[gsnedders]

What are they thinking? The majority of the W3C membership want this work done, and the W3C is ultimately bound by its membership. Not working on this isn't an option — take the W3C out of the picture and it'll still be done, quite probably behind closed doors, which is even worse for the web; MS, Apple, and Google are all likely going to ship this whether the W3C specifies this or not; for better or for worse, it is likely to become part of the de-facto Web Platform.

And if you read the lists (as opposed to overly emotional hearsay calling them stupid), you'll realize their concern isn't so much piracy in and of itself (they recognize DRM can and will be broken — they aren't blind), but rather "casual piracy", as it were, ripping a disc having had it lent to you, for example. The aim is to make it sufficiently inconvenient to work-around that that doesn't happen, not that it avoids release on P2P networks and the like.

[duncan_bayne]

Are you sure about that? The majority of the W3C membership is staying pretty quiet about it, at least on the list.

Even if you're right about the requirements (it's hard to say, what with their being confidential and all), is it worth breaking the Open Web to make it slightly harder for folks to pirate TV shows?

And if you're right, why then is every requirement short of non-user-modifiable client components being promptly shot down?

[azakai]

> The majority of the W3C membership is staying pretty quiet about it

As gsnedders said, it doesn't matter. The EME spec is written and pushed by Google and Microsoft, and Apple is on board. Those companies have a strong financial interest to do what hollywood asks here, and together they account for a large majority of the browser market.

The only possible thing that could stop this is pressure on those browser vendors by users of those browsers - which means, for users to stop using them. So far, the public and even here on HN there is little interest in doing that.

[higherpurpose]

I don't think Apple was initially on board. I think it may be there only since late last year.

All of this started with Netflix, and the outrage should be directed mostly at them (but definitely at W3C and the 3 companies, too).

Netflix got Microsoft (obviously, since Hastings is/was on their board), they got Google because of the Chromecast and perhaps some other previous partnerships, and also because Google is very interested in having content these days, which inevitably leads to them supporting the studios' corrupted ways to get the deals. And finally, I guess they got Apple, who saw Google and Microsoft was already on board, and thought it's a done deal, so why not?

I just can't believe that Netflix & Co would rather ruin the web than try to negotiate harder with the studios and make them understand DRM doesn't work, or just get some other kind of deal that's perhaps a little more profitable for the studios. I mean Google managed to give people the same "Match-like" service for free to the users, while Apple charges $25 a year, right? And Apple managed to make their music DRM-free years ago, no?

So I refuse to believe this is the only way around not using Silverlight and nothing can be done about it. There is a way - they just found it much easier to corrupt W3C, and I think this was MPAA's goal from the beginning. MPAA are the people who want to make IPSs all over the world police the web for them (ACTA/TPP), and want to be able to censor the websites they want off the web at will, with no judicial process (SOPA).

So you can only imagine what they have in mind for the browser vendors. Bringing DRM to the web is merely Step 1. Protocols like WebRTC's Data Channels that can make file-sharing easy through the browser, the way https://www.sharefest.me does it? Well, I guess that needs to be banned and discarded now. We can't have such piracy-aiding tools in the browsers, now can we? And so on.

It's clear MPAA runs the show already, if they got W3C, and 3 of the major browser vendors to do what they want. So expect more of this. MPAA member to take over after a "sudden" retiring of Tim Berners Lee from W3C in a couple of years? Wouldn't surprise me at this point.

[eridius]

> I just can't believe that Netflix & Co would rather ruin the web

People keep repeating this. How is it ruining the web to remove the requirement for crappy (and, at this point, end-of-lifed) browser plugins in order to play Netflix content? The only reason I, and I suspect most people, even bothered to install Silverlight was for Netflix. If I can get a pure HTML5 video-watching experience with no browser plugins, and get Netflix content, that is unambiguously a win for users everywhere.

You're acting like DRM didn't exist on the web prior to EME, and would continue not existing without EME. That's flat-out wrong. It existed and continues to exist using proprietary software that is shoved down users' throats.

[duncan_bayne]

But you can't get a pure HTML5 DRM experience! All the HTML5 bit is, is a Javascript API to a CDM decryptor that is every bit as crappy, proprietary, closed-source, insecure and buggy as Flash or Silverlight.

[eridius]

I'm still unclear as to how users are supposed to get the CDM decryptors. Are they installed like browser plugins? Or are OS vendors going to provide built-in ones for other companies to use?

Either way, the actual user experience is going to be a pure HTML5 player. If I have to install something first, that's unfortunate, but once it's installed I'll never have to think about it again, unlike the current situation where I'm confronted with the crappy plugin-based user experience every time I use the site.

[pepr]

Well, at the very least, it's a smaller piece of code :). (Don't get me wrong, I'm very strongly opposed to DRM and HTML5 DRM in particular.)

[fafner]

> How is it ruining the web to remove the requirement for crappy (and, at this point, end-of-lifed) browser plugins in order to play Netflix content?

Because then the Web will rely on proprietary binary crappy blobs in its basic functionality. Something which can't be implemented in an open source way. A plugin like Silverlight is no necessity for the web and if Silverlight is crappy and dying then that's really a problem of its users and Netflix. It shouldn't be my problem as a non-Netflix user. If the Web however starts to depend on such a crappy binary blob (which is the result of the EME proposal) then we all have to suffer and it will be a problem for us all.

In other words: If Netflix insists on DRM then they should write their own crappy plugins and applications but not ruin the open Web for all of us.

> You're acting like DRM didn't exist on the web prior to EME, and would continue not existing without EME.

No, we are not. We are just saying that EME will make the open Web depend on crappy proprietary binary blobs and hence no longer be open or libre.

> It existed and continues to exist using proprietary software that is shoved down users' throats.

EME is exactly that! It's proprietary crap software which is forced down everybody's throat because it makes the former open Web depend on it. It's not only something Netflix customers will have to deal with. It's something every web browser and web implementation has to deal with somehow. Which is impossible for open and libre implementations. Thus it will be the end of the open web.

[fafner]

> I don't think Apple was initially on board. I think it may be there only since late last year.

Didn't Apple already ship an implementation of that API in Maverick?

[gsnedders]

(Disclaimer: I haven't read the lists actively in quite a while, and no longer have access to Member-Only lists.)

There have been votes about whether this is in-scope of the AC. As you can tell by work continuing, the vote passed. How many abstained (explicitly or by not voting)? I cannot remember, and cannot check.

The requirement to merely make it more difficult, but not impossible, has been stated on several occasions. Forgive me for not looking up references for this, but it's almost 4am and I ought to sleep. :)

And they believe, rightly or not, non-user-modifiable client components are needed to make this sufficiently difficult — as otherwise someone could easily make a tool to make it sufficiently easy to violate the licensing terms (assuming, for now, all content is licensed — which is itself questionable; if it's not then in many jurisdictions they cannot place restrictions).

[dannyeff]

We (EFF) raised a formal objection to whether content protection was in-scope for the new HTML WG charter; our objection was overruled by the Director, but there was no vote of the AC.

[duncan_bayne]

Hmmm. I think a vote would be a good start, but as an interested third party I don't think I have any way of encouraging that short of advocacy.

[duncan_bayne]

In which case they're being supportive in private, and utterly quiet in public. That's a neat trick in itself.

But I don't think it's an issue of what they believe, it's an issue of what the actual licensing terms are. Those are the real requirements, and so far they've not been made available.

[gsnedders]

I don't think there's any WG which includes all W3C members — most members simply don't care enough to wish to dedicate resources to every WG, not to mention the extra obligations it makes them take on via the patent policy. The situation isn't at all unusual — just a more contentious subject matter!

[duncan_bayne]

That's true ... but this is a most fundamental issue. I'd have expected that the companies that have benefited historically from the Open Web would be at least a little concerned. Like Google. Oh, wait.

[jdjb]

Google's now got two of their own OS'es (one of which has 85% of the worldwide market on the fastest growing segment of personal computing...) and a leading browser in the desktop space. Whatever caring about an Open Web they had before (when they were at the whims of Microsoft, Apple, other browser makers, etc) is long gone.

[higherpurpose]

> What are they thinking? The majority of the W3C membership want this work done, and the W3C is ultimately bound by its membership.

When they accept organizations like MPAA on their board, no surprise this is the sort of decisions we get, and the sort of decisions we can expect for the web standards from now on.

W3C has been corrupted, and it's only going to get worse for the web if people keep listening to them.

[duncan_bayne]

No, it's perfectly reasonable that the MPAA be allowed membership. It'd be worse if the W3C got to choose who could join.

The issue is the 'crisis of representation' - i.e., some voices are heard more clearly than others.

[Fasebook]

It becomes the defacto standard when it's adopted by developers, it's adopted by developers when their boss hires them to adopt it, they hire people to develop it because they are assured a return on their investment. Why are they assured a return on their investment? Because they decide what the standards are.

It's the same old regulatory capture game since before, but now it's divorced from government support.