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Encrypted Media Extensions (EME), a mechanism by which HTML5 video providers can discover and enable DRM providers offered by a browser, has taken the next step on its contentious road to standardization. The World Wide Web Consortium (W3C), the standards body that oversees most Web-related specifications, has moved the EME specification to the Proposed Recommendation stage.
The next and final stage is for the W3C's Advisory Committee to review the proposal. If it passes review, the proposal will be blessed as a full W3C Recommendation.
Ever since W3C decided to start working on a DRM proposal, there have been complaints from those who oppose DRM on principle. The work has continued regardless, with W3C director and HTML inventor Tim Berners-Lee arguing that—given that DRM is already extant and, at least for video, unlikely to disappear any time soon—it's better for DRM-protected content to be a part of the Web ecosystem than to be separate from it.
Berners-Lee argued that, for almost all video providers, the alternative to DRM in the browser is DRM in a standalone application. He also argued that these standalone applications represent a greater risk to privacy and security than the constrained, sandboxed environment of the Web. He acknowledges that DRM has problems, chiefly the difficulties it imposes for fair use, derivative works, and backups. He notes, however, that a large body of consumers don't appear overly concerned with these issues, as they continue to buy or subscribe to DRM-protected content.
-- submitted from IRC
(Score: 4, Insightful) by WillR on Wednesday March 22 2017, @03:42PM (2 children)
If the Muggles all install Flash because that's what they have to do to watch Hulu and Amazon and install Silverlight because that's what they have to do to watch Netflix, then the vast majority of browsers have those plugins installed. Then web devs see 90%+ availability for those plugins and start putting other useful non-DRMed content in that format just because. And then we're back to the bad old days of "This website requires Adobe(r) Flash(tm). Click here to install the Flash(tm) plugin." banners everywhere.
Better to put DRM in one standardized plugin that does nothing else. The attack surface is smaller for everyone and the people who want to disable it can, confident that they'll never need to install a fscking plugin just to see whether the 2018 Chevy Whatever is going to have six front-seat cupholders or eight*.
*I have no idea why, but auto manufacturer sites were the absolute worst at requiring 10 megs of Flash to present information that should have been a <table>.
(Score: 1, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday March 22 2017, @04:19PM (1 child)
Then web devs see 90%+ availability for those plugins and start putting other useful non-DRMed content in that format just because.
Soon, all content was DRMed because DRM was ubiquitous and easy. Soon all content was perpetually owned by corporations and only rented to users. Textbooks and knowledge articles were available, but only to those who could pay.
(Score: 2) by WillR on Thursday March 23 2017, @03:44PM
Soon, all content was DRMed because DRM was ubiquitous and easy.
It's about 10 years too late to start worrying about that, Netflix and its associated DRM crap come preloaded on everything from PCs to refrigerators. The question that remains is "do we want to be patching Flash exploits forever, or not?"