Submitted via IRC for boru
Dear Jeff, Tim, and colleagues, In 2013, EFF was disappointed to learn that the W3C had taken on the project of standardizing "Encrypted Media Extensions," an API whose sole function was to provide a first-class role for DRM within the Web browser ecosystem. By doing so, the organization offered the use of its patent pool, its staff support, and its moral authority to the idea that browsers can and should be designed to cede control over key aspects from users to remote parties.
[...] The W3C is a body that ostensibly operates on consensus. Nevertheless, as the coalition in support of a DRM compromise grew and grew — and the large corporate members continued to reject any meaningful compromise — the W3C leadership persisted in treating EME as topic that could be decided by one side of the debate. In essence, a core of EME proponents was able to impose its will on the Consortium, over the wishes of a sizeable group of objectors — and every person who uses the web. The Director decided to personally override every single objection raised by the members, articulating several benefits that EME offered over the DRM that HTML5 had made impossible.
[...] We believe they will regret that choice. Today, the W3C bequeaths an legally unauditable attack-surface to browsers used by billions of people. They give media companies the power to sue or intimidate away those who might re-purpose video for people with disabilities. They side against the archivists who are scrambling to preserve the public record of our era. The W3C process has been abused by companies that made their fortunes by upsetting the established order, and now, thanks to EME, they'll be able to ensure no one ever subjects them to the same innovative pressures.
[...] Effective today, EFF is resigning from the W3C.
Thank you,
Cory Doctorow
Advisory Committee Representative to the W3C for the Electronic Frontier Foundation
Source: https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2017/09/open-letter-w3c-director-ceo-team-and-membership
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday September 19 2017, @02:24AM (7 children)
The standard makes precisely no sense. It requires binary bits that aren't actually included in the standard. The result being that the support will be limited to probably just OSX and Windows. There may be Android and iOS support, but that's not a given.
The result is hardly any better than in the past when there'd be a proprietary 3rd party plugin required for accessing those sites.
(Score: 4, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday September 19 2017, @02:52AM
systemd to the rescue! Yo dawg! Gotta blob for your blob, so now you can blob your blob with your blob!
(Score: 3, Informative) by Wootery on Tuesday September 19 2017, @12:54PM (5 children)
You can watch Netflix on Linux by using Chrome. It uses Google's 'WideVine' proprietary-blob.
Indeed, it's still all about proprietary binary blobs.
On the, uh, upside? Last I checked, Chrome on Linux doesn't prevent video capture, so the whole DRM charade is for nought.
(Score: 2) by Chromium_One on Tuesday September 19 2017, @04:15PM (2 children)
Note that Chromium can use Chrome's widevine plugin too, and Netflix has been working just fine on Firefox on Linux for a while now.
Yeah, DRM in the browser has some major issues, and not just philosophically, but cross-platform support for the most-used browsers is not a problem at this point.
When you live in a sick society, everything you do is wrong.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday September 19 2017, @04:23PM (1 child)
What hardware? x86_64? 32bit? x32? arm? ppc? mips? ppc64? itanium?
(Score: 3, Informative) by Chromium_One on Tuesday September 19 2017, @05:05PM
Getting away from the major hardware platforms, it's gonna get dicey. Support for x86 32 and 64 is a solid yes. Support for arm64 is a solid yes as well. Netflix will play on Chrome on at least some Linux distros Raspberry Pi 3's at the least. Widevine for arm64 has been repackaged for Chromium on some distros, though I haven't personally tested it. As examples, Debian arm64 is one, and same round of quick search shows a third-party answer for Arch Linux.
Oddly enough, widevine exists on itanium (Windows supported, dunno about others).
For ppc/mips, or other browser support ... eh, spent enough time searching on this already. If you really need it, good luck!
When you live in a sick society, everything you do is wrong.
(Score: 2) by jasassin on Wednesday September 20 2017, @11:03PM (1 child)
It's limited to 720p on Netflix. You need IE11 for 1080p or Edge for 4k. :(
jasassin@gmail.com GPG Key ID: 0xE6462C68A9A3DB5A
(Score: 3, Informative) by Wootery on Thursday September 21 2017, @09:02AM
Unless things have changed since I last checked, the best way to watch Netflix from a PC is using the Windows-only Netflix 'app' from the Windows Store -- it supports better surround-sound than any of the web-browsers. (The picture, though, is identical to using IE11/Edge, I believe.)