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posted by cmn32480 on Friday April 29 2016, @10:03AM   Printer-friendly
from the all-your-videos-are-belong-to-us dept.

The working group that is drafting the W3C's Encrypted Media Extension (EME) specification (aka DRM in HTML5) is baking in language that would allow the DMCA to be invoked despite denials that "EME [is] putting DRM in HTML".

The EME is a set of predefined javascript functions that invoke functions in Content Decryption Modules (CDM) and CDMs are containers for DRM functionality. It's simple and innocuous but how it's worded and what they refuse to define is where the danger lies.

First, the EME is hooked to the DMCA by using very specific legal language: "content protection". One of the people working on the specification freely admits that "it is well-known that the purpose of content protection is not to prevent all unauthorized access to the content (this is impossible)" but despite the fact that it cannot protect the content, the entire working group insists on this very specific language and has refused alternative wording. The reason of course is because "protected content" is the legal term that DRM implementers always use.

Second, the EME is hardware specific by refusing to make a specification for CDMs. By not defining how CDMs are implemented, this leaves it up to each browser author to invent their own. All existing implementations of the CDMs are done using non-portable binary plugins that execute directly on your computer. This means that if a website is using a CDM that isn't ported to your specific browser, OS and architecture, you cannot view the video on that page. So if your computer runs on PowerPC instead of x86 you are out of luck, every site using CDMs will be out of your reach. That's not all, despite having a 4K SmartTV, you can't watch Netflix in 4K because it uses PlayReady 3.0 and it was reveiled last year that PlayReady 3.0 is only for Windows 10 and requires hardware DRM. Specifically it uses an instruction set extension to use a hidden "security processor" which is only in the latest generation of Intel and AMD chips.

All proposed alternatives to the legal language and a legitimate alternative to hardware specific lock-in were rejected by those drafting the EME. After looking into their backgrounds, I found that the group is composed exclusively of Microsoft, Netflix and Google employees.

If you wish to express your concerns, you can still do so on the github issue pages:
Issue #159: Remove all "protection" language
Issue #166: EME specification needs to include a CDM specification


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  • (Score: 2) by tangomargarine on Friday April 29 2016, @01:53PM

    by tangomargarine (667) on Friday April 29 2016, @01:53PM (#338916)

    I'm generally a fan of RMS but that list is so ridiculous that it would be impossible to have a conversation with the guy without being stopped every 3 seconds for him to correct you. And most of the reasons not to use each term are extremely subtle, nitpicky differences anyway. As an example:

    “SaaS” or “Software as a Service”

    We used to say that SaaS (short for “Software as a Service”) is an injustice, but then we found that there was a lot of variation in people's understanding of which activities count as SaaS. So we switched to a new term, “Service as a Software Substitute” or “SaaSS.” This term has two advantages: it wasn't used before, so our definition is the only one, and it explains what the injustice consists of.

    See Who Does That Server Really Serve? for discussion of this issue.

    So basically the same as replacing "cloud" with "cumulus" just because we don't like it? Anyone with half a brain knows that the could isn't something to blindly trust. I don't see how replacing the term with a very slightly different one that nobody will be able to remember helps remind us of anything but the urge to punch people who insist on it.

    it wasn't used before, so our definition is the only one

    Invented here, so better!

    and it explains what the injustice consists of

    It really doesn't.

    --
    "Is that really true?" "I just spent the last hour telling you to think for yourself! Didn't you hear anything I said?"
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  • (Score: 2) by tangomargarine on Friday April 29 2016, @01:57PM

    by tangomargarine (667) on Friday April 29 2016, @01:57PM (#338919)

    knows that the cloud

    God, I'm on some sort of typo rampage lately. Don't know what's going on :P

    --
    "Is that really true?" "I just spent the last hour telling you to think for yourself! Didn't you hear anything I said?"
    • (Score: 3, Funny) by maxwell demon on Friday April 29 2016, @03:45PM

      by maxwell demon (1608) on Friday April 29 2016, @03:45PM (#338990) Journal

      Maybe that Spelling as a Service offering wasn't as good as you thought? ;-)

      --
      The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
      • (Score: 3, Funny) by JNCF on Friday April 29 2016, @05:56PM

        by JNCF (4317) on Friday April 29 2016, @05:56PM (#339070) Journal

        Service as a Spelling Substitute, you mean.

  • (Score: 4, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Friday April 29 2016, @01:58PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Friday April 29 2016, @01:58PM (#338921)

    I'm generally a fan of RMS but that list is so ridiculous that it would be impossible to have a conversation with the guy without being stopped every 3 seconds for him to correct you. And most of the reasons not to use each term are extremely subtle, nitpicky differences anyway.

    I don't think they're nitpicky. Corporations have pushed these buzzwords and confusing language upon us, usually with the intent to deceive. It's important to fight back against faulty assumptions, confusing terminology, and outright lies.

  • (Score: 2) by fritsd on Friday April 29 2016, @02:06PM

    by fritsd (4586) on Friday April 29 2016, @02:06PM (#338928) Journal

    So basically the same as replacing "cloud" with "cumulus" just because we don't like it? Anyone with half a brain knows that the could isn't something to blindly trust.

    (I'm sure you meant "cloud" instead of "could")

    Not everyone knows, and I can prove it to you: if everyone had thought about what "the cloud" meant, then this wouldn't have been funny:

    https://xkcd.com/908/ (The Cloud) [xkcd.com]

    I LOLed, I believe I've half a brain (didn't dare to ask my wife to check), ergo not everyone with half a brain has thought about the physical backing of the nebulous "The Cloud" concept.

    • (Score: 2) by tangomargarine on Friday April 29 2016, @02:31PM

      by tangomargarine (667) on Friday April 29 2016, @02:31PM (#338944)

      A) For the purposes of this discussion I'm considering all the marketeers and salespeople who sell The Cloud to not have half a brain.
      B) I don't follow why thinking the joke is funny requires you to not understand The Cloud.

      --
      "Is that really true?" "I just spent the last hour telling you to think for yourself! Didn't you hear anything I said?"
      • (Score: 2) by fritsd on Friday April 29 2016, @05:12PM

        by fritsd (4586) on Friday April 29 2016, @05:12PM (#339038) Journal

        A) fair enough

        B) I don't follow why thinking the joke is funny requires you to not understand The Cloud.

        well, in my personal case, i haven't had very much dealings with The Cloud yet.
        So, I just hadn't thought about what it all means, when I read the XKCD cartoon and laughed and a little lamp went on above my head. It *IS* somewhere, in someone's basement or datacenter.

        Probably more robust than that, replicated, and with multi-continent failover, etc. etc., but as customer you can't tell if a cloud provider saved on all that expensive stuff by not doing it because "it hardly ever goes wrong anyway".

  • (Score: 3, Informative) by mcgrew on Friday April 29 2016, @03:16PM

    by mcgrew (701) <publish@mcgrewbooks.com> on Friday April 29 2016, @03:16PM (#338975) Homepage Journal

    I disagree with a lot of that page, but not the part the AC linked. Copyright is an author's and publisher's legal protection. Saying "protected content" is a disingenuous way of saying "under copyright".

    --
    mcgrewbooks.com mcgrew.info nooze.org
  • (Score: 3, Insightful) by Zz9zZ on Friday April 29 2016, @06:58PM

    by Zz9zZ (1348) on Friday April 29 2016, @06:58PM (#339102)

    It signifies the difference between owning a movie and subscribing to a pay-per-view service. Instead of owning software that could works for decades we are being pushed into subscription services, with the measly benefit of using their servers for storage. Cloud services could easily be replaced with personal clouds, its not like it would be hard to code "use our cloud service, or specify your own location". SaaS is rent-seeking bullshit with a convenience factor that magically opens wallets of people who don't know better or who have no choice.

    That said, there are legitimate cloud services. The easy litmus test is: could it run on your computer without an internet connection?

    --
    ~Tilting at windmills~