyright at all. It seems idiotic to me for the same reasons patents are. But we do, and so just as you say there are "legitimate reasons" why someone may wish to save a video, there are too "legitimate reasons" someone may want to share their work in a protected manner. It's a product. If you don't like it don't buy it. There is no part of this that forces the user to view only DRM protected websites. As far as I can tell this only increases the rights of copyright holders, which, again, I think is stupid, but seems completely legal and a reasonable thing to do under our existing legal framework. Edit: it also does not seem like it will fundamentally change the user experience of the web since the things that it allows are mostly already doable, just not with an HTML standard.
ds9 13y ago
That would be the dystopian outcome if the sites and browsers together diverged from open standards and started forcing DRM on everyone. What this standard actually specifies however, is only that the browser will respond to a certain tag by looking for some proprietary-ware to play whatever audio and/or video someone wants to restrict. This is a disappointing move on the part of w3c, because it lends some air of legitimacy to DRM, and because it revives the otherwise dying plugin system under a new name. But it doesn't actually force DRM on anyone or restrict the ability to do anything on the web. The best case would be that users are unwilling to install the black-box-ware in order to see videos or whatever, and the feature is little used and the copyright exploiters have to either unlock the content or go away with it. None of which would be bad.
jiggy2011 13y ago
This is a bit of an exaggeration, we have had content like this on the web for years with proprietary technologies like flash, silverlight ,activeX and highly obfuscated JS. Not to mention the amount of content locked into walled gardens and proprietary app stores etc. The W3 proposals suggested do not in fact mandate browser vendors implement any DRM scheme to remain 100% standards compliant. This is myth that gets repeated on HN surprisingly often. The issue is that some big name content providers don't want to sell you content unless they can also install things on your computer. This fact remains regardless of the technological implementation details. The overwhelming majority of content on the web is DRM free. These proposals do not mandate nor give any incentive for that content to be protected if it is not already.
- jonahx 13y ago
  >The issue is that some big name content providers don't want to sell you content unless they can also install things on your computer. This fact remains regardless of the technological implementation details. Sure, but we don't have to aid them in their quest >The overwhelming majority of content on the web is DRM free. These proposals do not mandate nor give any incentive for that content to be protected if it is not already. The practical effect of being able to deliver DRM'd content to every non-technical web user, without first having to get that user to download and install your proprietary software, is just massive. This is one of the biggest falloff points in the conversion funnel, so it makes this new delivery method highly attractive. As it is now, businesses have to balance the cost of losing customers against the cost of not being able to DRM their content. Take that dilemma away and I think you certainly have a new incentive. The practical effects of this are far reaching imo.
  - jiggy2011 13y ago
    It seems odd for HN to be in favour of making technology & content marginally less accessible simply to spite people. Perhaps there exists a class of people who wanted to implement DRM on all of their content but were just waiting for the W3s blessing but such a class will be extremely small. Most of the DRM you see comes from mandates from big content firms, most other people could give less of a shit.
sliverstorm 13y ago
We've already got Silverlight, Flash, Java, so on and so forth... denying DRM entry to HTML won't stop DRM web content, and allowing it might just make the experience less miserable.
- pornel 13y ago
  It will make it more miserable, because EME is not a standard DRM, it's a plug-in interface for launching browser-specific/vendor-specific DRM plug-ins. DRM plug-ins are allowed to do whatever they want, and proponents at W3C want to completely bypass the browser and have DRM all the way from TPM to HDCP. Makers of Flash and Silverlight were a 3rd party in the DRM battle. They had to worry about their plugins' marketshare and could not implement too user-hostile DRM. They had to balance pleasing media corporations and users. Now there won't be anything stopping MPAA's CEOs wet dreams running in your OS's kernel. Media corps have Netflix and Google (Play Store) in their pockets and can force them to ship all kinds of nastiness — under W3C's brand name.
parasubvert 13y ago
The WHATWG are in control of the W3C's agenda. The corporate members of the WHATWG are the ones pushing for Web DRM. Oh, not the individuals necessarily. They might be opposed to it. But they're just voices in a large game: Microsoft and Google are co-editors with Netflix of the new DRM spec.

by cyrus_ 13y ago

Supermighty 13y ago

What is the WHATWG's position on this? They represent the browser makers. If they support DRM then it's game over. Another break-away standards group won't be able to do anything to sway the browser makers. What could they do?

cbhl 13y ago
Consider that three of the largest browser makers -- Microsoft, Apple, and Google -- all have arms that deal heavily with media companies. I dislike DRM as much as the next person, but if it's implemented reasonably (think Steam or Netflix), then many consumers are willing to deal with it. EME was what enabled Netflix on ARM-based Chromebooks, for example; and I prefer EME to not being able to legally access media at all.
- pdonis 13y ago
  I prefer EME to not being able to legally access media at all. In other words, you are willing to give up freedom to get--what, exactly? Movies? Music? Eye candy? I confess I simply can't understand this point of view. People are willing to hand over the Internet to DRM and the media corporations because they can't live without the "entertainment" that Hollywood provides? People are willing to have their computers pwned just so they can watch Netflix? That appalls me.
  - toyg 13y ago
    Dude, having your computer pwned is the smallest thing people will give up for entertainment. Romans were happy to hand their Republic to an Emperor, as long as he kept the circensem coming.
    - pdonis 13y ago
      Yes, but the Romans had few other options. Today people have lots of other options.
  - cbhl 13y ago
    I'm writing this comment from a Samsung Chromebook. When I use Chrome OS; I'm already giving up my freedom. Chromium itself is open-source, but there are tons of binary blobs on this device: the accelerated graphics driver for the Mali GPU, the ARM build of Adobe Flash, and the EME implementation that makes Netflix work on my device. EME is not new. There are already devices shipping with implementations, like mine. If EME is standardized, what it means for me is that there's a chance that my device will work with all DRMed content I want to access, and not on a per-service basis. We're not talking about giving "big bad media companies" full control of the Ring 0 Hypervisor; I am still perfectly capable of flipping the virtual developer switch on my device and booting a pure version of Linux at any time. If I buy a device ships like that, I hope that future me will have the good sense to return it to the store.
    - pdonis 13y ago
      When I use Chrome OS; I'm already giving up my freedom. Yes. Why? (I don't have a Chromebook, and don't use Chrome OS, for this very reason.)
    - makomk 13y ago
      You're giving up a lot more than that. Last I heard, the existing Chrome OS implementation of HTML5 EME refuses to run unless the device is a Chromebook that's locked down to ensure no unauthorized or modified code is running anywhere on the device: enable developer mode and the CDM disables itself.
jgraham 13y ago
The WHATWG doesn't really "exist" in quite the same way that the W3C does. There isn't Process for obtaining an opinion that you can then ascribe to an organisation rather than one or more individuals. It only represents the browser makers insofar as the specs hosted at whatwg.org accurately reflect what browsers implement. Sometimes this is achived by adjusting the browsers to match the specs; oftentimes the opposite occurs. It is certainly the case that several individuals editing specs under the WHATWG banner have set out their opposition to DRM. It seems unlikely that Hixie will include it the HTML spec he edits unless, of course, we end up with something implemented in browsers that is both interoperable and open. Since "open" rather defeats the point of DRM, it's difficult to imagine that happening, however.
- justincormack 13y ago
  The W3C though is an organization you can buy. Their process is not reasonable and we should not recognise their authority. Especially after this.
marcosdumay 13y ago
Most browsers are free software nowadays. Their makers opinion is important (yeah, forking is hard work), but not that much.
- glhaynes 13y ago
  This vastly underestimates the importance of the massive number of users running browsers supplied by the vendor of their device/OS.
- azakai 13y ago
  EME is driven by two browser vendors, Google and Microsoft, in partnership with Netflix. See Editors section of the spec, https://dvcs.w3.org/hg/html-media/raw-file/tip/encrypted-media/encrypted-media.html https://dvcs.w3.org/hg/html-media/raw-file/tip/encrypted-med... Chrome and IE are the ones pushing this - so yes, the opinion of browser makers matter, but sadly the 2 biggest ones, Google and Microsoft, do not just support EME but are the ones driving it.
parasubvert 13y ago
Seemingly, the WHATWG is against this. But there's a big difference between individuals on a mailing list and broader corporate interests. It's a tragic comedy that everyone's yelling at the W3C for losing their way yet again... the WHATWG, weren't they great. Yet the WHATWG is basically a proxy for Google, Apple and Microsoft. And they have driven the W3C agenda for a long while. When you repeatedly shit on the hippies, academics, and non-browser makers that had more sway in the past at the W3C, and replace them by corporate browser makers, you weaken the antibodies that were in place. The WHATWG's presence has marginalizing other voices within the W3C and forced it to listen to its primary members - i.e. corporate, pay-to-play ones.

jonahx 13y ago

This news makes me so sad. Also: The more things progress, the more and more sense RMS makes.

MarcScott 13y ago
I wish I could upvote more than once.
- deleted 13y ago
  [deleted]
rimantas 13y ago
Actually RMS makes less and less sense each day (and has nothing to do with this issue at all), and comments of this kind are getting annoying.
- bigphishy 13y ago
  Wait.. are you being facetious? Can you explain why you feel this way.
darth_aardvark 13y ago
What is RMS in this context? Googling got me nowhere.
- sounds 13y ago
  We're talking about DRM and content protection, so RMS' 1997 short story seems apropos: http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/right-to-read.html http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/right-to-read.html
- oscargrouch 13y ago
  RMS -> Richard Matthew Stallman

wdewind 13y ago

> It's a place where the next Tim Berners-Lee or Mozilla, if they were building a new browser from scratch, couldn't just look up the details of all the "Web" technologies. They'd have to negotiate and sign compliance agreements with a raft of DRM providers just to be fully standards-compliant and interoperable. I may be totally naive here, but I'm not really sure why this matters. That there is a WC3 standard does not imply that browsers have to adhere to it. If they didn't they simply wouldn't be able to access DRM protected content. From a UX perspective this seems no different from Netflix putting their content behind a login. Maybe I am being an idiot, if so please correct me, but this doesn't really seem like anything to worry about. The threats implied by EFF, that massive corporations will control content on the internet, seems only true for content published by those massive corporations (and thus are already happening now, with 3rd party DRM ie: Netflix's Silverlight player). It doesn't stop people from publishing non DRM protected content. I would agree this doesn't belong in the spec on technical level, but it seems to be inclusive not exclusive.

cyrus_ 13y ago
The W3C is the guardian of the world wide web, a system for disseminating information publicly and globally to all those who may benefit from it. By standardizing DRM for video, they are giving legitimacy to a technical kludge that is designed specifically to prevent the dissemination of information. There are legitimate reasons why someone may wish to save a video to their hard drive, just like they can save an image today. There is no reason the web should be built upon mechanisms designed specifically to privilege corporate interests over the interests of those falling under fair use exemptions to copyright laws.
- wdewind 13y ago
  If I had my way we wouldn't have copyright at all. It seems idiotic to me for the same reasons patents are. But we do, and so just as you say there are "legitimate reasons" why someone may wish to save a video, there are too "legitimate reasons" someone may want to share their work in a protected manner. It's a product. If you don't like it don't buy it. There is no part of this that forces the user to view only DRM protected websites. As far as I can tell this only increases the rights of copyright holders, which, again, I think is stupid, but seems completely legal and a reasonable thing to do under our existing legal framework. Edit: it also does not seem like it will fundamentally change the user experience of the web since the things that it allows are mostly already doable, just not with an HTML standard.

ds9 13y ago

That would be the dystopian outcome if the sites and browsers together diverged from open standards and started forcing DRM on everyone. What this standard actually specifies however, is only that the browser will respond to a certain tag by looking for some proprietary-ware to play whatever audio and/or video someone wants to restrict. This is a disappointing move on the part of w3c, because it lends some air of legitimacy to DRM, and because it revives the otherwise dying plugin system under a new name. But it doesn't actually force DRM on anyone or restrict the ability to do anything on the web. The best case would be that users are unwilling to install the black-box-ware in order to see videos or whatever, and the feature is little used and the copyright exploiters have to either unlock the content or go away with it. None of which would be bad.

jiggy2011 13y ago

This is a bit of an exaggeration, we have had content like this on the web for years with proprietary technologies like flash, silverlight ,activeX and highly obfuscated JS. Not to mention the amount of content locked into walled gardens and proprietary app stores etc. The W3 proposals suggested do not in fact mandate browser vendors implement any DRM scheme to remain 100% standards compliant. This is myth that gets repeated on HN surprisingly often. The issue is that some big name content providers don't want to sell you content unless they can also install things on your computer. This fact remains regardless of the technological implementation details. The overwhelming majority of content on the web is DRM free. These proposals do not mandate nor give any incentive for that content to be protected if it is not already.

jonahx 13y ago
>The issue is that some big name content providers don't want to sell you content unless they can also install things on your computer. This fact remains regardless of the technological implementation details. Sure, but we don't have to aid them in their quest >The overwhelming majority of content on the web is DRM free. These proposals do not mandate nor give any incentive for that content to be protected if it is not already. The practical effect of being able to deliver DRM'd content to every non-technical web user, without first having to get that user to download and install your proprietary software, is just massive. This is one of the biggest falloff points in the conversion funnel, so it makes this new delivery method highly attractive. As it is now, businesses have to balance the cost of losing customers against the cost of not being able to DRM their content. Take that dilemma away and I think you certainly have a new incentive. The practical effects of this are far reaching imo.
- jiggy2011 13y ago
  It seems odd for HN to be in favour of making technology & content marginally less accessible simply to spite people. Perhaps there exists a class of people who wanted to implement DRM on all of their content but were just waiting for the W3s blessing but such a class will be extremely small. Most of the DRM you see comes from mandates from big content firms, most other people could give less of a shit.

sliverstorm 13y ago

We've already got Silverlight, Flash, Java, so on and so forth... denying DRM entry to HTML won't stop DRM web content, and allowing it might just make the experience less miserable.

pornel 13y ago
It will make it more miserable, because EME is not a standard DRM, it's a plug-in interface for launching browser-specific/vendor-specific DRM plug-ins. DRM plug-ins are allowed to do whatever they want, and proponents at W3C want to completely bypass the browser and have DRM all the way from TPM to HDCP. Makers of Flash and Silverlight were a 3rd party in the DRM battle. They had to worry about their plugins' marketshare and could not implement too user-hostile DRM. They had to balance pleasing media corporations and users. Now there won't be anything stopping MPAA's CEOs wet dreams running in your OS's kernel. Media corps have Netflix and Google (Play Store) in their pockets and can force them to ship all kinds of nastiness — under W3C's brand name.

parasubvert 13y ago

The WHATWG are in control of the W3C's agenda. The corporate members of the WHATWG are the ones pushing for Web DRM. Oh, not the individuals necessarily. They might be opposed to it. But they're just voices in a large game: Microsoft and Google are co-editors with Netflix of the new DRM spec.